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Cuban-style street food hits Timmins

Customers going hog wild for pulled pork from La Cubana

The Downtown Timmins Urban Park provides a street festival to town every week. One booth at the Urban Park’s Farmers’ Market brings authentic Latino street food to the table.

La Cubana in Timmins serves up Cuban-style pulled pork sandwiches. These drool-worthy sandwiches have proven to be a well-seasoned, tasty treat.

Yadira Rodriguez moved to Timmins from Cuba seven months ago. She operates La Cubana in Timmins.

“I got here in January,” she said. “I came here because my son came to live with his dad. I saw the opportunity of having a new life and more opportunities because Cuba doesn’t have a lot. I wanted to grow professionally.”

Once here, she put her cooking skills to work and came up the with idea for La Cubana.

“Everybody has always told me that I’m a good cook,” Rodriguez explained. “The pulled pork sandwich is very famous in Cuba. I thought I would give Canadians an opportunity to try it here. I know there are not many Cubans around Timmins. I decided I wanted to give it a shot.

“It’s been good. I always hope more that people will come. But so far so good.”

While she brings Cuban-style pulled pork to the market, it is done on a slightly smaller scale than at a Cuban street festival.

“In Cuba, where we have festivals in the street kind of like this, people roast a whole pig right there on the street and they shred it there for everyone,” Rodrigues said. “I can’t do that here because the conditions are different. But it’s very traditional.”

Still, she manages to get all the traditional flavours in her sandwiches, without going the whole hog with an entire pig.

“I do my sauce with garlic, lemon and the juices from the meat,” she said. “It’s very hot so it will cook the garlic there and add a little more flavour. I don’t cook the meat with too much salt.

“In Cuba, they just roast the whole pig in a charcoal oven. The way I do it here in a slow cooker is like my mom. She did it with the lemon and garlic and cumin and (other seasonings). So, it’s more like my mom’s way. I use the pork shoulder and butt. I remove most of the fat, but leave a little bit because it adds flavour.”

For those unfamiliar with cuts of pork, the butt isn’t the rear end of the pig. Pork butt is a cut from the shoulder and has a relatively high-fat content. The pork shoulder is also from the shoulder but is leaner.

In Cuba, pulled pork is traditionally served with beans.

“I was going to bring black beans, but this is lunch time so people want to grab a sandwich and keep going,” Rodriguez said.

There are also a variety of toppings available at La Cubana in Timmins.

“I have five types of vegetables,” she said. “I have cabbage, lettuce, tomato, onion and pickles. Mostly everybody takes everything. But sometimes they have their choices like no onions or no tomatoes.

“Normally we (in Cuba) don’t put too much vegetables because our vegetables are seasonal, so we don’t always have the same ones. So, it’s only the pulled pork with the sauce.”

She hopes that the downtown farmers’ market will lead to other opportunities for her Cuban dishes.

“I was planning to do other places,” Rodriguez said. “If I have offers, I’ll do it. And if people have a party and want to order some Cuban food, I would like to do more, like catering, but will have to promote more on my Facebook Page.

“I try to post there what I’m doing in the next week.”

The city is turning out to be a good fit for Rodriguez and her family.

“I really like Timmins because where I come from in Cuba it’s a city that’s not too, too big,” she said. “Timmins is feeling like home too. So far so good.”

La Cubana in Timmins’ booth is open every Thursday at the Urban Park Farmers’ Market from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. For more information, find them on Facebook.