Showing 1-7 of 7 results
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Café del Oriente
You'll have to pinch yourself to remember you're still in Cuba when you enter the confusingly named Café del Oriente restaurant. Firstly there's the fancy decor, which includes marble floors, mahogany paneling, a resident pianist (or string quartet) and powerful air-con. Then there's the menu, a culinary bonanza of smoked salmon, caviar, goose-liver pâté, lobster thermidor, pepper steak, cheese and port. To top it all, service comes in a tux.
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Paladar Decameron
Ugly from the outside but far prettier within, the Decameron is an intimate Italian restaurant where you can order from the varied menu with abandon. Veggie pizza, lasagna bolognese, a sinful calabaza (pumpkinlike squash) soup - it's all good. There's a decent wine selection and vegetarians will find heavenly options. Figure on around 10.00 to 12.00 per person.
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Paladar Le Chansonnier
A great place to dine if a) you can find it (there's no sign), and b) it's open (best to phone ahead to check). Hidden in an elegant dining room in a faded mansion-turned-paladar, the French theme extends beyond its name to the wine, furniture and cuisine. Specialties include rabbit in red-wine sauce, chicken smothered in mushrooms, Dijon pork chop, and huge salads for herbivores. It's also one of Habana's few truly gay-friendly establishments.
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Prado Y Neptuno
The pizza at this Italian-themed restaurant is not nearly Habana's best although, judging by the crowds, you'd think the cooks were native Neapolitans. With its comfortable decor characterized by dark tinted windows, colorful tiles and green ceiling lamps that hang low over the individual tables, the P & N is a good place to escape the hotel buffet for a night. There's a good selection of Italian wines in the bar.
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Restaurante El Castillo De Farnés
Advertising itself as a Spanish-orientated restaurant (it was founded by a Catalan), El Castillo de Farnés has average food, with house specialties such as chickpeas and chorizo lacking bite; suffice to say it's usually busy. The varied seafood menu can be cheap or pricey depending on your taste. Next door, the sidewalk bar that sits alongside traffic-choked Av de Bélgica is OK for a beer, although the car fumes can sometimes be asphyxiating.
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Restaurante La Paella
The theme of this classic Habaguanex restaurant is that great Valencian gift to the culinary world - paella. Though popular elsewhere in Habana, the Spanish rice concoctions here are generally considered to be the city's best, and come in six different varieties. Decorated with plenty of Mediterranean greens and yellows, and continuing the old-world Spanish theme that characterizes the adjoining hotel, the restaurant has a very special ambience.
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Trattoría Marakas
Don't be put off by the cheap Formica tables and the dodgy map of Italy on the wall; real olive oil, parmesan and mozzarella cheese, plus a wood oven, mean that the pizza in this Italian trattoria is among the city's best. Also on offer are Greek salads, tortellini with red sauce, and spinach-stuffed cannelloni; the menu is long and few items are over 8.00 .
Showing 1-7 of 7 results
