Cañamelao

So good. Our host was patient, considerate, and helpful as we worked through the unfamiliar menu.
The food was unpretentious and wonderfully tasty. Just what I would hope to find in a neighbour hood restaurant.
The service was quick and friendly.
Of note, the garlic ship was delicious … ¹⁰⁄₁₀.

Really good little spot for cuban/​colombian food and coffee. I have lunch here all the time and my friends and I always enjoy it! Service is awesome everyone here is so sweet!

Love this place! They have the best platanos maduros! Their guava empanadas are also delicious. The portions are huge, and extremely affordable. A bang for your buck. The servers are friendly. BYOB is a plus! Liquor store is across the street.

Love that this place is so close to me. Have gotten Breakfast, lunch and dinner here and have yet to be let down! Everything is delicious, big portions and great prices! Do yourself a favor on go on over and try anything and everything :)

Great Colombian and Cuban food, very tasty and authentic food, lots of things to chose from, Love the empanadas, soups, rice beans, the pernil is delicious. Very clean place and the staff is very friendly. I Highly recommend this place, it is my favorite spot. Delicious !!!

This place has delicious food. The portions are incredibly huge, very generous. The food is seasoned very well, has lots of flavor. Service is awesome! They care about their customers. Happy to keep coming back!

Very good and testy food 5 stars for the food and customers service It’s a great place
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED for delicious food …

I was craving a good old school Cuban sandwich, I have tried many in the area and nothing was really good until I found this place. Bread was soft steak was juicy, Soo yummy. After this we came back again and the food was just delicious, the waitresses are friendly and the prices are great. My new favorite spot.

Food was great, portions were huge and the prices are low. The atmosphere is what I imagine Cuba to be like. Will def go back and recommend it to anyone!

Living in an area with plenty latin restaurants it’s not difficult to compare and be critical, specially for a picky eater like me. My biggest complaint about Cuban or Colombian places is the lack of freshness and the emphasis on quantity over quality. I can taste that the black beans are canned, the sweet plantains are frozen and the pork smells like old grease.
I saw this place and was drawn to it by the good reviews and also for the combination of two very good cuisines, Cuban and Colombian in one.
Going in, I immediately noticed the light and clean ambiance, no grease smell and the clean and quiet dinning room. They served us hot garlic bread that was delicious to start. I ordered blackberry juice in water which was freshly made and delicious. I chose the garlic shrimp with salad and sweet plantains. The shrimp was a small dish, not overflowing in oil, but with a nice fresh parsley taste. The black beans were not salty and definitely not canned. Texture and taste were like home made. My mom ordered the lemon chicken which was on the Cuban menu side. She finished the 2 portions, and loved it. It was juicy and lemony. The masitas de cerdo that my husband ordered were definitely fresh, juicy and perfectly made.
Overall, if they keep up the freshness and the quality, this restaurant is a keeper!
As far as the service, it was good enough for the great price. Nothing fancy but efficient and pleasant. The owner even came by the table to to ask if everything was ok!

It’s your run of mill food of the area. A combination of Cuban and Colombian which I normally abhor (not individually, just combining), but it tastes good. From what I hear and it’s better than the nearby but that’s not saying much. I will say it’s even better than a few other local spots. One thing I really like is that they serve salad on the plate, a rarity in Latin American cuisine, oh and it has dressing (even more rare). Now, I’ve only had 2 plates, but both the masitas de cerdo and ropa vieja were good.

These guys rule! Super friendly, great breakfast food. I recommend the avocado arepa combo. I go there for breakfast every chance I get and if I don’t feel like going, they deliver they’re so polite, but some of their employees don’t speak much English, I never mind that, but it’s something to know.

Great authentic Spanish/​Latin food. I can even eat here with my gluten allergy. That is priceless!

Been coming to this spot since it opened. Not only is the food wonderful, authentic and consistently delicious, the people who work here are always pleasant and happy. And, if all of that wasn’t enough, the place is BYOB… There are a lot of restaurants in this neighborhood, but none like this. The place feels like grandmas house.
Healthy portions, BYOB, Good prices and friendly people… what more can you ask for???

Pernil, rice and beans, maduros, café con leche. That was my lunch and I enjoyed every spoonful of it. Love this place and the food is super tasty.

First time here and it was worth the short trip-​in my neighborhood. This place is clean, great food and reasonable. They give you a lot for your money.

This place is great. The shakes are the best. The consistency is very good. The fruit shakes are almost like a milk shake. The staff is very accommodating and they don’t rush you out. All the food I’ve tried has been good and very home style.

The best! Been waiting to try this spot! So glad today is that day! Fresh Cuban/​Columbian food… period! Did I say FRESH! Keyword people! Oh and no comparison to El Unico next door, I’ve eating there a couple of times (just because it was really cheap) but you get what you pay for I guess… never again!
This place is my new spot! Keep it up Cañamelao! Salute!

It took me awhile to go here, but now it’s a frequent spot, everything I have tried is delicious, the food is always fresh, and the service is always great. I love their daily specials. The Café con leche is amazing I could drink it all day!

There’s something really sweet about the lady making your coffee belt out bachata while doing so… can’t get that at a hipster java joint lol (i love them so much though)
Decided to skip my usual place and my beloved iced latte to try this fairly new spot my friend has been raving about.
I decided to stop in on my way to work. Ordered a café con leche. So good but kinda expected. Living in the area has really spoiled me with amazing coffee. I also ordered pan con mantequilla which some people may ask «you paid for bread and butter??». Yes I did. This is for sure a traditional and common breakfast in Latin America. And no, it’s nothing like the toast you get at a diner! Traditionally they use pan de agua, a very soft loaf that they split, cover in butter and press like a panini. #delish… the bread this morning was good, not the best. After a few minutes got cold and a little hard. It was decent though. I also ordered a beef pastelillo (fried empanada). It was VERY good and maybe my favorite thing that I ordered.
Overall a typical local Union City restaurant. Would love to go back to try more stuff.
Also if anyone can figure out if the owners are Cuban or Colombian let me know. That might help guide for better options when ordering.

Can’t believe I haven’t updated my review. This place is great the food is great the owner is very friendly and the prices are reasonable. This area, despite what many Ppl want to think, is predominantly hispanic, so yes, if you’re a non Spanish speaking person it may be hard for you, but the girls that work there r so friendly, I’m sure they’ll try if you try.
. I’ve had tons of different meals here, all cooked very we’ll. I love their Cuban sandwiches, the meats on it are always very fresh. Coffee is good here (_​yes, you can make a bad cup of coffee) empanadas are good (although, I hate their aji — its just store bought hot sauce with some cilantro in it). They also make fresh squeezed juices. My favorite is all 4 — carrot, celery, apple, and orange. I just wish they would put it over ice, but if u ask for a cup with ice they will gladly appease. Last but not least, the prices are soooooooo reasonable. I wish they would raise their prices by like fifty cents to a dollar!!! They deserve to do well!

This place is great, cheap and clean. I grew up around the area and recently moved back. Their Cuban food is fresh and tasty without being overly greasy.
Not sure what the issue is with the person who gave 1 star — it’s not a tourist place and up until recently it’s been a predominantly Spanish area — they don’t say anything because the don’t speak english very well!!! Really 1 star because you can’t bother to try! ?
If you live nearby, try it and judge yourself. Breakfast is cheap and delicious with café con leche included.

This restaurant opened a few months ago down the street from my apartment, which I was really excited about since getting to the Colombian restaurants on Bergenline is such a hassle because driving and parking is awful.
I’m Colombian, so I was pretty familiar with the offerings on the menu. If you’re not a Spanish speaker, the menu has English translations to help you know what you are getting. The portions are generous. If you’ve never had Colombian food, I highly recommend that you pair the food with one of the fruit batidos. That’s the way God intended it.
I ordered the arroz con pollo. The chicken was very moist and tender. The Colombian empanadas were okay. Not great. I guess if I wanted great empanadas I would get them from my mother.
The bar area is beautiful, and they have a ton of fresh baked goods and coffee to go around. They serve breakfast all day, so I am looking forward to heading there when it’s 5’o clock on a Saturday and I’m craving an arepa.
I think you’ll have a great meal at this restaurant if you know what to expect. This are Colombian/​Cuban classics, made like your mother would make them. This is not gourmet, but it is quite tasty.
Things that I would change:
1. Simplify the menu. There are so many items that are duplicates or just slight variations on the same theme. It’s really overwhelming. Also, there’s no reason for the menu to include all the specials of each day of the week. Just have a separate menu for each day. It’ll make the ordering process a lot easier.
2. Remove the tacky ads from the windows. The interior of the restaurant has been beautifully renovated. You’d get a lot more people inside the door if they were able to see what the atmosphere is like. The restaurant is BYOW, which is something that appeals to a more American crowd. The American crowd won’t come in and BYOW if they can’t even see what the place looks like. Additionally, I love to sit by the windows at restaurants to be able to people watch, and I know a lot of people love to do that as well. With the ads, I wasn’t able to enjoy the view on a beautiful spring day at all.