Victor's Cafe, New York

Entrance

Victor's Café is a Cuban restaurant close to Broadway. We had heard of it from some magazine with night life and restaurant tips. I made a reservation that night. They have quite a selection of Mojitos so we tried one of course.

Generous Mojito

The staff at this restaurant seemed friendly from the beginning and explained everything quite well. I have not been to Cuba or really had authentic Cuban food so this was something new and interesting for me.

Home made chips and salsa sauce

With the aperitifs they brought some home made chips and home made salsa sauce which were very good. We stopped ourselves from eating too much of them before our other courses but I would have wanted to order a second portion which many other people in the restaurant did.

Ceviche

If you like fish, you should try the Ceviche which is a fish dish with vegetables only cooked by the acidity of limes or lemons. This was our starter.

Ropa Vieja, Victor's house speciality

I had the house speciality Ropa Vieja as a main course. This is a kind of Cuban beef stew. It seemed to me like a Cuban goulash. It was tasty and not too big of portion for New York standards, which was good for a change. 

Camarones Enchiladas (pink shrimp in creole sauce)

We also ordered the pink shrimp in creole sauce which was very good.

Cuban flan, crème brûlée

We ordered a Cuban type of crème brûlée for desert. We were not disappointed by the desert either.

This restaurant was an interesting experience where we just sat and had a pleasant evening. There was no usual New York stress as you see in other places. We sat as long as we wanted. I asked for a rum and they found a special one to my liking. The restaurant was full and it was good to have had a reservation but I am sure that you could have just had a drink at the bar and waited for a table. All in all, this is a relaxed place with a nice atmosphere and I would definitely recommend it. We heard that they also have live music sometimes which we unfortunately missed.