Havana Restaurant #2

GABRIEL O.

Reviews
Written: 1

I totally agree with the former, I grew up in Miami,Florida, my family is from Cuba, I grew up eating Cuban food my whole life. I moved up to Greenville,SC in 2007 so it's been a while since I've eaten at a Cuban restaraunt. This past weekend we decided to drive to Asheville to check out the City. As we walked around the Downtown area we ran into this place that called itself Havanna's. We decided to give it a try. When we first took a look at the menu, I already knew we've been fooled. A few things, NO CUBAN BREAD!!!!!, thats like eating at a Mexican restaraunt that doesn't have tortillas. NO PAN CON BISTEC!!, NO PALOMILLA STEAK!!, BLACK BEANS WITH YELLOW RICE!!!, ARE YOU KIDDING ME. Everything is served with chips n salsa, my wife had a Tamal, that tasted like an Arepa. Please, if you are going to name the place Havannas and say that you serve authentic Cuban Cuisine, do a little more research because this is so not Cuban. My suggestion, CHANGE THE NAME.

ericar

Reviews
Written: 2

I've been to this restaurant a few times and I absolutely love it! I'm not cuban, and I'm not from a very cuban area, like miami, so I can't say if it's "authentic" or not, but I've always had declicious food there. No complaints whatsoever. The servers are always very nice, and the owners are really sweet people. It's a man and his wife. The wife is white, the husband is Cuban, not Colombian like the server told the previous reviewer.
I've had the Cuban Sandwich and also the platter with a little bit of everything.
Both were delicious. Also, the chips and salsa are soooooo good. They are freshly home-made chips and the salsa is very fresh as well.
It's definately worth it!

NCcuban

Reviews
Written: 1

Sadly, this is a very poor attempt at Cuban food. The staff is extremely friendly from the moment you walk in, but the food is surprisingly dissapointing. Maybe I'm a bit picky, but as a Cuban who grew up and lived in Miami for 25 years, I know my Cuban food. From the moment our group set eyes on the menu we could tell that this would not be authentic.

The "Ropa Vieja", a very traditional Cuban dish, was probably the best thing anyone in our group had, but it was somewhat dry; it could have used a little more tomato sauce and garlic.

For the the Cuban sandwich they use a very wet shredded pork--that does NOT belong in a traditional "Sandwich Cubano". It should be sliced, roasted pork. If you've ever had a REAL Sandwich Cubano you know what I'm talking about.

The fried plantains were waaay too green and should have been used for "tostones" or mariquitas (plaintain chips). They should let the plantains ripen so that they are sweet when fried.

We expected the yucca to be traditional Cuban yuca with mojo (an AWESOME garlic/lime sauce), but instead got yucca fries. That said, the yucca fries were VERY good.

The empanada that comes with the sampler plate is stuffed with cheese (absolutely NOT Cuban) and was not particularly tasty. The dough was very good, although a bit over-fried, and it was difficult to taste it because of the cheese. They also have ground beef empanadas (much more traditional Cuban fare), but we did not try them.

In conclusion, according to one of the servers the owner is Colombian. Maybe he should either stick to Colombian food (some patacones with a little garlic aioli for dipping would have been great), or get an experienced Cuban cook. I would almost bet my life that the person who cooked our food is NOT Cuban, and we could tell.

We were visiting from Raleigh and are not familiar with Asheville, but the location seems awesome. Unfortunately, the food at this restaurant does not do its location--or Cuban food in general--justice.