Haitian Mural at New Florida Bakery TAKE FOOD FURTHER
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PHOTOS AND STORY BY LIZ GROSSMAN Haitian mural at New Florida Bakery TAKE FOOD FURTHER. 50 plate THE CARIBBEAN ISSUE spotlightmiami Street-side cigars in Chef Alfred Kong at Little Havana Jamaica Kitchen CUBAN, HAITIAN AND JAMAICAN-CHINESE DISHES SHARE A HOME IN SOUTH FLORIDA John Viera’s portrait of Celia Roast chicken at Cruz inside Azucar Ice Cream Sango’s Company in Little Havana IF THE DENSE, TROPICAL AIR AND INTENSE SUN DON’T DO IT, a drive through the Miami neighborhoods where Spanish, Creole and even Hakka are still spoken will transport you to the Caribbean. Make your way down Little Havana’s Calle Ocho, past the ladies with tobacco-stained fingers rolling cigars and men slapping down dominoes on park tables to landmark restaurants like Versailles, La Carreta and El Exquisito—which still serves Cuban coffee and pastries from the original ventanita (window) once marked by a makeshift wooden sign. North of downtown in the more subdued Little Haiti, you’ll find bright murals (like those inside the pop- ular-with-the-tourists Tap Tap) and Haitian flags painted on the sun-drenched façades of Lakay Tropical Ice Cream and New Florida FOR RECIPES AND MORE, VISIT plateonline.com JULY/AUGUST 2017 plate 51 spotlightmiami Menecier de guayaba destapado at Versailles Empanadas at El Exquisito Bakery, where locals line up for savory One of the first groups to immigrate to American-Jewish or American- pate (patties), hearty breads and corn to Miami were Bahamians, who arrived Chinese, so that care about eating shakes. And in nondescript strip malls via boats and rafts in the early 1800s. locally was lost,” says Baca. Even areas south of downtown, you’ll spot perhaps “They not only brought ingredients from like Little Havana evolved; Bahamians the most interesting mash-up of all— the Bahamas, but recognized products were actually there first, followed by a Jamaican-Chinese restaurants opened already in existence, and set that food kosher community. “Now other Latin by immigrants of Chinese heritage who movement forward to teach people from American countries are coming, and it’s found their way to Florida via Jamaica. the north how to use these products becoming less Cuban,” says Baca. “Each Yet, “a lot of that Caribbean flair got lost and deal with the soil. People coming to time a new group comes in, they change in translation, because Miami likes to kill Florida didn’t even know what a mango a neighborhood or part of Miami and its history a bit,” says Miami food histo- was,” Baca explains. Besides mangos, the way people eat. And in that process, rian Mandy Baca, author of The Sizzling they cooked with Rangpur limes, sour- cuisines get lost.” History of Miami Cuisine. “I hate to say it, sop, Jamaican apples and other fruits but it’s sort of true—that’s why the cui- indigenous to the South Florida swamp- CALLE OCHO CULTURE sine in some of the iconic places hasn’t land. But as other cultures migrated to While Little Havana may not be as sat- changed much,” she continues. “Every Florida in the 1900s, the bounty of the urated with Cubans as it was in the time a new culture comes in, it’s not like in tropical terroir was overshadowed by 1960s, when exiles arrived to work in other cities where the culture assimilates. Americanized versions of these trans- warehouses and settled in the afford- Here, it doesn’t mix with the cultures planted cuisines. “[The cuisine] was all able area near downtown, a visit to some already there.” about the land, but it started to change of the original restaurants reveals that TAKE FOOD FURTHER. 52 plate THE CARIBBEAN ISSUE spotlightmiami “just enough to fill you up and still let you sleep at night.” Hernandez embraces classic dishes but laments that Cuban cuisine “has lost a lot of its traditional cooking along the way when people migrated out of there. I think that hurt them a lot.” Cuban food was influenced by Spanish, African and Taino Indian cultures, and those flavors made their way to Miami with the immigrants who fled Cuba when Fidel Castro took over Cuba in 1959. “Most of our ingre- dients come from the island, like sour oranges for mojo and mamey,” Hernandez notes. “We cook with cumin, bay leaves, red and green peppers, saffron, things derived from Spain and Africa. We don’t cook with chilies or jalapeños. We don’t do spice, we do flavor. We eat a lot of Cuban sweet potato, okra, papayas, dragon fruit and cassava—things already grown here in South Florida.” Just a few years before El Exquisito opened, another café was already serving Cuban coffee, sandwiches and pastries out of a window on Calle Ocho. Nicole Whole fish at El Exquisito Valls’ grandfather arrived in Miami as an exile in 1961, and turned his espres- so-machine import business into a café “OTHER HISPANIC IMMIGRANTS THAT COME TO THE he called Versailles for the etched glass U.S. TRY TO ASSIMILATE, BUT CUBANS STUCK WITH mirrors on the walls. Now a Little Havana THEIR FOOD, CULTURE, LANGUAGE AND MUSIC. landmark, the café is known as a meeting That’s why when you come here, everyone speaks Spanish. It stayed as a little mini Cuba.” place for political discussions and press —Nicole Valls, Versailles conferences, and has been a historic stop for Cuban musicians like the late Celia Cuban food culture is alive and well. almost like a speakeasy, which is what Cruz and Tito Puente (more recent visits Having grown up in the once rough-and- people liked,” says Hernandez. Today, have been paid by Pitbull and Beyoncé). tumble neighborhood, Alex Hernandez, the ventanita sees a stream of locals and A crowd hovers around the massive pas- the owner of El Exquisito, remembers tourists (Gordon Ramsay was recently try case bursting with guava and cream what the diner was like when it opened spotted filming outside) stopping by cheese pastelitos, croquetas and bread in 1974. “The original owner, Heliodoro for Cuban coffee and pastelitos, but the pudding, and the menu of classic Cuban Coro, established a nice relationship menu is made up of much of the orig- dishes like codfish fritters, vaca frita de with the exiled community,” Hernandez inal classic Cuban fare, like milanesa pollo (fried shredded chicken) and masitas recalls. “He had a lot of regulars; he was de pollo, lechon, ropa vieja, vaca frita, de puerco fritas (fried pork chunks). “There busy every day.” A sign outside adver- whole fried snapper and the mediano- are a few things you probably didn’t see in tised Cuban sandwiches and coffee, and che, a classic sandwich composed of egg Cuba in the 1960s, like yucca fries and cevi- diners walked through the kitchen to bread, roasted pork, ham, cheese, pick- che—which is more the Peruvian influence get to their tables. “It was very plain, les and mustard that Hernandez says is from Miami,” Valls points out. “We’ll do FOR RECIPES AND MORE, VISIT plateonline.com JULY/AUGUST 2017 plate 53 spotlightmiami Whole fish at Piman Bouk in Little Haiti Argentinian styles of cooking meat, but for Peruvian-, and Cuban- HAITIAN NATION the most part, it’s stayed authentic to how influenced restaurant. “IT CAN TAKE While Little Havana is a it was 40 years ago.” But you’ll also find ham, 45 MINUTES TO tourist attraction, Little The food was kept classic in part chicken and fish croquetas GET YOUR FOOD Haiti is a different story. because the original exiles thought their inspired by her family’s IN HAITIAN Haitian exiles started Florida stay was temporary. “The first wave 40-year-old Cuban restau- RESTAURANTS, arriving to the U.S. in the was people who were able to leave when rant, Islas Canarias, and BECAUSE 1960s, during the regime they realized what was happening in Cuba,” other riffs on updated THEY MAKE of Francois Duvalier. Some says Valls. “They came to Miami thinking Cuban cuisine. “I grew up moved to New York, while EVERYTHING they’d go back once everything died down, on my mom’s traditional others settled in Miami, TO ORDER. but it didn’t. Other Hispanic immigrants Cuban food, so that cui- especially in the ’80s and If they don’t, there’s hell to that come to the U.S. try to assimilate, but sine reminds me of eating pay. Hell hath no fury like ’90s after discrimination Cubans stuck with their food, culture, lan- something homey,” says a disgruntled Haitian who from Jim Crow laws died gets bad food.” guage and music. That’s why when you Andrade, whose grand- down somewhat. But the come here, everyone speaks Spanish. It father owned five restau- — Carlos Olaechea exile community still faced stayed as a little mini Cuba.” rants in Cuba before he discrimination, and “a lot Baca agrees. “They’re still using those migrated with his family to Miami in 1969. of them have this kind of generationally same basic recipes,” she says. “They’re “His favorite dish was fried pork chunks passed down mistrust for those outside rich and complex, and they’re being with mojo. He told me that you’d work of their community,” says Miami food made by everyone with different touches on a farm in Cuba at a certain age and scholar Carlos Olaechea of the area in here and there, but for the most part, you’d get your lunch on a metal tray, so North Miami that isn’t a tourist attraction, they’re the same.” But Hernandez says the we serve it that way with rice, beans and yet can’t help but lure visitors curious younger generation isn’t as hardcore as plantains,” says the chef, who puts her about Haitian food and culture.