Cuban Medianoche Sandwich

Miami's sunny landscape is dotted with palm trees and just as many Cuban cafés like La Carreta, Oasis, and Versailles. These are establishments where you can have a seated meal, but what's more charming is the invitation to walk up to an outdoor counter and order a quick breakfast of café con leche and tostadas, an afternoon caffeine lightning bolt of concentrated cortadito or café cubano, and, late at night, a medianoche sandwich.

This habit of eating on your feet among a friendly crowd, where everyone seems to know each other, and melodious Spanish is spoken almost exclusively, has its roots in Havana. Cubans who fled to Miami brought with them their unmistakable accent, their food, and their gregarious eating customs.

I've heard that after a long night of dancing, people would stop for a medianoche, so named as an allusion to the time it was often eaten: at midnight. The pressed, toasted sandwich is traditionally made with pan suave, a sweet egg bread similar to challah or Hawaiian bread, while the filling is typically lechón (marinated and slow-roasted whole pig), ham, cheese, pickles, butter, and mustard. Sweet, salty, and deeply satisfying, it's a sandwich you'll crave at all times of the day.

For this recipe, I took a a couple slight shortcuts to make this easier for the home cook. First, given that most of us don't usually have lechón sitting around from which to rip off hunks of tender roast pork. Instead, quick-cooking pork tenderloin makes for an easy and still incredibly delicious substitute. I rub it down with mojo, a mixture of orange juice, lime juice, lots of garlic, oregano, and a dash of cumin, then roast it just until perfectly cooked through to prevent it from drying out. Once chilled and sliced, it an ideal stand-in for lechón.

Second, medianoches are usually made with "pan suave," a soft, sweet egg bread. Since it is not widely available, I've substituted it with 6-inch challah rolls, which are sweet and soft like the original. That said, if you can find pan suave, use it.

Once the sandwiches are assembled, it's important to press them well while toasting them. If you have a panini press, you can use that. Otherwise, the easiest thing to do is to set a second heavy skillet on top of the first, and then press down on that. Only with enough pressure will you achieve the sandwich's signature compact, crisp look.