On Café Tropical reopening day, the community gathers around an iconic Cuban café in LA

A line snaked out the door all Saturday morning, and guests peered through the front windows at trays of guava pastelitos sitting on cooling racks.

Families, dates, babies and the occasional puppy streamed through the room, which echoed with excited hums at the corner of Sunset and Silver Lake Boulevards. The grand reopening of the Cuban restaurant and community space Café Tropical It was in full swing and at least one version of the legendary Pastelitos sold out within the first two hours of business.

“We got beaten down in the best way possible,” Ed Cornell said.

Cornell and his friends Danny Khorunzhiy and Rene Navarrette helped revive the community event Closed abruptly at the end of November partly due to a Lawsuit, financing and a family feud between previous owners after almost 50 years of business. Not only did it serve as one of the last remaining Cuban-American restaurants in LA, but also a safe haven for those in recoverythe adjacent meeting room hosts countless sobriety support groups for many, including some of its new owners.

They opened quietly again with a soft launch last Thursdaythen fully opened the doors to the throngs of guests over the weekend and began meeting again on Monday evening.

Local resident Katherine Tabor has been visiting the cafe for about 20 years and has seen it survive several Silver Lake eras, the neighborhood's increasing popularity, higher cost of living and gentrification. She noted that Cafe Tropical remained “a pillar of the community.”

On reopening day, she and her dog Levi sat in a booth at the back of the restaurant. The room is cleaner and shinier, she said, and she's looking forward to getting back to its usual wear and tear, but otherwise everything is the same. Possibly even better.

She'd chosen a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich – which she thought was even better than the last bacon, egg and cheese sandwich she'd ordered there from a previous owner – as well as a guava pastelito.

“It's part of my Saturday morning ritual and I was really disappointed to see it closed,” Tabor said. “It’s very low-key, unpretentious and a staple in the neighborhood, so I’m really glad it’s back.”

The new owners have spent the last few weeks quietly preparing the space and tinkering with recipes; The Breakfast Sandwich and Jerk Chicken Sandwich are now served on Jamaican coconut bread with a golden crust. And although the Cubano bread has the same basic recipe, it is now seasoned a little differently. In addition to the classic sweet and savory pastelitos, a new rotating yeast donut will be offered – currently filled with a pastry cream with a hint of locally grown orange.

“We definitely hit reset on everything, but keep in mind that a lot of people would feel very strongly about certain things,” Cornell said, adding, “We are now responsible for something that is really important to a lot of people. “, and we just hope we do it justice [and] make people happy.”

Cornell, formerly of the nearby restaurant Quarter Sheets, has been overseeing the menu and hopes to add some dishes from the cafe's previous incarnation, such as whole round guava cakes. At some point, he said, the restaurant could reopen for evening service.

While Cornell and the team are reinventing some products, they're also using some iconic recipes from the past, thanks largely to the help of longtime employee Pascual Guachiac, who ran the previous pastry program.

On reopening day, Guachiac spread buttercream over trays of flaky, fresh-from-the-oven pastelitos in the back of the restaurant. He had long hoped to become a partner in the company, and he is now an investor in the new Café Tropical. Other employees – some of them remained unpaid after the sudden closure – have also returned, including Manuel Contreras, who ran Café Tropical.

Toks Shoyoye sat in the corner furthest from the entrance, eating a Cubano.

The self-proclaimed “coffee nerd” is part of the new team and helps with the coffee program with lattes, cortaditos and café con leche. He buys their beans from Highland Park roaster Collage Coffee.

He enjoys seeing the mix of guests not only enjoying their coffee and pastelitos at the cafe, but also those looking forward to visiting the community room for sobriety meetings, including some of his friends.

“I never used it, but I’m glad it’s back,” Shoyoye said. “It is a great joy that it is back; There is also a great sense of relief.”

Kyle Charmit, who had attended meetings in the adjacent room for seven years, drove in from West LA the morning of the reopening. The cafe's support group has always been one of the most welcoming, he said, and the meetings took place in a space that always felt comfortable to him.

“When they closed, we lost our meeting point and had to reschedule the meeting,” he said. “But with the power of love, the power of AA and a lot of people trying to help, they were able to bring this place back. “So I really wanted to bring my family to support me, meet my friends, be together and just enjoy this Cuban cuisine.”

He sat next to his mother, Cristina, and his sister, Larissa; The Charmits are Brazilian and they said this food reminded them of their own.

The whole family has been visiting Cafe Tropical for years. Larissa brought Kyle to Cafe Tropical for the first time and immediately fell in love with the mango smoothie, an item she hopes the new owners would bring back.

Larissa once lived near the cafe and came by almost every day to meet with her mother and her friend over pastries and sandwiches – sometimes, she said, her mother told her not to go without guava and cheese pastelitos come round .

That morning her brother contacted her and told her he was coming over and would she like to join him? It was the first time she had heard of Café Tropical reopening, and even though she no longer lives nearby, she jumped at the chance and said she could meet him there in half an hour.

The food, Larissa said, was as good as always. They all sat together, their backs against the seafoam-green cabin, and called the return “a triumph” – and a kind of life cycle.

“It's a win for all of us because I can come here and enjoy breakfast with my family,” Kyle Charmit said, “and [for] Personally, be clean and sober. It’s like we’ve come full circle.”

Café Tropical is located at 2900 Sunset Blvd. in Los Angeles, open Tuesday through Sunday from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m