This little Havana could use a lot more spice
La Bodeguita del Mediopl. Zbawiciela 5Hours: 11:30 a.m. - last guestTelephone 825-3824Reservations and credit cards accepted
It has given the world mambo, Havana cigars and the Mojito cocktail.
Fidel Castro calls its shores home as did American author, Ernest Hemingway, who lived there for almost 20 years. These days, it's the octogenarian members of the Buena Vista Social Club who are beating Cuba's timbales around the world.
But what of this Caribbean country's cuisine? I cannot name a single Cuban dish. I could hazard a guess at something with seafood and perhaps bananas or even a dubious nouvelle fusion of the two but that would be stretching my culinary imagination.
I asked a colleague who traveled to this island's balmy shores about five years ago.
"The food's rubbish," was his dismissive reply. A strapping, rugby-loving lad, he went on to tell me that visiting Cuba not the wealthiest of nations was the best diet he ever went on, and that after spending 10 days there, he left significantly lighter.
So it was that I visited Poland's first (and only) Cuban restaurant, La Bodeguita del Medio, none the wiser. It opened just this month in a great spot on plac Zbawiciela where the Planet Music nightclub used to be a place of dubious quality that once earned a listing in the infamous "Box of Pain" section of our sister publication, the Insider.
But times have changed. The street level of La Bodeguita del Medio (the bar area) looked warm and friendly with a few guests propping up the place not bad for a Tuesday night. The restaurant is housed in the cavernous downstairs, but I liked what I saw colonnades and whitewashed walls that were covered in Spanish and Polish graffiti (well-wishes to the owners and the ubiquitous "I was here" scrawls, obviously from guests at the opening-night party). The furniture was rustic Poland-does-Spanish leather and timber, and framed photos of wonderful Cuban scenes were everywhere.
There was a stage and dance floor, and even a disco ball hanging from the ceiling that makes me wonder if this place turns into a heaving mass of mambo movers and shakers on the weekends. But what do they dance to, I wondered. My question was answered on cue with the appearance of a Cuban trio. They play at the restaurant every night of the week, wandering around, serenading diners, or playing lively salsa. I really enjoyed the music, and it put me in the mood for some Cuban food or so I thought.
La Bodeguita del Medio, as I discovered from the self-promotional blurb printed on our paper place mats, is another Cuban export, with restaurants around the world. The original opened in Havana in the 1940s. Ernest Hemingway dined there, as have Errol Flynn, Nat King Cole and Naomi Campbell. They all left behind some wall graffiti something of a restaurant tradition. And now you can dine at "La B del M" in California, Rome, Paris even in Muscat ... and of course, Warsaw.
What I also discovered is that Cuban cuisine is kind of a Mexican/Spanish/Creole mixture, containing plenty of beans, pork, chicken and rice with the occasional plantain thrown in for good measure. As my colleague had warned me, Cuban food is certainly nothing to rave about, but it's something different for your palate.
Cuban cuisine seems to come into its own when the cocktails arrive, and this restaurant has a great selection, including the Mojito a blend of white rum, soda, lemon juice, mint and sugar or another refreshing rum number, the Ernest Hemingway.
Thankfully the menu was in English, Polish and Spanish. I ordered the Sopa de Mariscos Caibarien (or Caribbean Seafood Soup) and David the Alitas de Pollo good ol' chicken wings, cooked in a pepper and garlic sauce and heaped with fried onions. As chicken wings go, David assures me they were O.K. The soup was too salty for my liking and filled with mussels probably my least favorite sea creature.
My main dish, Ropa Vieja, was a plate of shredded, fried beef in a sauce of tomatoes, garlic and spices. It came with rice and some lukewarm steamed vegetables. The meat was tasty and the sauce reminiscent of stroganoff, but it was a little on the chewy side.
David's Butifarras del Congo con Salsita was something a bit different little grilled Cuban white sausages with a hot, sweet sauce. It came with rice, and those same lukewarm vegetables. Like my main dish, it was competent, but failed to live up to my exotic Cuban dreams.
Mid-dinner, the Cuban trio came toward our table: "Would you like us to play for you?" asked the guitarist.
David and I cast each other a doubtful look. "No, that's O.K.," I answered. I remember being serenaded once at a seaside restaurant on the Mexican coast and it was wonderful. But somehow, in the bowels of a Cuban restaurant in downtown Warsaw, it didn't feel quite the same. Instead, I negotiated the dessert menu. It was filled with familiar things like French toast and rice pudding, but seeking something more Cuban, I ordered a Platanos Tentacion al Ron a banana fried in rum and spices. It was warm and sweet and lusciously simple.
"Next time you should try the bread pudding," suggested the waitress. I wondered if there would be a next time. La Bodeguita del Medio had left me pondering over the culinary high points of Cuban cuisine, but this place is brand new and I'm always willing to try something again. Hopefully within a few months, it will be more mambo than mediocre. And besides, the music and cocktails are too good. The restaurant has a great outdoor area on the plac, so hopefully, come summer, La B del M will feel more like what I imagine Cuba to be like.
Dinner for two, not including drinks or VAT, came to zl. 99 ($24).
From the menu:
Sopa de Mariscozl.14Alitas de pollozl.14Butifarra Congozl.26Ropa Viejazl.29Platanos al ronzl.16Mojito cocktailzl.13Ernest Hemingway cocktailzl.18
