Havana Alma de Cuba

We went out for Kevin’s birthday with our good friends Robb, Nellie and Chris to this great little Cuban place. Kevin’s birthday is actually on Monday so this was an early celebration on Friday night allowing us to recover for a few days before having to return to work. The restaurant, a perfect recommendation made by the Lillies, is Havana Alma de Cuba (Soul of Cuba).

Havana is located at 94 Christopher Street between Bleeker and Bedford in the West Village. The offered cuisine is Cuban, Latin and Spanish. Dress code is described as casual with style, but this also describes the atmosphere and décor of Havana. There is live music in the front room and an outdoor courtyard, seating 30 people on warm days. We were seated in the back room, at first it seems you are being lead out the back door but soon realize there is this additional unseen dining room further to the back.

The most popular meal ordered at our table was the Filete de Pargo, a filet of Red Snapper with a crunchy green plantain crust, avocado, and covered in a smooth sofrito sauce. This was delicious, a fried fresh fish that was perfectly breaded for a somewhat reasonable price of $19. Being the only one at the table not following the rules of Lent, I went with the evening special of Filet Mignon served with roasted brussel sprouts and a sweet semi glaze sauce. This was a much larger piece of steak than I’m usually served when ordering a filet, it is actually enough to serve 2. Kevin started his meal with a “Tony Montana” an interesting cocktail made with a combination of gin, cucumber juice, and Tabasco sauce. I’m not sure how much he enjoyed it since he was trying to get everyone else at the table to have some. The rest of the table raved about the pitcher of red wine Sangria.

As Chris and I are looking for the restrooms I tell him my plan of asking the servers to sing Happy Birthday to Kevin and perhaps snag some free cake. His response is “Do you want to embarrass him?” Now that is tempting, but I return to the table intent on leaving embarrassment out of this birthday dinner when one second later I see cake and servers coming to the table. Going through my head, “Oh someone else has already requested this?”, until the cake lands in front of me and I realize that they are in fact singing to me. Lesson learned: after a couple years of marriage it is all a race to see who can embarrass the other person first! We had a wonderful time with our friends at this restaurant and can’t wait to see where we’ll end up together next.