Cuban Eats — Restaurant in Tampa

Had the pleasure of grabbing lunch on Monday at Cafe Perera on N Morgan just off E Twiggs, about a block from the Courthouse (I was the lucky recipient of a jury duty summons 🤦🏻‍♀️). There was a decent line to order and many tables were taken but we grabbed a free table and I made my way up the line. Ordered a BLT because I assumed it would be fast and we had limited time. My sandwich was actually very flavorful, considering the basic nature of a BLT. Bread was fresh and toasted just enough, LOTS of bacon, fresh tomato that actually tasted like tomato, crisp lettuce. What more could I ask for? Staff was pleasant. Poor guy behind the cash register was dealing with a bit of a crisis because the register stopped functioning, he couldn’t even get the cash drawer to open to make change. He very graciously offered me my sandwich gratis since I had to wait a while to pay. I declined, he’s running a business, not a charity, but I appreciated the offer. Fortunately for him, he got it fixed and only one out of three took him up on the freebie. If I’m in that neighborhood again I’d definitely go back. Not haute cuisine, but a solid...

Thought I'd grab lunch here since we're on break from jury duty selection; I assumed it would be better than the chain sandwich shop closer to the courthouse. I ordered a small Cuban sandwich, french fries, and deviled crab. Fries are okay. The Cuban sandwich was a generous size for a small, but very little pork. And, the deviled crab - something told me not to get it, but I did anyway since I thought the worse that could happen would be it having very little crab - I was wrong! Not the worse - I took one bite and spit it right out! It tasted spoiled/rotten/rancid/gross/no bueno! Makes me question the quality and freshness of the rest of their food, like the sandwich I ate. I'll post an update if I feel sick later.

The one star is for the politeness of the 2 men there.

I don't like to do negative reviews since there's enough people that don't mind, but for food that tastes spoiled or rotten - all day! The least a restaurant could do is make sure the food they serve is...

I hope this was a one time occurrence but I will definitely not go there again. I ordered a pressed cuban sandwich and what I got was really gross. Loaded with mustard and pickles, I'm guessing it was microwaved then pressed because parts of the bread was chewy and others were hard as a rock. One or two slices of ham, two slices of salami and chunks of pork. The worst part was that something in there smelled and tasted unusual so when I decided to take it apart, I had to dig the salami off of the bread with my nails. Needless to say I didn't finish the sandwich. Then to top it off, I also bought chips... and of course they would...