![]() Cuban bread is used to make Cuban sandwiches. | |
Type | White bread |
---|---|
Place of origin | United States |
Region or state | Florida |
Created by | La Joven Francesca Bakery |
Main ingredients | Flour, water, lard or vegetable shortening |
Cuban bread is a fairly simple white bread, similar to French bread and Italian bread, but has a slightly different baking method and ingredient list (in particular, it generally includes a small amount of fat in the form of lard or vegetable shortening); it is usually made in long, baguette-like loaves. It is a staple of Cuban-American cuisine and is traditionally the bread of choice when making an authentic Cuban sandwich.
The origins of "real" Cuban bread are debated, with both Miami and Tampa, Florida, claiming to be the home of the authentic version. With regards to where it originated, the first commercial bakery in the U.S. to produce Cuban bread was most likely La Joven Francesca bakery, which was established by the Sicilian-born Francisco Ferlita in 1896 in Ybor City, a thriving Cuban-Spanish-Italian community in Tampa. [1] The bakery originally sold bread for 3 to 5 cents per loaf, many of which were delivered every morning like milk. Houses in Ybor City often had a sturdy nail driven into the door frame on the front porch, and a bread deliveryman would impale the fresh loaf of bread onto the nail before dawn. [2] [3]
Ferlita's bakery was destroyed by fire in 1922, leaving only the brick bread oven standing. It was rebuilt and expanded, and it soon became a major supplier of Cuban bread for the Tampa area. The bakery also added a dining area which became a place to congregate, drink a cup of Cuban coffee, and catch up on the local news. [4] La Joven Francesca closed in 1973, but soon found new life when it was renovated and converted into the Ybor City State Museum. [3] The original ovens where the original Cuban bread was baked are still viewable inside. [5]
La Segunda Bakery in Ybor City is currently [when?] the largest producer of Cuban bread in the world and ships the product all over Florida and beyond. [6] [7] It was co-founded by Juan Morè, who migrated to Tampa from Spain via Cuba and became a partner in a bakery co-op with three locations: "La Primera", "La Segunda", and "La Tercera" (literally, The First, The Second, and The Third). Morè had been running La Primera, but when the other two bakeries closed in 1915, he bought the larger La Segunda building. His descendants have been running the bakery ever since, and it still uses Morè's original Cuban bread recipe and many of the same bread-making techniques. [8] [9]
It is not amiss to say that the Latins in Ybor City make a very fine bread, equal in all respects to the French article of that kind and unexcelled by the Vienna product.
- -Tampa Daily Journal, 1896 [10]
A traditional loaf of Cuban bread is approximately three feet long and somewhat rectangular crossways (as compared to the rounder shape of Italian or French bread loaves). It has a hard, thin, almost papery toasted crust and a soft flaky center. [11] In the early days, the dough was stretched thin to make it last, creating the bread's distinctive air pockets and long shape. As they have for over a century, La Segunda and a few other traditional Cuban bread producers lay a long, moist palmetto frond on top of the loaves before baking, creating a shallow trench in the upper crust, producing an effect similar to the slashing or scoring of a European-style loaf. [12] (The frond is removed before eating.)
Cuban bread is the necessary base for a "Cuban sandwich" (sometimes called a "sandwich mixto"). [13] [14] [15] It can also be served as a simple breakfast, especially toasted and pressed with butter and served alongside (and perhaps dunked into) a hot mug of cafe con leche (strong dark-roasted Cuban coffee with scalded milk).
Because the traditional recipe uses no preservatives, Cuban bread tends to go stale quickly and becomes hard and dry if not eaten soon after baking. However, it can be frozen for shipping or storage. [16] In Tampa, stale Cuban bread became a key ingredient in other recipes, such as the breading of a deviled crab. [17]
Stale Cuban bread is the preferred "weapon of choice" in protests performed by the Conch Republic and in mock battles involving the "Ybor City Navy" during Tampa's Gasparilla Pirate Festival. [18] [19]
Bread pudding is a bread-based dessert popular in many countries' cuisines. It is made with stale bread and milk or cream, generally containing eggs, a form of fat such as oil, butter or suet and, depending on whether the pudding is sweet or savory, a variety of other ingredients. Sweet bread puddings may use sugar, syrup, honey, dried fruit, nuts, as well as spices such as cinnamon, nutmeg, mace, or vanilla. The bread is soaked in the liquids, mixed with the other ingredients, and baked.
Sliced bread is a loaf of bread that has been sliced with a machine and packaged for convenience, as opposed to the consumer cutting it with a knife. It was first sold in 1928, advertised as "the greatest forward step in the baking industry since bread was wrapped". By 1933, around 80% of bread sold in the US was pre-sliced, leading to the popular idiom "greatest thing since sliced bread".
A baguette is a long, thin type of bread of French origin that is commonly made from basic lean dough. It is distinguishable by its length and crisp crust.
A Cuban sandwich is a variation of a ham and cheese sandwich that likely originated in cafes catering to Cuban workers in Tampa or Key West, two early Cuban immigrant communities in Florida centered on the cigar industry. Later on, Cuban exiles and expatriates brought it to Miami, where it is also very popular. The sandwich is made with ham, (mojo) roasted pork, Swiss cheese, pickles, mustard, and sometimes salami on Cuban bread. Salami is included in Tampa, but is not usually included in South Florida.
Cuban cuisine is largely based on Spanish cuisine with influence from Taino, African and other Caribbean cuisines. Some Cuban recipes share spices and techniques with Spanish, Taino and African cooking, with some Caribbean influence in spice and flavor. This results in a blend of several different cultural influences. A small but noteworthy Chinese influence can also be accounted for, mainly in the Havana area. There is also some Italian influence. During colonial times, Cuba was an important port for trade, and the Spanish ancestors of Cubans brought with them the culinary traditions of different parts of Spain.
A po' boy is a sandwich originally from Louisiana. It traditionally consists of meat, which is usually roast beef, ham, or fried seafood such as shrimp, crawfish, fish, oysters, or crab. The meat is served in New Orleans French bread, known for its crisp crust and fluffy center.
Ybor City is a historic neighborhood just northeast of downtown Tampa, Florida, United States. It was founded in the 1880s by Vicente Martinez-Ybor and other cigar manufacturers and populated by thousands of immigrants, mainly from Cuba, Spain, and Italy. For the next 50 years, workers in Ybor City's cigar factories rolled hundreds of millions of cigars annually.
West Tampa is one of the oldest neighborhoods within the city limits of Tampa, Florida, United States. It was an independently incorporated city from 1895 until 1925, when it was annexed by Tampa.
A loaf is a (usually) rounded or oblong quantity of food, typically and originally of bread. It is common to bake bread in a rectangular bread pan or loaf pan because some kinds of bread dough tend to collapse and spread out during the cooking process if not constrained; the shape of less viscous doughs can be maintained with a bread pan whose sides are higher than the uncooked dough. More viscous doughs can be hand-molded into the desired loaf shape and cooked on a flat oven tray.
The modern history of Tampa, Florida, can be traced to the founding of Fort Brooke at the mouth of the Hillsborough River in today's downtown in 1824, soon after the United States had taken possession of Florida from Spain. The outpost brought a small population of civilians to the area, and the town of Tampa was first incorporated in 1855.
Ybor City Museum State Park is a Florida State Park in Tampa, Florida's Ybor City. The museum occupies the former Ferlita Bakery building at 1818 9th Avenue in the Ybor City Historic District. The bakery was known for producing cuban bread and its ovens are part of the museum displays covering the history of the cigar industry and the Latin community from the 1880s through the 1930s. There is also an ornamental garden in the building.
The Ybor City Historic District is a U.S. National Historic Landmark District located in Ybor City, Tampa, Florida. The district is bounded by 6th Avenue, 13th Street, 10th Avenue and 22nd Street, East Broadway between 13th and 22nd Streets. Ybor City contains a total of 956 historic buildings, including an unparalleled collection of architecture with Spanish-Cuban influence, as well as historic cigar factory buildings and associated infrastructure. The area was developed by businessman Vicente Martinez Ybor beginning in 1886, and was for a time the world's leading supplier of cigars.
Vicente Martinez Ybor was a Spanish entrepreneur who first became a noted industrialist and cigar manufacturer in Cuba, then Key West, and finally Tampa, Florida.
SoHo Tampa, short for "South Howard Avenue (Tampa)" is a residential district within the Hyde Park neighborhood of Tampa. Some of the main cross streets are Kennedy Boulevard, Cleveland Street, Platt Street, and Swann Avenue. The area has historic architecture and is within walking distance of Bayshore Boulevard where it terminates. The much praised Bern's Steak House is located in the district. Other high-end restaurants and nightlife venues are located here. Other offerings are high-end locally owned clothing boutiques, art galleries, dessert cafes, and a Starbucks. One of only three Publix GreenWise Markets is also located in the district. As of 2009, small companies have sprung up utilizing NEVs to shuttle clubgoers between core neighborhoods including SoHo and Channelside.
Ybor City is a historic neighborhood that includes the Ybor City Historic District in Tampa, Florida. It is located just northeast of downtown Tampa and north of Port Tampa Bay. The neighborhood has distinct architectural, culinary, cultural, and historical legacy that reflects its multi-ethnic composition. It was unique in the American South as a prosperous manufacturing community built and populated almost entirely by immigrants.
Deviled crab is a crab meat croquette. Deviled crab croquettes originated in Tampa, Florida, where they were developed in the Spanish, Cuban and Italian immigrant community of Ybor City. It is typically served for lunch or as a snack, and it is meant to be eaten with one hand.
The pane ticinese is a white bread traditionally made in the Swiss canton of Ticino, but also available in the rest of Switzerland, where it is known as "Bread of Ticino". In Ticino, it is referred to by a number of names specific to the region, including pane riga, reale or lireta.
La Segunda Central Bakery is a purveyor of Cuban bread, pastries, and other baked goods in the historic neighborhood of Ybor City in Tampa, Florida. It was founded in 1915 as part of a co-op of three bakeries in the Ybor City area: La Primera, La Segunda and La Tercera. The other two establishments closed during the Great Depression, leaving the slightly renamed La Segunda Central as the primary supplier of Cuban bread to the local community. The bakery was founded and operated by Juan Moré, an immigrant from northern Spain who is generally credited with developing modern Cuban bread by adapting a recipe he'd learned in Cuba while serving in the Spanish-American War. The Moré family has continued to own and operate the business for four generations.
Bread is a staple food throughout Europe. Throughout the 20th century, there was a huge increase in global production, mainly due to a rise in available, developed land throughout Europe, North America and Africa.
Japanese milk bread, also called Hokkaido milk bread, or simply milk bread in English sources, is a soft white bread commonly sold in Asian bakeries, particularly Japanese ones. Although bread is not a traditional Japanese food, it was introduced widely after World War II, and the style became a popular food item.
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