Havana Central at The West End

While the food here is tasty and reasonably priced (for the neighborhood, NOT for what it is), the service is abysmal. As someone who put herself through college waiting tables in Manhattan restaurants, I can say that Havana Central offers almost the worst service I have ever experience in New York City. The first time I went to the restaurant, I had a full hour between meetings at work (which is two blocks from the restaurant), and decided to use the time to have a relaxing lunch with a friend. We ended up waiting almost 25 minutes to order, and eventually had to get the food wrapped to go because it barely arrived at our table at the moment I had to leave for my meeting. My friend had to bring my food to me at work, and I sat through my meeting with a growling stomach. The next experience I had with the place involved a delivery order which took over one full hour to arrive. I am definitely disappointed, as I love Cuban food, but would not recommend this restaurant to anyone hoping to eat within an hour of arriving.

I've been consistently pleased with the food and drinks at West End--nothing spectacular, but always decent. The service is abysmal, though; the waiters impossible to get a hold of (even when you want to order, you're often left sitting for up to 15 minutes). The delivery is worse--both times I've gotten Havana Central delivered, something in the order has been wrong. Tonight, after waiting over an hour for the food to come, I realized I had gotten a cuban instead of a turkey sandwich, and the food had to be sent back TWICE before the order was right. If you want okay food in the neighborhood, or a good sangria, then West End's your place. But don't expect good service, and I would advise against delivery...

While their menu is definitely Cuban, there isn't much Cuban flavor here. I was pleased to be invited for brunch there today and saw dishes I hadn't seen in other Cuban restaurants that remind me of my childhood. Today I had fried eggs with white rice and black beans and some yucca frita---something I haven't had as a dish since my dad made it for me when I was a kid. I will go there again, I'm sure. I want to try all their dishes and hope that the flavor comes through next time. Don't get me wrong--it's not bad food---just not as good as it could and should be. The staff are pleasant, but not very attentive. This is my 2nd time there and both times we've asked for items (like coffee) that never came. The Cuban sandwich is better (and bigger) than a lot of other places, but expensive. You can skip the Mojitos.

My husband and I had dinner at Havana Central shortly after it opened. The food was just ok and the service was less than stellar. In fact, the waiter forgot our drinks the whole meal---even water! We gave Havana Central another chance last night, this time as part of a group. The food was still just ok (we had the pork sandwiches and chips & guacamole...which came all at once, but whatever), but the service was even worse than before. In addition to what appeared to be the normal level of inattentiveness for all the tables around us, we were graced with a server who seemed completely uninterested in our group. Right at the beginning he brought the wrong drink to me. No big deal, right? I exchanged it without a problem. The problem came with the bill: our server had not adjusted the price difference. When I mentioned it to him, he said, "it's only a dollar." He didn't change our bill. We took the difference out of his tip. It was only a dollar. PS The pork was greasy on the outside and dry. The bread was not grilled, but painted with margarine then toasted. I have to say, however, that the guacamole was really good. Unfortunately for Havana Central, that is not enough to make me want to go back. Fortunately for Havana Central, there are a lot of college-age kids in the area who probably couldn't care less about the food or the service.

The place was fantastic. The service was awesome - we were very well attended. The food tasted very good, and the general atmosphere was incredible. The place looks awesome, and was definitely a great choice. Prices are great too. Absolutely recommend it!

My roommates and I were excited to try this place, because it's nearby and I've always enjoyed the food and drinks at the Havana in midtown. However, our visit was poor from the moment we walked in the door. First, our party of five asked to be seated at a table, only to be interrogated about what exactly we planned on ordering. The rude hostess explained that if we were only having drinks and appetizers we would have to sit at the bar. I might have understood this if the place was full, if there was a wait, or even if it was dinnertime, but it was 9:30 on a Friday and about half the tables were open as opposed to about two barstools. Having convinced her we would order entrees, she then disappeared for an extremely long time to "find" us a table. After several minutes of standing there in the front of the restaurant, we were toying with the idea of seating ourselves at an open table outside when a manager approached us and asked if we were being helped. We said we'd like a table, and could we just have that one there? He said sure, grabbed some menus and started to walk us over. Right about this time the hostess shows back up. "Oh, you wanted to sit outside?" she said angrily. "You should have told me that! Why didn't you tell me that??" Her tone of voice was entirely unacceptable and was remarked upon by everyone in our group. Having been seated, we waited about ten minutes before a server ever bothered to show up. Our drinks and food took forever to arrive. The sangria tasted like kool-aid, the tortilla chips were so bland and stale they were nearly inedible, and the empanadas were cold and nowhere near as tasty as the ones I remember eating at the midtown location. The icing on the cake of our whole experience was when we had a friend join us unexpectedly and we tried to get him a chair. They finally did, but first told us that it would be against some sort of fire code if they brought an extra chair over...despite the availability of several chairs.

After reading the reviews here about how good the paella is at this restaurant, I decided to have dinner there tonight. The paella was nothing to praise about. The shrimp had no flavor, nor did the mussels or the clams. I've had paellas all over the city and this one of my most disappointing experiences.