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The Columbia Restaurant Spanish Cookbook
*"Five Forks"--Spanish government ranking
*"Recommended"-- AAA Travel Guide and Mobil Travel Guide
*Golden Spoon Award-- Florida Trend
*"A Spanish happening not to be found elsewhere."-- Holiday Magazine
*Epicurean Rendezvous Award for "The best restaurant in Tampa, Florida"-- Fortune Magazine
*Fine Dining Hall of Fame Award-- Nation's Restaurant News Out of secrets and dreams and romance, Adela Hernandez Gonzmart and Ferdie Pacheco memorialize their passion for the Columbia in this narrated cookbook inspired by the nation's largest Spanish restaurant and Florida's oldest restaurant.
Adela's affair with food is a family legacy that began more than 90 years ago, when her beloved grandfather Casimiro emigrated from Cuba to Tampa, then a little town on Florida's west coast. There, amid scrub palmettos and rattlesnakes, an enclave of Cubans, Spaniards, and Italians worked in the growing cigar industry in a neighborhood known as Ybor City.
Casimiro Hernandez found work, saved his money, and in 1905 purchased a bar, where he started selling soup, sandwiches, and coffee. Out of gratitude to his new country, he named his small café the Columbia, after the personification of America in the popular song "Columbia, Gem of the Ocean." Prophetically, he added this motto to his "The Gem of All Spanish Restaurants."
This book is both a history of the elegant family restaurant, which now boasts six locations in Florida, and a cookbook of 178 recipes that make them famous. It is also the biography of Adela, the heart of the Columbia, with commentary by Ferdie Pacheco, television's "fight doctor," Ybor City's famous raconteur, and Adela's neighbor as they grew up together in Ybor City.
Casimiro became known for dishes that the Columbia still serves--Spanish bean soup, his lusty creation that combines sausage, garbanzo beans, and potatoes in a beef stock; arroz con pollo , a classic chicken and rice dish; an authentic Cuban sandwich; and the 1905 salad, dressed with the family's special blend of fresh garlic, oregano, wine vinegar, lemon juice, and Spanish olive oil.
Pijuan, Casimiro's fabled chef from the kitchen of King Alfonso XIII of Spain, contributed numerous works of art, such as pompano papillot and steak capuchina . Adela and Ferdie now reveal the best of these recipes and offer many others, giving lovers of good food the opportunity to bring home the aroma, the seasonings, and the glamour of the Columbia, the gem of all Spanish restaurants.
Adela Hernandez Gonzmart was born two blocks from the Columbia Restaurant. After graduating from the Juilliard School of Music, she toured the United States and Cuba as a concert pianist. After her marriage to violinist Cesar Gonzmart, she performed with such entertainers as Liberace, Ernesto Lecuona, and Amparo Hurb. She was instrumental in forming the Tampa Symphony Orchestra and has received countless honors from organizations in the Tampa Outstanding Citizen of the Year awards from the Tampa Museum Society and the Optimist Club, Hispanic Woman of the Year from the Hispanic Heritage League, Paulo Longo Award from the Italian Club, and the Centro Asturiano Award for contributions to the Latin community, as well as awards from the community Red Cross, Salvation Army, Girl Scouts, and Arts Council and other awards for civic service.
Ferdie Pacheco, who as a teenager worked in the Columbia Restaurant as a waiter, is the author of Ybor City Chronicles (UPF, 1994), Muhammad A View from the Corner, Fight Doctor , and Renegade Lightning . He served as Muhammad Ali's personal physician from 1963 to 1977. He is also a painter, exhibiting one-man shows in London, Paris, New York, and Miami (where he now lives), and a boxing color commentator on television. He is married to Luisita Sevilla, who danced flamenco with Los Chavales de España until Ferdie booked her into his house "for a lifetime run."
*"Recommended"-- AAA Travel Guide and Mobil Travel Guide
*Golden Spoon Award-- Florida Trend
*"A Spanish happening not to be found elsewhere."-- Holiday Magazine
*Epicurean Rendezvous Award for "The best restaurant in Tampa, Florida"-- Fortune Magazine
*Fine Dining Hall of Fame Award-- Nation's Restaurant News Out of secrets and dreams and romance, Adela Hernandez Gonzmart and Ferdie Pacheco memorialize their passion for the Columbia in this narrated cookbook inspired by the nation's largest Spanish restaurant and Florida's oldest restaurant.
Adela's affair with food is a family legacy that began more than 90 years ago, when her beloved grandfather Casimiro emigrated from Cuba to Tampa, then a little town on Florida's west coast. There, amid scrub palmettos and rattlesnakes, an enclave of Cubans, Spaniards, and Italians worked in the growing cigar industry in a neighborhood known as Ybor City.
Casimiro Hernandez found work, saved his money, and in 1905 purchased a bar, where he started selling soup, sandwiches, and coffee. Out of gratitude to his new country, he named his small café the Columbia, after the personification of America in the popular song "Columbia, Gem of the Ocean." Prophetically, he added this motto to his "The Gem of All Spanish Restaurants."
This book is both a history of the elegant family restaurant, which now boasts six locations in Florida, and a cookbook of 178 recipes that make them famous. It is also the biography of Adela, the heart of the Columbia, with commentary by Ferdie Pacheco, television's "fight doctor," Ybor City's famous raconteur, and Adela's neighbor as they grew up together in Ybor City.
Casimiro became known for dishes that the Columbia still serves--Spanish bean soup, his lusty creation that combines sausage, garbanzo beans, and potatoes in a beef stock; arroz con pollo , a classic chicken and rice dish; an authentic Cuban sandwich; and the 1905 salad, dressed with the family's special blend of fresh garlic, oregano, wine vinegar, lemon juice, and Spanish olive oil.
Pijuan, Casimiro's fabled chef from the kitchen of King Alfonso XIII of Spain, contributed numerous works of art, such as pompano papillot and steak capuchina . Adela and Ferdie now reveal the best of these recipes and offer many others, giving lovers of good food the opportunity to bring home the aroma, the seasonings, and the glamour of the Columbia, the gem of all Spanish restaurants.
Adela Hernandez Gonzmart was born two blocks from the Columbia Restaurant. After graduating from the Juilliard School of Music, she toured the United States and Cuba as a concert pianist. After her marriage to violinist Cesar Gonzmart, she performed with such entertainers as Liberace, Ernesto Lecuona, and Amparo Hurb. She was instrumental in forming the Tampa Symphony Orchestra and has received countless honors from organizations in the Tampa Outstanding Citizen of the Year awards from the Tampa Museum Society and the Optimist Club, Hispanic Woman of the Year from the Hispanic Heritage League, Paulo Longo Award from the Italian Club, and the Centro Asturiano Award for contributions to the Latin community, as well as awards from the community Red Cross, Salvation Army, Girl Scouts, and Arts Council and other awards for civic service.
Ferdie Pacheco, who as a teenager worked in the Columbia Restaurant as a waiter, is the author of Ybor City Chronicles (UPF, 1994), Muhammad A View from the Corner, Fight Doctor , and Renegade Lightning . He served as Muhammad Ali's personal physician from 1963 to 1977. He is also a painter, exhibiting one-man shows in London, Paris, New York, and Miami (where he now lives), and a boxing color commentator on television. He is married to Luisita Sevilla, who danced flamenco with Los Chavales de España until Ferdie booked her into his house "for a lifetime run."
320 pages, Hardcover
First published September 1, 1995
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
April 6, 2026
If you like Spanish and Cuban cooking and if you are a fan of the Columbia Restaurant this book is for you.
The book tells the story of the Columbia restaurant from the opening in 1905 to present day. The story of the trials and tribulations of the restaurant business is intertwined with hundreds of useful recipes divided into several chapters from eggs and omeletes, soups, salads, appetizers and snacks, drinks, meats, fish and seafood, beans and rice dishes, chicken and turkey, sauces, pasta, vegetables, and finely desserts. Many of these traditional recipes are often simple and straightforward. Some could use a bit more explanation. I wish there were more photographs of the signature dishes. These are my only criticisms.
Thus far, I have duplicated the 1905 salad several times and I am about to make the black bean soup. I love to cook and I love Cuban and Spanish food so I studied each recipe. I also appreciate the effort that the family has made over the past 110 years to make this restaurant my favorite on St. Armands Circle in Sarasota, Florida. The restaurant business has broken many a man. It was a good read.
The book tells the story of the Columbia restaurant from the opening in 1905 to present day. The story of the trials and tribulations of the restaurant business is intertwined with hundreds of useful recipes divided into several chapters from eggs and omeletes, soups, salads, appetizers and snacks, drinks, meats, fish and seafood, beans and rice dishes, chicken and turkey, sauces, pasta, vegetables, and finely desserts. Many of these traditional recipes are often simple and straightforward. Some could use a bit more explanation. I wish there were more photographs of the signature dishes. These are my only criticisms.
Thus far, I have duplicated the 1905 salad several times and I am about to make the black bean soup. I love to cook and I love Cuban and Spanish food so I studied each recipe. I also appreciate the effort that the family has made over the past 110 years to make this restaurant my favorite on St. Armands Circle in Sarasota, Florida. The restaurant business has broken many a man. It was a good read.
July 7, 2013
The Columbia restaurant is the oldest restaurant in Florida, the largest Spanish restaurant in the US. As an institution , it embodies the American dream of a multigenerational family business. This delightful book presents many of the wonderful recipes, including all my favorites, but more than that. This book recounts, through the eyes of the Gonzmart family and the large tribe of Columbia employees (many of them lifetime employees), the history and traditions of this unforgettable restaurant. So many families have made the Columbia part of their own family history and traditions, my family included, and the book fills in the backstory of our childhood memories as it deepens our understanding of many of this venerable and special restaurant's traditions and architecture and style.
February 9, 2020
Fabulous! There can't be anything more interesting to me then the history of an icon restaurant and how it melds and makes stories to tell for all involved from owners, to chefs, cooks , waitstaff, family and customers! I have the 1905 Salad on my list first then the San Isidro Salad, among other recipes that will make my table for sure!
August 31, 2026
For those of us who’ve grown up going to the Columbia, this is an incredible dive into its Cuban/Spanish recipes and heritage. Some of the recipes including the gazpacho, the 1905 Salad, the ropa vieja, and the black bean soup will forever be my favorites. And since I live so far away, I love being able to create these dishes in my own kitchen. I’m deducting one star because the format of the narrative and family timelines was often confusing. I frequently didn’t even know which decade each story was happening in.
October 31, 2014
Of the cookbooks I've been trying out on a monthly basis, this is the best so far.
The Columbia Restaurant is a Spanish/Cuban/American restaurant located in Ybor City in Tampa, FL. There are also locations, not quiet as old but by the same family and of the same name, in other places in Florida. I've eaten at The Columbia in both Ybor City and St. Augustine. I highly recommend both. I bought this cookbook at our last visit to the restaurant on our last week of living in Florida because I couldn't imagine not getting to eat their salad or salteado ever again and hoped to make them myself. I'm pleased to say that the recipes in this cookbook are incredibly close to what is served in the restaurants with a few additions that aren't on the restaurant menus. Our absolutely favorite recipe from this month is the Chicken Diablo. We also loved the white rice (not your standard white rice), Caribbean Pineapple Cake, Shrimp Salteado...well honestly, I didn't make a single recipe that I wouldn't make again. I would have rated this 5 stars except for 2 issues: 1. The recipes are repetitive. Most require the same ingredients is slightly different amounts, so it does make for a lot of similar dishes. Probably great for a restaurant in branding its food but not so much for variety at home. 2. There are several key sauces (i.e. brown sauce) needed for many recipes (i.e. a recipe may call for 1/4 cup brown sauce) that require a huge amount of time and energy to make, and make a lot more than I could use in a month. I've frozen some in parts to use later, so I'll see how it goes.
The Columbia Restaurant is a Spanish/Cuban/American restaurant located in Ybor City in Tampa, FL. There are also locations, not quiet as old but by the same family and of the same name, in other places in Florida. I've eaten at The Columbia in both Ybor City and St. Augustine. I highly recommend both. I bought this cookbook at our last visit to the restaurant on our last week of living in Florida because I couldn't imagine not getting to eat their salad or salteado ever again and hoped to make them myself. I'm pleased to say that the recipes in this cookbook are incredibly close to what is served in the restaurants with a few additions that aren't on the restaurant menus. Our absolutely favorite recipe from this month is the Chicken Diablo. We also loved the white rice (not your standard white rice), Caribbean Pineapple Cake, Shrimp Salteado...well honestly, I didn't make a single recipe that I wouldn't make again. I would have rated this 5 stars except for 2 issues: 1. The recipes are repetitive. Most require the same ingredients is slightly different amounts, so it does make for a lot of similar dishes. Probably great for a restaurant in branding its food but not so much for variety at home. 2. There are several key sauces (i.e. brown sauce) needed for many recipes (i.e. a recipe may call for 1/4 cup brown sauce) that require a huge amount of time and energy to make, and make a lot more than I could use in a month. I've frozen some in parts to use later, so I'll see how it goes.
October 19, 2024
Good favorite recipes and history
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews