The Columbia Restaurant Spanish Cookbook

In this narrated cookbook, Adela Hernandez Gonzmart and Ferdie Pacheco memorialize their passion for the Columbia, the nation's largest Spanish restaurant and Florida's oldest restaurant. This special 115th anniversary edition of The Columbia Restaurant Spanish Cookbook features a touching foreword by Andrea Gonzmart Williams, granddaughter of Adela. Adela's affair with food is a family legacy that began in the early twentieth century, when her grandfather Casimiro Hernandez emigrated from Cuba to Tampa. In 1905, Casimiro purchased a small corner cafe, where he started selling soup, sandwiches, and coffee. Out of gratitude to his new country, he named his small cafe Columbia, after the personification of America in the popular song "Columbia, Gem of the Ocean." Prophetically, he added this motto to his sign: "The Gem of All Spanish Restaurants." Casimiro became known for dishes that the Columbia still serves today--Spanish bean soup, his hearty creation that combines sausage, garbanz