Cuba

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Holidays in hot climate countries, such as in Cuba, is the best way to forget about freezing northern snow in Feb. Havana is a beautiful city, full of vintage cars, music, rum, etc. In the local Chinese town, you can easily find people selling little buns with pork on the street (Pic 1). I particularly love the buns because they put crispy pork skins on the meat. If you didn’t notice yet, almost all Chinese love animal skins. Roasted BBQ pork with crispy skin is the dish every Chinese wedding has, not to mention that famous Beijing duck (Crispy BBQ duck skin wrapped in a thin pancake).

Most Cuban street food are deep fried, just like Cuban restaurants serves beans and rice (Pic5 ). I heard all restaurants are state-owned, therefore, the cooking for them just a job. There is no love for food. Unfortunately, it was true for the restaurant I have been to. Meat is often over-cooked and dry; as for vegetables… I don’t have much to say, because simply there aren’t any veggies for most of the dishes. Even at a fancy tourist restaurant, the lobsters and fish are over-cooked (Pic 4). I am not sure if it is a style, but I can’t I enjoyed soft pizza crust, neither the limited topping selection (Pic 6).

The best chicken I had in Cuba was in a mountain village. The meal comes with the coffee -factory tour 1 hour drive from Havana city. The guide told us the villagers had an competition for the best chef, who is cooking for the tourists. The chicken we had was free-ranged in the village and meat is really moisture.

In the village, the guide showed us an interesting plant (pic 8) and warned us Do Not Touch It! The fruit of the plant has a very stinky smell, which will last on your skins for a long time. Nothing can get rid of that smell. Locals are studying the plant because they discovered healing-cancer ability of the fruit.

After one-week of meat diet, I am ready to go home to have a veggie meal (surprise! Even for a meat-lover like me). At my last day in Havana, I discovered a market and surprise to see they do sell green vegetables there. I guess Cubans don’t really like veggies. For the last hours in Havana, I bought some guava fruit (Pic 3) and an interesting looking fruit (Pic 2). At least I thought that was a fruit, since it is sold with other fruits. But it turns out, its bright orange meat tastes like cooked yam. It is not juicy at all; I ended up give it to someone on the street. I don’t remember the fruit / veggies’ name so I can’t really find out what is it. Maybe you can tell me?