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| Coconut layer cake, this and other recipes below |
During the military dictatorship of General Fulgencio Batista y Zaldívar (1952-1959), Guayos residents responded to the corruption and repression of Batista’s regime by immigrating to Brooklyn and later to Tarrytown north of the city in Westchester County. In the 1950s, job opportunities at restaurants and factories, including General Motors were abundant in the Tarrytowns. The first Cubans who came to Westchester County in the 1950s were all single men. They tended to keep to themselves or to eat, drink, and dance with Puerto Ricans, going to their bars, clubs, and ballrooms in the Tarrytowns and Manhattan. By 1977, however, there were about 3,000 Cubans living in the Tarrytowns along with a few Dominicans, Venezuelans, and lots of Puerto Ricans. Combined there were enough Spanish-speaking immigrants to support two cocktail lounges on Cortland Street, La Embajada and La Teresa, and a Venezuelan Bar and Disco called La Arriba at 11 Beekman Avenue. The Latin cocktail lounges on Cortland Street were a stone’s throw from three African American bar and grills, De Carlo’s, the Upper-Class Men, and the Wonderful Bar. Cubans also founded their own social club in uptown North Tarrytown on Beekman Avenue. As the nature of these institutions makes clear, Latino immigrants and African Americans remained within their own urban borderlands in the Tarrytowns which included ethnic bars and restaurants. Black owned eateries in the Tarrytowns had menus that included southern foods: fried chicken, potato salad, corn bread, greens, sweet potato pie, and layer cakes. Here are recipes for what I call a “black church lady’s” coconut layer cake that’s perfect for holiday guest: