Photo by amarino17

Mojitos, mixto sandwiches, the cha-cha-cha and Ernest Hemingway stories are some of the cultural delights that have come out of Cuba. Being able to enjoy them inside the travel-restricted Carribean nation is a rare treat for many curious Americans. Chef Guillermo Pernot of Cuba Libre Restaurant & Rum Bar, however, is making the experience possible.

Pernot, the James Beard Award-winning restaurateur who has traveled to Cuba several times in the past year to engage with the country’s growing culinary scene, is organizing a five-day trip to Havana for 15 people this spring.

From April 20 – April 24, these travelers will dine at several of the city’s popular paladares, which are privately owned restaurants that have recently proliferated under President Raúl Castro’s economic reforms. Some of these “speakeasy eateries” are already participating in Cuba Libre’s “Pop-up Paladares,” a program that invites Cuban chefs to the restaurant to showcase their country’s new wave of cuisine.

“Over the past year at Cuba Libre, we’ve been strongly devoted to bringing our guests the authentic Cuban experience through our menus and transportive ambience,” said Pernot in a press release. “Now, we’re finally able to show them the places, taste the foods and meet the people that inspire us.”

The itinerary will also include a tour of the capital, including Old Havana, as well as a visit to the Cuban Culinary Association, an organic farm and Finca Vigía, Hemingway’s home where he wrote “For Whom the Bell Tolls” and “The Old Man and the Sea.”

The cost is hefty–at least $4,000 per person. But it’s perhaps the price to comfortably travel to a communist regime experiencing the constraints of an economic embargo with an award-winning chef and his Cuban-born wife who both have close ties to the culture (this includes her great-great grandfather who was one of the island’s early presidents). Cuba Libre has enlisted an authorized travel organization Insight Cuba to administer the legal arrangements. The all-inclusive package consists of a round-trip airfare from Miami to Cuba, a U.S. Treasury Department License and Letter of Authorization, five-star hotel accommodations, paid meals, an English-speaking Cuban tour guide, all entrance fees for scheduled activities, all ground transportation to scheduled destinations and emergency-related fees. For more details, contact CubaTrip@cubalibrerestaurant.com.