Is the Cuban Sandwich Even Cuban?

In Havana, one bite turned into a story—far more layered than pork and pickles.

The first Cuban sandwich I found in Havana: slim, pressed, and full of questions—with tomato purée where mustard should’ve been. Photo: Diana Pérez

There’s something meta about ordering a Cuban sandwich in Cuba. Not Matrix-style meta but food meta, the kind where you bite into a sandwich that shares a name with the country you’re standing in and suddenly wonder which came first—and which one’s a copy.

An Impromptu Pilgrimage

I’d always wanted to visit Cuba. After a summer as hot as Hades at the USA Pavilion at Expo Milano in 2015, I came across an Aeroméxico travel agency in Mexico City, a relic like the nearby Templo Mayor. On a lark, I booked my ticket for Havana departing two days later, relying on my sense of adventure and La Virgen de Guadalupe. Back home, I called the first casa particular I could find online. Though there were no available rooms, the owner assured me he’d find accommodations upon my arrival, thanks to his personal network of casas particulares.

Since the trip was impromptu, my to-eat list was scribbled on the fly—literally—on a cocktail napkin as we flew over the Gulf of Mexico. On it, was a pasticcio of Sino-Caribbean flavors: arroz frito, vaca frita, and of course, ropa vieja. All dishes I’d had at La Caridad, a Chinese-Cuban restaurant on the Upper West Side that was a perennial family favorite.

Naturally, drinks also made the list: Havana Club, Cuba Libre, daiquiri, mojito—cocktail delights that once turned the island into a garden of earthly pleasures. Some would say those pleasures came at a cost, one the Cuban Revolution sought to remedy. Either way, any serious journey to Cuba requires understanding the terroir.

The Sandwich I Forgot

Bizarrely, not until the third or fourth day walking the streets of Havana did I remember Cuban sandwiches. It seemed absurd to overlook such an obvious Cuban food—I mean, it’s in the name. From then on, I dared myself to try as many Cuban sandwiches as possible for the remainder of my sojourn, assuming it was in the Cuban culinary canon.

Yet the space between listing a food and eating it is occupied by the hunt for the dish. Where would a Cuban sandwich be? Rather than search through tourism-board approved eateries (paladares wouldn’t dare serve them, I thought), I decided to sneak into as many locals-only cafeterias as I could.

Where the Tourists Aren’t

Reality hits like a blast of hot air on the hottest summer day when you pierce through the romantic haze in Havana. No amount of preparation softens the starkness of a real cafeteria in La Habana.

Havana—and Cuba, for that matter—felt like two different places. One was for tourists, with its own currency back then: the peso cubano convertible (CUC), favored in the old town, La Habana Vieja, with its curated attractions, hotels, bars, and restaurants. Then there was La Habana, where Cubans lived and paid in pesos cubanos (CUP) for rations in bodegas lined with just enough canned goods and a few gleaming bottles of yellow cooking oil. Bananas and rice were weighed on grocers’ scales—the kind that required a counterweight, proof that in Cuba, even rice must be earned by balance.

As a native Spanish speaker, I tried to blend into spaces that were implicitly verboten to foreigners—cafeterias included. Cuisine is culture—and the dishes I sought predated the revolution yet stood in sharp contrast to its legacy. A note: In Cuba, the revolution is still spoken of in the present tense, unlike how it’s framed in the U.S.

Where the Cubanos Weren’t

Inside that first cafeteria, I didn’t see a single Cuban sandwich on the menu. Instead, I watched a man bite into an emparedado—two slices of limp white bread holding a forgettable mix of cold cuts. Scanning the room, there wasn’t a shred of mojo-marinated pork or a mustard-slicked pickle in sight. I clung to the illusion that I blended in and didn’t want to shatter it by asking for a Cuban sandwich—that would’ve instantly outed me as a tourist. I mean, if you’re in Cuba, is it even called a Cuban sandwich? Or just... sangwich?

If Cubans weren’t eating them, then where were the Cubanos—the sandwiches—hiding? I walked along Boulevard San Rafael and ducked into a food shop. “Oiga, acaso tienen sangwiches... cubanos?” “By the way, do you have Cuban... sandwiches?” I asked, trying to sound casual—but for the slight pause before “cubanos,” a hesitation I couldn’t hide. The woman behind the counter looked me up and down, hesitated, then nodded. “Sí.” “Bueno, me da uno, por fa?” “Great. May I have one, please,” I replied in my Mexican syntax, a quiet tell. Back then, Cuba’s dual currency system made for a messy transaction—two economies, two exchange rates, and one confused visitor. (They’ve since merged into a single peso cubano.) I don’t remember the price, only that it was far more than she would’ve charged a local.

The sandwich she handed me was slim and pressed—more Hot Pocket than Cubano. Was this really it? The baguette-style bread held a layer of tomato purée, unexpected but not unpleasant. Still, the core flavors were there: juicy pork, a trace of sour orange, a breath of cumin with oregano, a swipe of sharp mustard. But the pickles? Tart, not briny—sliced cucumbers, still crisp and fresh, the telltale sign of a quick pickle. The sliced ham was there. And yet… something was off. Familiar, but foreign. A remix of a memory.

The Search for Truth Between the Bread

What is a Cuban sandwich? I walked to a nearby park with public Wi-Fi in search of answers. Sitting next to locals texting, chatting, and enjoying music in that warm autumn sunset, I dug into the history of the Cuban sandwich. What I discovered was a tangle of tales, with Miami and Tampa competing for the title of birthplace of the Cuban sandwich. Wait—so the Cuban sandwich isn’t Cuban? That made me want to try the Cuban versions even more. But then, why is it on menus in Havana if it wasn’t Cuban? Make that make sense. I’ll wait.

So, what exactly is a Cuban sandwich? A pressed pork-and-ham classic born in Florida? A Cubano-for-export? Or something older—something that started in Cuba, long before we started stacking nationalities on sandwiches? I had questions. I still do. And what I found suggests we’ve been slicing this story from the wrong end. The more I looked, the more it unraveled—across the Straits of Florida, in English and Spanish. And like so many things in diaspora, the answer isn’t simple. But I found a trail (as usual) and it starts not in Tampa or Miami… but in print. I thought I knew the story. The research said otherwise. More in Part 2.