Miami Croquetas and more, is a business that was born in full pandemic and today has become a reference for lovers of Cuban cuisine in exile.
“When we arrived from a trip to Spain, Sandra told me: ‘Joel, what a big thing that in Miami there is no place where one can eat a croquette with rich bechamel sauce, like my grandmother’s‘. And so everything began, ”says Joel, founder of Miami Croquetas and more, a business that was born in full pandemic and today has become a reference for lovers of Cuban cuisine in exile.
Joel and Sandra are originally from Matanzas. “I am from Cárdenas and my wife in the city of Matanzas. We study in the same vocational, with a year apart, but we never met,” he recalls. His roads crossed years later, already out of Cuba. Joel had left the country in 2009 heading to Chile, where he decided to stay. “I didn’t want to live in Cuba. I knew things were not going to end the political issue well,” he confesses. After difficult years in Chile and Spain, he finally managed to reach Miami in 2012. Sandra arrived months later, in January 2013.
The idea of undertaking came naturally. “Sandra looked for a croquette with Bechamel to remind her of her childhood. As she did not find it, she told me: ‘I will do it myself, I will remember my grandmother’s recipe and use the advice of the best chefs I can‘. He began to rehearse at home, to take them to parties … and they all told us the same thing: ‘They have to sell these croquettes‘“, Says Joel.
The project was consolidated in April 2020, in the midst of the uncertainty of the pandemic. “Sandra was between a master’s degree and the beginning of a phd, I worked in real estate and we didn’t know what was going to happen to the market. We decided to open the Miami Croquetas Facebook page and more to receive home orders,” he says. The answer was immediate. “People thanked us: ‘You are the only face I’ve seen in days’. It was an aid for them and an opportunity for us. ”
The great impulse came when the influencer Alex Otaola tried the croquettes. “That day the business changed for good. The demand shot and made ourselves known to many people who did not know about us. Today our croquettes are served in their ranch, something that makes us very proud,” says Joel.
The road has not been exempt from difficulties. “It is very difficult to start a business from scratch, more being immigrant and without capital. Sometimes we had to inject money from my work in Real Estate to keep the business afloat,” he explains. In 2023 they diversified their model: they began selling croquettes to restaurants and coffee shops and launched shipments by UPS to other states. “It was a challenge to climb the recipe without losing quality. The croquette with Bechamel is delicate, it is not like the Cuban of flour. But we succeed and now we have USDA certifications that allow us to reach more markets.”
Today, Miami croquetas and more offers more than ten flavors of croquettes – from ham and sausage chorizo to cod and manchego cheese – in addition to tartlets, empanadas, sandwiches and other products for events. “Our dream is to bring our croquettes to supermarkets, but always maintaining the quality that characterizes us,” says Joel.
For him, the business is much more than an entrepreneurship. “I always say that our croquette is my wife’s recipe and my favorite too. Every time I can, I like one,” he confesses with a laugh. “This business is an example that, in freedom, dreams can grow. Something like that we could never have done in Cuba.”
