Sarasota’s best Cuban sandwich restaurants: Where to go and what to order
Following my story last month about the best restaurants for fried or baked chicken wings in Sarasota and Bradenton, I shifted my focus to Cubanos ahead of National Cuban Sandwich Day on Aug. 23. Despite the record-breaking heat, I visited numerous Cuban restaurants in recent weeks across Sarasota and Manatee counties. However, this year's list of the best local Cuban sandwiches features only three.
For me, the Cuban sandwich ranks among the most quintessential Florida foods, serving as a delicious embodiment of multiple cultures. Here, I present restaurants that craft flawless Cubanos, brimming with flavor. The first establishment assembles their Cuban sandwiches in the Tampa style, featuring ham, roasted pork, salami, Swiss cheese, pickles, and mustard on pressed Cuban bread. The next two restaurants offer an enticing Miami-style Cubano, employing the same ingredients but omitting the salami.
Now, press play on the positively delightful sounds of the Buena Vista Social Club, maybe mix yourself a Cuba libre, or perhaps light up a Cohiba cigar, and take a few moments to contemplate savoring these authentic Cuban dining experiences found right here in Sarasota.
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Columbia Restaurant
411 St. Armands Circle, Sarasota; 941-388-3987; columbiarestaurant.com
Recognized as the oldest restaurant in Florida, the original Columbia opened in Tampa's Ybor City in 1905. Its charming location on St. Armands Circle, which offers indoor as well as covered sidewalk seating, has been welcoming guests for more than six decades.
“My dad opened a second Columbia Restaurant on St. Armands Circle in 1959,” Richard Gonzmart, fourth-generation “caretaker” of Columbia Restaurant Group, told me in 2017. “He loved Sarasota and Longboat Key.”
In 2021, Food & Wine magazine named the Cubano at Columbia the best sandwich in Florida.
Biting into a warm, freshly pressed Cuban sandwich at Columbia is like traveling back a century in time, to when immigrants were leaving indelible footprints in Florida communities such as Tampa's Ybor City.
"Tampa was like the sandwich, a mixture of cultures and food," Columbia Restaurant once noted on its website. "The Spanish brought the fine ham, the Sicilians the Genoa salami, the Cubans the mojo-marinated roast pork, the Germans and Jews the Swiss cheese, pickle and mustard."
It must also be noted that the brilliance of the sandwich ($14) begins, like all superior sandwiches, with the bread. At Columbia, that means using freshly baked Cuban bread from Tampa's La Segunda Central Bakery, established in 1915. Yes, it's a smartly balanced sandwich, best experienced at the Columbia in St. Armands Circle or one of their other Florida locations, and one that you want to pair with the restaurant's equally appealing, and perhaps equally famous, Original "1905" Salad ($15).
Columbia’s iconic salad, which is tossed tableside, contains crisp iceberg lettuce with julienne of baked ham, natural Swiss cheese, tomato, olives, grated Romano cheese, Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce, and the restaurant's irresistible garlic dressing. I love the salad as much as the sandwich and chose it as one of the selections for my recent "last meal" interview with Axios.
Fun fact: Columbia’s Original Cuban Sandwich is only listed on the lunch menu at the St. Armands Circle restaurant and all of their non-airport locations. However, you can order it at dinner, even though it’s not listed.
Columbia Restaurant also appears on 12 best seafood restaurants in Sarasota and Manatee serving fresh Florida stone crab
J.R.’s Old Packinghouse Cafe
987 S. Packinghouse Road, Sarasota; 941-371-9358; packinghousecafe.com
Originally opened during Labor Day weekend in 1999, in the same building that owner J.R. Garraus estimates has been around since the '50s, J.R.’s Old Packinghouse Cafe is a funky slice of Old Florida found just out of sight from I-75, about six miles east of downtown Sarasota. While now boasting a full-liquor bar and live music six nights a week, OPC remains most renowned for its food — and among the culinary creations of South Florida native and trained chef Garraus, none are more famous than his Miami-style Cuban sandwich ($12.95).
Sink your teeth into the crusty Cuban bread exterior, and you'll discover a generous serving of gooey Swiss cheese. Accompanied by firm, thinly sliced spear pickles and sweet ham, the true highlight of this experience lies at the bottom: a mound of slow-roasted, expertly seasoned shredded pork. In fact, you'll find yourself contemplating ordering any item from the menu, or any of the daily specials, featuring that succulent pork.
Indeed, O.P.C. incorporates the pork into its utterly distinctive and delicious creation called the Blackened Ybor Burger ($16.95), a fusion of a Cuban sandwich and a cheeseburger. One of the best burgers in Sarasota, this masterpiece features Cuban bread cradling a half-pound chuck patty, draped in melted Swiss cheese, J.R.'s exquisite shredded pork, and grilled onions. It arrives with a side of Thousand Island dressing for dipping, ensuring a delightfully messy yet unforgettable experience with this exclusive innovation — a culinary gem that could only have emerged from our greater Tampa Bay region.
J.R.'s O.P.C. also appears on: Best chicken wing restaurants in Sarasota, Bradenton and across Tampa Bay
Mirna's Cuban Cuisine
7980 N. Tamiami Trail, Sarasota; 941-316-9793; mirnascubancuisine.com
Located on the North Trail, just across the street from the Sarasota Bradenton International Airport, Mirna's Cuban Cuisine is the cozy little cafe where 64-year-old Mirna Gonzalez has been serving her delectable and inexpensive Cuban cuisine since 2016. There's nothing fancy about Mirna's, but that sure has not stopped it from being a crowd pleaser. The popularity of the place, even when visiting in the early evening on a Thursday in the dead of summer, can cause you to wait longer than usual for your food or the next cold beer. But trust me, it's worth it.
The Cuban sandwich costs a mere $9.95, is 12 inches long, and could easily feed a hungry couple. It contains some of the best baked ham I have tasted anywhere. Everything except the bread, which Mirna's gets from La Segunda in Tampa just like the others on this list, is made in-house. This includes the other star ingredient of her Miami-style Cuban sandwich: the roast pork. During my visit in late July, I paired the sandwich with Mirna's soup of the day, which turned out to be my favorite: her superior garbanzo bean soup ($3.95 for a bowl), laced with chunks of the baked ham that I adore.
I would also be remiss not to mention Mirna's arroz con pollo, which comes with a side and costs less than $12. It has to be among the best Cuban chicken and yellow rice served this side of Havana. Both the meat and rice were tender, moist, and teeming with flavor. The entrée is rendered strikingly beautiful with its green olives, roasted bell peppers, sweet peas, white onions, and green pepper. Honestly, I can't think of a better entrée priced under $15 found anywhere in Sarasota County.
However, these three genuine Cubanos, from Columbia, J.R. 's and Mirna's, all priced under $15, are every bit as satisfying as an entrée, and among the finest sandwiches you'll find anywhere.
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Wade Tatangelo is Ticket Editor for the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, and Florida Regional Dining and Entertainment Editor for the USA TODAY Network. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. He can be reached by email at [email protected]. Support local journalism by subscribing.??????
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Best Cuban sandwich restaurants in Sarasota, Bradenton
