Typical Cuban food, amazing for the variety of dishes, the good seasoning and the amounts served, is usually saved for Christmas' Eve, New Year's Eve or big family occasions.

It all begins drinking iced beer, Bucanero or Cristal, with crisp pork rinds. Women are in charge of the black beans, yucca with a garnish of chopped parsley and onion with lemon; plenty of white rice, malanga or corn fritters, fried banana patty and tomato salad with lettuce. Men, gathered at the courtyard, see to the roast pig, which is placed on a spike above the charcoal fire, covered with leaves from a guava tree and sprinkled with sour orange juice from time to time. This can take several hours but, meanwhile, they keep on talking and drinking beers. Everything is served in dishes, except the pork, which is placed on a tray at the centre of the table. Cubans like to eat everything together, usually on the same plate. During dinner, beer and cold water are the beverages. Typical desserts are guava marmalade with yellow cheese slices and yucca crullers in anise-flavoured syrup. Having eaten to the point of contentment, they drink rum and dance till daybreak.