The Old Love’s riff on the Cubano is a sandwich we love

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The Cubano is one of the world’s great sandwiches. Though there is often some debate about its origins, it likely developed in Cuba — duh, right? — from a sandwich known there as a mixto. The mixto, like the Cubano, is a mix of meats on bread.

The mixto picks up its Cubano moniker when it comes to the USA, and to Florida in particular, where debate rages as to the location of its invention: Miami or Tampa?

It was probably Tampa, which was selling the sandwich known as a Cubano in the 1940s. (Maybe just keep that to yourself if you’re ever in Miami.)

History aside, the Cubano is a killer sandwich for eating at the bar. A couple of meats, cheese, all heated up on the grill and fashioned into sandwich form? It’s got the sustenance and form factor you need when knocking back a Daiquiri or two.

Sydney rum and cocktail bar, Old Love’s, knows the joy of a Cubano. It has been on the list there since they opened and — as we can attest — it has been a hit with guests wanting some late night eats.

We spoke to bar manager Callum Marra — better known as Squid — to find out how they make theirs, and what makes it so good after a night on the rum.

BOOTHBY: What are you looking for in a good Cubano?

SQUID: Good pork is obviously a great place to start. The classic Cubano sandwich has both ham and a roast or braised pork, mustard and pickles and cheese.

What do you do to make yours?

We put a few different little twists in there. We make a tomato relish with little bit of Szechuan peppercorn and a bunch of good stuff. For the pork, we make a mix with both shoulder meat and pork belly, we slow braise it for about 13 hours at 90 degrees in a combi oven, with all sorts of stuff: fresh citrus spices, chipotle and adobo, all sorts of aromatics. And then that braising liquid with all the fat that has leached out after we pull out the meat, we pour a really good whack of that back in there to keep it moist and keep it tender. 

And then we use mum’s potato roll — if you’re talking small format sandwiches, particularly for bar food,   it doesn’t get much better than mum’s potato roll, you know?

Why is that? What’s it about the potato roll?

It’s got a similar quality to brioche in that it’s got this kind of like, spongy, almost like watering on sweetness as well. It’s got quite a richness in there. It toasts up really well. It holds really well as a base layer to add something to the sandwich, while never taking away from the ingredients.

How do you make it for service — you’re a bar with only a small space for food prep.

Obviously being a cocktail bar, all of our food is made by bartending staff. It’s all lead time. We have a full prep day every week, one of us will do all the prep. So we’re up there, hubble-bubble, toil and trouble, cooking everything away. We make our own mayo, we make our own pickles, we braise the pork ourselves. It’s not a full egg mayo — we actually do a vegan version with soy milk, because it’s just bit more shelf stable than a full egg mayo.

The pickles we do ourselves, we do a mustard pickle, lots of coriander seed. We’ve got elements of the original Cubano, but we put them in a slightly different form. The house-made mayo is made with garlic oil that we infuse by confiting garlic in a neutral oil for like two hours. A lot of work is put in by the team before service.

It all gets weighed out into portions and moulded into little patties on rice proof paper, and it’s already cooked so we warm it through, and put cheese on top and  melt it under the griddle. Toast the bun, chuck on salsa mayo pickles, and Bob’s your uncle — you can have a Cubano in eight minutes. 

Why is it such good drinking food?

It’s rich. We’ve got the tomato salsa in there with a little bit of corn. It’s tangy. You’ve got that Szechuan peppercorn, lots of sherry vinegar in there as well. The pickles on the top. And let’s be honest, if you’re having a bit to drink, you want something that’s the right amount of greasy. And it’s hard to quantify what the right amount of greasy is. But I think when you’re out having a drink, you know it when you get it. 

And it’s not too big. The classic Cubano is a big-ass sandwich. You can eat them throughout the day — eat them in the morning and go work in the fields all day.

And it is rich, but like I said, it’s small format which helps. Little bit of acid in there helps. And just that right amount of greasy, for cheese we use a provolone. Like beautiful melty cheese, won’t split, good texture.

Old Love’s Cubano recipe

Ingredients

• 4.8kg pork belly
• 2.2kg pork neck 
• 50g salt
• 100g shio koji
• 100ml soy sauce
• 250ml rice wine vinegar
• 250ml Chinese cooking wine
• 4 onions 
• 4 oranges 
• 10g allspice30g paprika
• 8 cinnamon quills
• 20g methi (fenugreek)
• 30g dried chipotle
• 2.5kg crushed tinned tomatoes 
• 2.5L water 
• 200g Dijon mustard 
• 200g chipotle in adobo
• chives, finely chopped
• small brioche rolls
• Hellmann’s mayonnaise

To make the pork

1. Cut pork in half and season with salt and koji. Massage well and let marinate for 6 hours or ideally overnight.

2. Season pork with dry spices, rub in well and place into deep gastronomes to cook in.

3. Roughly chop onions and add to pork.

4. Add liquids.

5. Peel oranges, add peel and squeeze in juice. 

6. Mix well and cover tray with baking paper and foil.

7. Cover foil with lid and place in a combi oven on bake/steam at 80-90 degrees. Cook for a minimum 12 hours. 

8. Let cool then strain liquid and reserve.

9. Shred pork adding cooking liquid to keep a moist consistency.

10. Blend the can of chipotle in adobo.

11. Season mix, add 200g of Dijon mustard and the can of adobo (200g).

To make the Cubano

1. Warm pork on the grill.

2. Add provolone on top and chuck in the salamander. 

3. Warm a potato bun both sides.

4. Once bun is warm add house made garlic mayo to one side of the bun.

5. Add housemade salsa to the other side.

6. Layer house made bread and butter pickles onto the mayo.

7. Once cheese is melted add pork to the bun.

8. Close the Cubano and dive on into that bad boy.