In the ’90s, when I was new to Atlanta, I found my way to the Atlanta Cuban Club in Doraville. On Saturday nights, it was a place to eat, dance, and listen to stories of life in Cuba before the Castro Revolution. The scene felt straight out of Miami, with a touch of Southern charm. But, about five years ago, the club closed its doors.

“I miss having a place that feels like ours,” my friend Karina Reoyo, a fellow Cuban American from Miami, tells me. “There’s nothing like that here anymore.”

Like me, Reoyo grew up in the Kendall neighborhood of Miami, where our Cuban roots showed in everything—from weekday meals to our parents’ stories about the island. She moved to metro Atlanta seven years ago, and I moved back in 2024, after first living here as a graduate student at Mercer University in DeKalb County. Now, without the Cuban Club to guide us, we’ve kept our roots alive the way we know best: through food.

And we’re not alone.

There’s a growing network of Cuban Atlantans crisscrossing the city like detectives on a hot trail, chasing down leads. We’ll drive 45 minutes for a proper pastelito, a flaky pastry filled with guava and softened, sweetened cream cheese; ground beef; or another classic rendition (like coconut). If they’re “just like they make them in Miami,” then we’ll share our finds with like-minded food sleuths we meet through friends, at PTA meetings, or even at the gas station.

If a Publix, like the one on West Paces Ferry Road, has stocked up on Materva (the sweet, slightly herbal Cuban soda made from yerba mate), then errands will be rerouted for an emergency grocery-store run. And, if Kroger, like the one on Dallas Acworth Highway in Paulding County, puts five-pound bags of frozen yuca—a starchy root vegetable served at most Cuban meals—on sale (which hasn’t happened yet this year), watch out! We’ll be there ready with two shopping carts, as if it’s Black Friday.

Photograph by Ben Rollins

Photograph by Ben Rollins

Photograph by Ben Rollins

It hasn’t always been this way. Havana Sandwich Shop co-owner Debbie Benedit says there was a time when few people in Atlanta were familiar with Cuban food. When she and her late husband, Cuban-born Eddie Benedit, opened their Buford Highway restaurant in 1976, Cuban fare was often mistaken for Mexican cuisine.

She says customers would ask, “Where are the tacos? Where’s the salsa? Why isn’t this spicy?” Then she’d have to provide a quick culinary lesson. “We’d explain that Cuban food isn’t spicy. It’s olive oil, garlic, beans, rice, citrus, and vinegar,” she says. Cuban cuisine blends Spanish, African, and Caribbean influences. It’s shaped by the island’s tropical climate and the ingredients that thrive there, including sour oranges, lemons, limes, root vegetables, and plantains.

“Things are different now,” Benedit says, adding that more Atlantans are seeking out Cuban flavors. The area’s growing Cuban population may explain the culinary shift. According to The Atlanta Regional Commission, Cubans are the fourth-largest Caribbean-born group in the area, and their numbers have more than quadrupled in counties such as Forsyth, Henry, and Gwinnett since 2010.

When Miami-raised Stacie Antich moved to Atlanta in 2007, she craved pastelitos, but there was a problem: “Pastelito recipes weren’t on Pinterest or Instagram,” she says. “You didn’t even know what was in them. I had to work from memory.”

Photograph by Ben Rollins

In 2016, she opened Buena Gente Cuban Bakery food truck, serving up her perfected pastelitos, empanadas, croquetas, and other favorites. Then, in 2020, Antich cut the ribbon on a brick-and-mortar bakery of the same name in North Decatur; the shop is bright and pink, just as her food truck was, with freshly baked pastries in a welcoming display case. “This would be considered a fancy bakery in Miami,” she says with a smile.

Buena Gente’s pastelitos are flaky, golden, and sweet, with delicate layers that break apart with each bite. And they come in a few distinct shapes: a circle for meat, a rectangle for guava, and a rolled cigar shape for cream cheese alone—an unspoken code for Cuban pastry lovers. The pastelitos de queso (cheese pastries), my go-to every time, are indeed just like the ones sold from the ventanitas (walk-up windows at neighborhood restaurants) in Miami.

Photograph by Ben Rollins

Photograph by Ben Rollins

In Roswell, Lazaro’s Cuban Cuisine offers a proper sit-down meal wrapped in nostalgia, with Cuban memorabilia throughout. A black-and-white photo of the I Love Lucy star Desi Arnaz (surely Cuba’s best-known expat) hangs directly across from the front door; I even found a bottle of Agua de Violeta in the bathroom, a nod to the abuelitas who douse the floral cologne all over babies.

Cuban-born chef and owner Lazaro Tenreiro, who once owned jewelry stores in the metro area, also says he missed the food he grew up with before he opened his own eatery. “When I opened the restaurant in 2012, it was really a passion project. I wanted food my kids and my family would eat—so it had to be good,” he says.

Lazaro’s frijoles negros (black beans) are exactly how I was taught to make them: rich with garlic, onions, and a hint of cumin. And the vegan picadillo (a clever twist on our traditional ground beef dish) is a tasty surprise, with ground green-plantain peel cooked with peppers, onions, and Manzanilla olives.

Photograph by Ben Rollins

Photograph by Ben Rollins

In Marietta Square, a popular spot to take my kids for a quick, authentic meal is D’Cuban Cafe, which has other locations around metro Atlanta. Colombian co-owner Nicolas Angel says his cousin, D’Cuban co-owner Lucas Mejia Angel, also from Colombia, fell in love with Cuban food during a trip to Miami and brought those flavors back to Atlanta.

Though the D’Cuban menu is fast-casual, everything is made from scratch daily. A bowl of ropa vieja (“old clothes” in Spanish) comes with shredded beef simmered in a garlicky tomato sauce, served alongside black beans, white rice, and perfectly sweet maduros (ripened plantains).

Of course, Papi’s Cuban Grill is still my top pick when Cuban relatives come to town. The Kennesaw location brings back memories of the casual spots we Miamians grew up with. When my family and I walk in the door, we’re transported to the famed Versailles restaurant on Calle Ocho as the aroma of sofrito—the base of most Cuban dishes, comprising the holy trinity of onions, garlic, and green peppers—fills the air. And the fried yuca appetizer, crispy on the outside, tender on the inside, is even better than the one I grew up eating.

Meanwhile, in Paulding County, my friend Karina’s husband, Carell Rodriguez—who is also Cuban and from Miami—is reviving the spirit of the Cuban Club by guest-teaching rueda de casino, a form of Cuban salsa, at Rosa Negra restaurant in Dallas. “Rosa Negra is Latin-infused, and not necessarily Cuban food,” Rodriguez tells me. “I do, nonetheless, enjoy their chicharrones (crispy fried pork), empanadas, and tostones (twice-fried, smashed plantain slices). They remind me of home.”

After class, he unwinds with a mojito. “A mojito is basically Cuba in a glass,” he says. “It’s light, refreshing, and nostalgic.” His wife agrees, chiming in, “Their mojitos are better than the ones in Miami.”

I can’t vouch for their mojitos (not yet, anyway). But in many ways, Atlanta’s Cuban finds are better than what we left behind. Maybe it’s the chase that makes them more satisfying. Or maybe it’s just the joy of tasting home, right when you need it most.

This article appears in our April 2026 issue.

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