Pepo's Cafe - St. Petersburg

My friend and I decided to go here because we eat Cuban food. This restaurant is more buffet style with most dishes already cooked on the menu. I bought a chicken breast with onions and paprika, Spanish beans, yellow rice and 2 cattle emanadas. The empanadas were not good at all. The yellow rice and Spanish beans were delicious. The chicken breast and the paprika were just fine. The staff was friendly.

9939. St. North St. Petersburg, FL 33702 Tuesday, 20. September 20, 2022 Welcomed by friendly staff Furnishing Clean Comfortable Interior Temperature No line Waiting at this time Arrived Order at the counter: 4:40 pm We ordered both El Habano Cubano, an order from Fritten that we shared and 2 drinks. It was a traditional Cuban sandwich consisting of roasted pork, ham, salami and Swiss cheese with mustard and a spear by Dill Pickel. Delicious. For dessert we had a piece of chocolate cake and it was amazing over the top. We can't wait to go back.

This restaurant is absolutely horrible! Every time we order food and drive it home just 1 mile, the food ends up opened and spilled at the bottom of the bag. On multiple occasions, within 12 to 24 hours, we have gotten sick and we believe it may be due to the food or potentially contaminated thank you bags that the food is always spilled in. It is not worth getting sick over, and the staff has been rude about it as well. We had to throw away $14 worth of food and then figure out what to eat for dinner after a 10 hour work day, and it was already 8:00. There are plenty of other great Cuban restaurants with friendly staff that we will be visiting instead. See the included picture that literally made me feel sick to my stomach.

I had a very interesting experience at this restaurant. The rice was served cold, so I asked for it to be warmed up. It took them 15 minutes to bring it back to me, but unfortunately, it was so hot that I couldn't even eat it without it leaving an unpleasant aftertaste. Additionally, there was no water provided at the table. Overall, the service was lacking.

So, we were on the way to Weedon Island (which is AWESOME [see my review] and good old Google suggested Pepo's. Don't be put-off by the outside. Sometimes, such places serve the best food around and...we were NOT dissapointed! Everything is authentic Cuban and the food was crazy-good! I had the Cuban pork on a Cuban roll (instead of the wrap and my wife had the Chicken with rice and black beans and both were outstanding! The staff were very friendly and you could tell the customers were loyal locals who knew where to get great Cuban food. So, if you ate looking to pick up something on the way to Weedon, don't even think about going somewhere else!