The short answer
Cuban food is the home cooking of Cuba, built on Spanish, African and Caribbean roots. Its best known dishes include ropa vieja (shredded braised beef), moros y cristianos (rice cooked with black beans), lechon asado (garlic and citrus roast pork), and the Cuban sandwich. Plantain in its two forms, savoury tostones and sweet maduros, and starchy yuca con mojo round out most meals, usually followed by flan and a small, strong Cuban coffee.
What to remember
- Cuban cooking is comfort food at heart: slow braises, garlicky roasts, rice and beans, and plenty of plantain.
- Its flavour comes from a blend of Spanish technique, West African ingredients and Caribbean produce, which is why it feels familiar to anyone who loves African or Caribbean food.
- The holy trinity of the kitchen is sofrito, a slow-cooked base of onion, garlic, peppers and cumin that flavours almost everything.
- Sour orange, garlic and oregano make up mojo, the marinade and sauce that gives lechon asado and yuca their signature tang.
- Most of what you need, from black beans and plantain to yuca and Cuban style coffee, you can pick up at African and Caribbean food shops across the UK.
There is a reason Cuban food feels like a warm welcome. In Cuban homes the kitchen is the loudest room in the house, and a meal is rarely just about eating. The slow roast of lechon asado on Nochebuena, the pot of black beans left quietly bubbling, the little cup of sweet coffee passed round after lunch, these are the rhythms that hold a family together. Much of that spirit came across the Atlantic with West Africans who carried their cooking into a new land, and it grew alongside Spanish tradition and Caribbean produce into something Cuba can call its own. When you cook ropa vieja or fry a pan of sweet maduros, you are stepping into a table that has always been about generosity, patience and gathering people close. That instinct, feeding the people you love without fuss, is exactly what ties Cuban cooking to the African and Caribbean food traditions we care about.
What is cuban food?
Cuban food is honest, generous home cooking. It leans on a handful of humble ingredients, rice, beans, pork, plantain and root vegetables, and lifts them with garlic, cumin, oregano and sour citrus. There is not much heat from chilli; the warmth comes from long, slow cooking and a base called sofrito. You will taste the same instinct for slow braises and starchy sides that runs through much of the wider Caribbean, which is where Cuba belongs on the map of flavour. If you already love Caribbean food, Cuban cooking will feel like a close cousin.
The roots of the flower
Cuba sits at a crossroads, and its food tells that story. The Spanish brought pork, rice, citrus, cumin and the technique of the slow braise. Enslaved West Africans, brought to the island to work the sugar plantations, shaped the everyday table just as deeply, bringing plantain, root vegetables and the frying, mashing and one-pot methods that hold the cooking together. The Caribbean itself supplied the produce, the black beans, the tropical fruit and the yuca. Put those three threads together and you get a cuisine that is unmistakably its own, yet shares a kitchen with the food of West Africa and the islands. That shared heritage is exactly why the ingredients cross over so neatly with Jamaican food and West African cooking.
Ropa vieja
Often called Cuba's national dish, ropa vieja means old clothes, a nod to the shredded, tattered look of the beef. Flank or skirt steak is simmered until tender, then torn into strands and braised in a sofrito of onion, pepper, garlic, tomato, cumin and a splash of wine. The result is soft, savoury and deeply comforting, served over white rice. It is the dish most people fall for first.
Moros y cristianos
Moros y cristianos, Moors and Christians, is black beans and rice cooked together in one pot so the grains take on the dark colour and earthy flavour of the beans. The name is an old reference to medieval Spain, and the dish is the backbone of the Cuban plate. When the beans and rice are cooked separately and served side by side, it is often called arroz con frijoles. Either way, it is the side that turns up at almost every meal.
Lechon asado
Lechon asado is Cuba's celebration roast: pork shoulder or a whole suckling pig marinated overnight in mojo, that punchy blend of sour orange, garlic, oregano and cumin, then slow roasted until the meat pulls apart and the skin crackles. It is the centrepiece of Christmas Eve, Nochebuena, and family gatherings, the kind of dish a whole household plans a day around.
Picadillo
Picadillo is Cuban comfort in a bowl: minced beef cooked down in sofrito with tomato, then given its signature sweet and salty character by olives, capers and raisins. It is quick, thrifty and endlessly useful, spooned over rice, tucked into stuffed peppers or used as a filling. Ask a Cuban about the food they grew up eating on a weeknight and picadillo will come up.
The cuban sandwich
The Cuban sandwich, or cubano, is a product of the Cuban communities of Florida as much as the island itself, but it is beloved on both sides. Roast pork, ham, Swiss cheese, mustard and pickles are layered into soft Cuban bread, then pressed flat and toasted until the cheese melts and the crust turns golden. It is proof of how Cuban flavours travelled and put down new roots.
Tostones and maduros
Plantain appears in two guises, and Cubans love both. Tostones are made from green, unripe plantain, sliced, fried, flattened and fried again until crisp and savoury, perfect for dipping in mojo. Maduros use ripe, blackened plantain, fried slowly until the sugars caramelise into soft, sweet, almost sticky pieces. One dish, two completely different pleasures, and a staple you will recognise from West African and Caribbean tables alike.
Yuca con mojo
Yuca con mojo is boiled cassava dressed in warm garlic and sour orange mojo. The root turns soft and buttery, and the sharp, garlicky sauce cuts straight through it. It is a humble, satisfying side that shows off Cuba's love of starchy roots and its African and Caribbean heritage in a single plate.
Arroz con pollo
Arroz con pollo, chicken with rice, is the Cuban Sunday classic. Chicken is browned, then cooked slowly with rice, sofrito, peppers, peas and often a little beer or saffron for colour, so everything finishes in one fragrant pot. It is the sort of generous, feed-the-family dish that every home cook has their own version of.
Desserts and coffee
Cuban desserts are sweet and simple. Flan, the silky baked custard with a caramel top, is the one everyone knows, a legacy of Spain. You might also meet arroz con leche, a cinnamon-scented rice pudding, or pastelitos, flaky pastries filled with guava and cheese. Then there is the coffee. A cafecito, a tiny cup of strong espresso whipped with sugar into a sweet foam called espuma, is how a Cuban meal ends and how the afternoon restarts. It is less a drink than a ritual.
Where to find cuban food in the UK
Dedicated Cuban restaurants are still few in the UK, but the ingredients are very much here. The black beans, plantain, yuca, sour orange, cumin and Cuban style coffee that Cuban cooking depends on are the same staples stocked by African and Caribbean food shops up and down the country, because so much of the pantry overlaps. If you are cooking a braise or a roast at home, your nearest Caribbean grocer will almost certainly have what you need. To find one close to you, browse Caribbean food stores near you, and if you would rather someone else did the cooking, look through African and Caribbean restaurants near you to see what is on offer in your area.
Frequently asked questions
What is the most famous Cuban dish?
Ropa vieja is the one most people name first. It is shredded beef slowly braised in a garlicky tomato and pepper base and served over rice, and it is often treated as Cuba's national dish. Lechon asado, the citrus and garlic roast pork, runs it a close second, especially at celebrations.
Is Cuban food spicy?
Not usually. Cuban cooking is built on garlic, cumin, oregano and sour citrus rather than chilli heat. The flavour comes from slow cooking and from sofrito, the onion, pepper and garlic base, so the food is savoury and aromatic rather than hot.
Is Cuban food the same as other Caribbean food?
It belongs to the same family and shares many ingredients, plantain, rice and beans, root vegetables, but it has its own character. Cuban food carries a stronger Spanish influence, milder spicing and its own signatures like the citrus mojo marinade, while sharing deep African and Caribbean roots with its island neighbours.
Can I buy Cuban ingredients in the UK?
Yes. The core pantry, black beans, plantain, yuca, cumin, sour orange and Cuban style coffee, overlaps heavily with what African and Caribbean food shops already stock. Your nearest Caribbean grocer is the easiest place to gather what you need for a Cuban meal. African Stores lists African and Caribbean food shops across the UK, so you can find one near you.
What do Cubans drink with a meal?
A meal often ends with a cafecito, a tiny cup of very strong, sweet Cuban coffee. It is a small ritual rather than just a drink, shared after lunch or to see friends off, and it is as much a part of the table as the food.
