The Cuban Place

Salsa dancers will enjoy this place for live music on Friday and Saturday nights. You will run into local sanders and people from Latin America (mostly Peru). Overall a cool place. Drinks are watered down a lot so I can’t compliment the bar much.

Loved the food here! We tried the lamb, fish and pork. Everything was delicious especially the lamb… Very tender. I also liked that the restaurant was more spacious than most places in the city and you’re not elbow to elbow with the tables beside you. Only downside was that our table was right beside the life band and the speaker behind me made me feel like the guitarist was serenading me (not in a good way). Also couldn’t switch tables and the restaurant was full. Giving this place 4 stars because of the food!

Cool place. The Ropa Vieja plate was absolutely wonderful. The Cuba Libre picture perfect. The mojito was surprisingly unbalanced and disappointing, particularly for a Cuban joint. The Caramel & Coffee dessert was very good.
The service was inattentive. The maître d’ was very responsive and aware. The music and dancing were absolutely fun!

I used to work in the same building as the cuban place, just a few levels above and had been telling myself that I should pop in there for happy hour at some point. Well I finally made that visit on a Friday after work. They have happy hour specials for their mojitos (half price I believe) which was pretty much all we drank during that visit. Love it and will definitely visit it again. Hopefully not that look.

Hey pendejo! Nobody mess with da Cubans!
Such a sentiment greeted us as we emerged from the dark deluge of the street on a wet Wednesday in December. Upon arrival you’ll feel like you have been transplanted, somewhat in an overdone, Cuban oasis.
Wednesday night is $ 1 taco night. Dios mio man! 3 tacos per person. Tiro in a Quilmes (Argentinia’s cerveza of choice), and you have a light bite for $ 12.
The vibe is upbeat and bustly. You could be forgiven for feeling like a complete idiota in those first few momento as you try to grab someone’s … anyone’s … attention. What you will certainly grab is the amused looks from the diners and drinkers enjoying their experiencia.
Once seated in a high backed leather bound booth, encased in dark mahogany, that conjures imagery of Castro and humidor preserved Cubans, you’ll feel chuffed… till you realise your mistake. Those bonita chica’s in hot red salsa-​inspired outfits don’t actually serve your table.
What you’ll then do is find yourself in a conga-​line trying frantically to attract the attention of the ultra busy two barstaff over the heads of all the patrons seated at the bar. This is where Cuban Place has a huge missfire for me. The service is el loco. They should grow some cojones and have table service. The salsa staff aren’t busy enough just bringing ready orders to tables, they should be taking orders too, because in the meanwhile they stand around looking pretty picante but doing nothing.
If you like rich wood, scribbles, cheap eats, and expensive beer then Arriba! Arriba! Andale! Andale! down to The Cuban Place.

This place is very lively on a Saturday night. They have a live band which plays till about midnight and then music through a sound system. There are lots of couples dancing away, swinging their hips and getting into the groove. A word of warning though, if you are a group of ladies you will be constantly asked by men of all ages to dance with them. We declined at first as we just wanted to dance in our little group of three, but two of us eventually agreed to dance with a couple of guys. The guys are friendly and don’t try to hit on you, but the style of dancing is very ‘close’ so if you aren’t comfortable with a stranger gyrating against you and nuzzling into your neck, then you might want to politely decline their offers.

Get here before 7 if you work near by and take advantage of the half price cocktails. They make a mean Mojito and the Cuba Libre is pretty darn good. The bartenders at this bar are awesome, they’ve got great banter so perch yourself up at the bar.

2 originals please! That’s Mojito for those that don’t know what i’m talking about.
If you get to be here during their happy hour time frame you can snag yourself Mojito’s for the cool price of $ 6!
If you are with friends that opt to get the Grande Mojito basically a bucket of this delicious stuff will help you start the night in a cheerful mood! (You get straws to drink from the bucket so it feels like you are on spring break or something ;)
This places always seems like the first visit of your night out beacuse when you get there during happy hour its packed and then if you get there around 8pm the bar is your’s for the taking.
I have yet to try the food as you tend to fill up on Mojito’s then move onto the next bar hop. So i can only vouch for their liquids!
If you had enough of mint then opt to try the Mary Pickford. She’s a little bit fancy but not too sweet.

Here’s an idea. Don’t market yourself as a cigar bar and not stock any cigars. Went there last night for the sole purpose of having a rum and smoking a cigar. Was informed by one the staff that the manager wasn’t around and suggested we wait 10 mins. The manager never showed, and the staff member came back to confirm that they had NO CIGARS in stock. The day after Melbourne Cup. Unbelievable. Had a $ 15 Cuba Libre which I must admit was tasty, but the place was amateur hour. Won’t be going back.

Last week for my birthday I had a very special meal here at lunch with my husband. I kind of always forget how much I like cuban food so its a rare meal out for us. However, this place has gotten under my skin and we might keep going more frequently.
The restaurant is decorated in masculine wood and leather with some palm accents to bring in the Caribbean feel. We choose a seat near the window; the rest of the restaurant is very dark. A massive bar lords over the northern side of the dining area. It was pretty slow for lunch.
We made a special request for fried plantains, usually a dinner menu item, and they were cooked up for us. SO worth it. We also ordered the papas trituradas (a twice cooked potato dish), Moros y Cristianos (classic black beans and rice), and the classic Ropa vieja (lamb). I am not kidding when I say this is the best cuban food I’ve ever tasted. The only reason this place isn’t getting a 5 star is because the Mojito was a little watery and the portions are small. However, we were still very happy. Can’t wait to go back. Maybe try dinner service when the place is more lively. And don’t forget to order the plantains.

Twirling, grinding, alcohol laden patrons is pretty much what you’ll find in this place. The live band was good, but the salsa dancing wanna be superstars were unfortunately not.
Overall people were having a good time and the one or two latinos who really know how to move made up for the rest of the crowd.
The drinks irked me — a cup full of crushed ice with a tiny amount of alcohol made me clench onto that glass so I can drink the melted ice and convince myself I wasn’t getting ripped off.

This place serves one of the best mojitos in Sydney, hands down.
I used to go here for after work drinks and if you’re lucky enough to get there during happy hour you’ll get the mojitos for only $ 10.
I love the fact that you can draw on the walls, and if you’re ever bored you can just zone out and read what’s others have written. If you go on a weekend they even have a live band playing salsa music and other Cuban classics which gives this place a really cool vibe.
There is a dining area upstairs which I have never tried but the area is nice and spacious and the food does look great.
So if you’re looking for a great mojito and a Latin-​American themed bar in the Sydney city definitely give this place a go!

Prawns for entrée and short ribs were amazing! Serving size definitely enough for one. A bit on the expensive side but good ambiance and lovely décor with a love wall to graffiti on.

I’d been to LBdM in PV (mex) and was hoping for an equally fun evening. Not!
Hanging out in the bar for happy hour mojitos was fine, but once dinner began it was a joke:
— We ordered a magnum of red. It took 15 minutes for them to sort out a magnum is not a 750ml bottle. Then another 10 to find a special corkscrew that could open it.
Group: «We’d like to order beef. Can you tell us about your steaks»
Waitress: «Umm, not really, I don’t eat meat»
Group: «But there are only three cuts — can you explain the differences?»
Waitress: «No, sorry. Maybe just order the most expensive one»
— After an excruciating three hours or so, we asked for dessert. Waitress «oh sorry, I forgot to ask for your order. The kitchen closed 30 minutes ago.»
All this joy for only $ 200 pp. Bottom-​line is: Go for drinks or salsa dancing. But the kitchen and dinning room will make you feel completely violated the morning after.

Walking into here last night reminded me of walking into a Greek plate smashing restaurant or a Señor Frog’s in Mexico. There’s graffiti on the walls, a bachelorette at the bar with devil horns and veil, the restaurant is heaving with rowdy, screaming patrons and the bartenders are lining up 10 Mojito’s at a time as they ply the restaurant with alcohol, before shooting a champagne cork across the bar and trying to catch it in a cocktail shaker. They missed, which sums up how I feel about this place.
I came because I love Havana Club and Latin American food. I left feeling like one of my favourite cocktails, the Mojito, had been turned into the equivalent of jugs of frozen margaritas at a cheap Mexican restaurant, a la Señor Frog. I had a bottle of Imperial, a Costa Rican beer, for $ 8.50. It was good, but along the lines of every other Latin American beer I’ve had; easy to drink, great on a hot day and with spicy food, but not overly memorable. My friend had a Cuban President for $ 16; a cocktail of Havana Club, Cointreau and Vermouth, shaken and served in a martini glass with a squeeze of lemon rind and a maraschino cherry. This was great.
Maybe Saturday night is a crazy time to come here and there is a more relaxed vibe on other nights. I hope so, because last nights visit doesn’t inspire me to go back.

When I first saw the sign Lab Delm I thought I had discovered a funky new Sydney bar /​night club. What I had in fact really discovered was La Bodeguita Del Medio, which is actually a Cuban restaurant and bar, so I was half right.
Lab Delm (it’s just easier to type without spelling mistakes) boasts the perfect Mojito, and yes I can say they make a very good one and at certain times they offer them for a cheapie $ 10. Offering Sydney a Cuban experience is a bit exciting, as we don’t have much (or anything) of Cuban food and culture provided to us otherwise. They also have Cuban bands and dancers.
The food is a little expensive at over $ 40 per main meal, but if you call in for lunch you can get a meal for less than half that price., I avoided the curiosity of braised goat and opted for the safety of Pan Cubano which is Roasted Pork dish which comes with delicious sweet potato chips.
Check it out for something different.

I visited La B del M for the first time last night to meet some friends in the city. As I got there a bit earlier than expected, I picked up the $ 10 special for the Mojito which is $ 14 after 6pm on a Friday night.
It was as if you walked into a quiet restaurant on one side, and a crazy cuban bar on the other, luckily downstairs knew exactly what it was, the den of dancing.
We sat and sipped on cuban and mexican beers for most of the night, until need for food was overwhelming, and we escaped to go get some other multicultural food for the night’s international adventure.
I really liked the vibe here, and I’m sure to come back for the Mojitos — or I could attempt their famous recipe at home, but I may need to learn spanish before pulling it off to any degree of certainty:
6 – 8 fresh mint leaves
½ Lime
1 Tbsp Caster sugar
A good measure of your favourite white rum
Soda water
Ice cubes

I’ll take any excuse for a mojito. And hey, if it comes with a side of delicious Cuban Latin food, count me in.
Already popular with the suits (and the suit-​chasers), La Bodeguita is smack-​bang in the heart of the city but at least has a bit more atmosphere than some of the other CBD offerings. It’s good for a dinner-​and-​drinks night with friends, particularly if you’re up for sharing a range of dishes. We noshed on delights like the terrine de cerdo — pork cheek terrine with pear, cinnamon and molasses vinaigrette — and rosemary and garlic roasted potatoes, and our bellies would heartily recommend both.
Sure, there’s some dancing and whatnot going on downstairs, but we were happy enough to stay up on deck, sipping our magical mixes of Havana Club rum, lime, soda, sugar and fresh mint. And keep ‘em coming!

It was late in the evening, we’d been having a few drinks after a stand up gig and were ready to move on to more fertile grounds.
My friend who had recently returned from Cuba proclaimed, «I know of a Cuban bar!» and he lead us on a mini expedition to La B Del M, a small Cuban Bar right behind the Queen Victoria Building.
We danced the salsa like all the movers and shakers housed within; a hot bed of dancing frivolity. We drank the Mojito’s like all the sippers and drip dram’s drinking at the bar and tables. The writing was on the wall. Not metaphorically, the wall was actually covered in writing. People who had been there and shuffled their feet across the very floor boards that I now tapped my toes atop of, had all left their messages of joy, remembrance and repentance.
We continued drinking our flavoursome Mojito’s long into the night and flailing about to the music like a bewildered wildebeest in the wild. This was a place of madness, of whirling, twirling Cuban madness.
But would this late-​night-​gyrate, this drunken cavorting, this alcohol fuelled carousing end with a hangover in the morning, pining for the reason behind so many a Mojito and hip thrust? The writing was on the wall.

With already two locations — Cuba and California — La Bodeguita has now arrived on our Australian shores. The Sydney edition feels a bit formulaic in parts; fake vintage photographs of Che Guevara and Hispanic paraphernalia adorn the interiors, while customers are encouraged to make their mark on certain walls with coloured textas.
The menu spans Cuban, Central and South American dishes with some molecular gastronomic desserts thrown into the mix. We tried the fresh and zesty Peruvian ceviche and the ‘ropa vieja’ braised lamb neck with black bean infused rice. To follow was the refreshing lime granita made with mint and white rum (which arrived to the table all spooky like, effusing liquid nitrogen gas) and the tropical passionfruit panna cotta with fresh fruit and edible flowers. Everything was well made and tasted good, but the sheer variety of flavours, cuisines and non-​seasonal was very confusing on the palate. The mojitos, however, were some of the best I’ve ever tried here, packed with fresh mint, not stingy on the rum and just enough sugar to help it all go down.
The restaurant and bar areas are enormous, with high ceilings to match — a rarity in the high rent CBD. With a live salsa band and plenty of mojitos pouring out of the bar, I’d say this place will do well with the corporate crowd and hen’s nights.