Two World-Famous Chefs Opening A Restaurant in...Cuba

On Sunday, Enrique Olvera — chef-owner of Pujol in Mexico City, ranked #10 in The Daily Meal's 101 Best Restaurants in Latin American and the Caribbean and currently ranked by Restaurant Magazine as the 20th best restaurant in the world, and of Cosme, just opened to much anticipation in New York City — tweeted (in Spanish) that "In a stroke of good luck," Pujol and Mugaritz had signed an agreement to collaborate on a restaurant in Havana.

Mugaritz is a Michelin two-star establishment (ranked #31 in The Daily Meal's 101 Best Restaurants in Europe 2014 and named the sixth best restaurant in the world, according to Restaurant Magazine) in Rentería, in Spain's Basque Country, run by Andoni Luis Aduriz, a frequent collaborator with Ferran Adrià and one of the most adventurous of Spain's avant-garde chefs. Olvera's Mexico City restaurant is known for its reimagining of traditional Mexican cuisine. Requests to both chefs for details on the style of food they will be serving, as well as other details, have not yet been answered, but watch this space.

Cuba's tentative liberalization under President Raúl Castro now makes provision for private enterprise in the communist nation, but for-profit businesses are very heavily taxed. Previously, under the communist regime, the only legal privately run restaurants in Cuba were the so-called paladares, small, primarily family-run establishments, permitted under the reform laws of 1993.