For a lot of Miami families, Sunday lunch had one address: Havana Harry's, at 4612 S. Le Jeune Road in Coral Gables. After more than a year away, the restaurant announced on October 2 that it is getting ready to welcome guests back this fall, with a renovated dining room and the Cuban dishes people have been missing.

A Coral Gables tradition since 1995

Havana Harry's opened in 1995 and spent three decades as the place for birthday dinners, post-graduation celebrations, quick weekday lunches and long family meals where the plates kept coming. It built its name on big portions, Cuban classics with a Latin American accent, and desserts that turned a simple lunch into an event. Its flan won awards, and its mojito was once voted among Miami's ten best.

The restaurant first told fans in August 2025 that a refreshed Havana Harry's would return in fall 2026. Its newest announcement says the wait is nearly over and the doors are getting ready to open again.

What the new room looks like

Rather than a quick touch-up, the renovation reached throughout the restaurant. The new dining room has green leather booths, lush greenery, mosaic details and Cuban-inspired artwork, with a warmer and more modern feel. The restaurant's own tagline for the reopening sums up the goal: a new look, with the same Cuban soul. The idea is a space that works as well for a quick cafecito in the morning as it does for a family dinner or a celebration with friends.

The dishes coming back

Regulars can relax: the menu is not being reinvented. Havana Harry's says the classics are returning, starting with the dish most people order without opening the menu, the Chicken Vaca Frita: crispy shredded chicken cooked with onions, garlic and the house seasoning. Ropa vieja, arroz con pollo, lechoncita, Cuban sandwiches, tostones and croquetas are all on the way back too.

Breakfast returns as well, with Cuban morning plates alongside café con leche, cortadito and colada for the office. And the desserts, which became almost as famous as the meals, are coming back with them: traditional flan, tres leches and the over-the-top Overdose milkshakes that have been showing up on Miami birthday tables for years.

Why it matters on Le Jeune Road

Coral Gables has changed a great deal since 1995, and so has South Le Jeune Road. Plenty of restaurants have come and gone, and dining rooms around the city have gotten sleeker and pricier. Havana Harry's mattered because it stayed the same kind of place: generous, familiar and reasonably priced, the restaurant where three generations could sit at one table and each find something to order. The restaurant's own message to Miami is that the recipes, the hospitality and the spirit behind the place are staying, and the refreshed room simply gives those traditions a new setting.

That is why this reopening travels by text message. Ask anyone who grew up in the Gables, South Miami or Westchester where their family went after a graduation or a first communion, and a lot of them will name this corner.

How to know when it opens

Havana Harry's has not yet posted an exact reopening date or new hours. The restaurant has said it will share opening updates, hours and special launch details as the date gets closer, through its website, its newsletter sign-up and its Instagram. Until then, online ordering through the site is the place to check for when the kitchen is back up and running.

When it does open, expect a crowd from the neighborhood and from everyone who moved away and still drives back for this food. A weekday breakfast in the first weeks is the low-stress way in: a colada, a Cuban breakfast plate and a first look at the new booths. Save the Sunday family lunch, and the Overdose shake, for once the dust has settled.