I have driven by this Cuban restaurant on Hillsborough Ave hundreds of times, so I finally stopped in on a Friday for lunch. It's a small place, with a counter when you first walk in, then about ten tables to sit at to the right. I was sat right away as there was only one other couple in the place at the time. The good: Service was quick and friendly, and in no time my order for grilled grouper was in, and I had my water to drink. Plus, complimentary bread with garlic butter spread on top was brought out, and it was delicious. The okay: My food came quickly, and sadly, my grouper was not cooked all the way through, so I had to send it back. Once it returned it was good, although a bit more garlicky than I had expected. The yuca and tostones served with it were excellent. The not great: The menu is in Spanish with brief English descriptions (mine simply said "grouper" on the menu). I wish it was a bit more explanatory. Also, for being so small, the place was surprisingly loud. The chef in the back was non-stop pounding on something, a baby was crying, and another customer was talking loudly on his phone the entire time, plus television and overhead music were on. Finally, they automatically added on a "Thanks (10%)" on to the bill, and didn't say anything about it. Is that a non-Cuban person tax? A tax for being a woman? A solo-person tax? I could understand it if I were getting an item to go, but not for someone dining in. I was very tempted not to add anything additional, but felt too guilty, and did. One and done; this just wasn't my kind of place. read more

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El servicio muy bueno. La mesera muy atenta y al pendiente del servicio! Los tostones rellenos deliciosos!

Go to take out Cuban pizza for my wife, she likes the ham and pineapple. Would highly recommend ! Will be back soon .

Parece que estamos en cuba, pero no en la cuba de antes, en la cuba de ahora que nada está bueno. Empezando que no había hielo para el batido, ni las bebidas; los refrescos calientes. Después no había panes de aperitivos xq no hay con que hacer la salsa. Los tostones sin la decoración que trae en la foto. El congrio estaba duro y los platanitos fritos de Goya. El espagueti frío, no había condimentos en la mesa. La pizza llegó a la hora de irnos y quemada, ah y la masa ácida. La comida fría y las bebidas caliente. El baño sucio, en fin, muy mala experiencia y para colmo la propina incluida. Yo como dueña de negocio no me gustaría un comentario así pero hay que decir la verdad para que los clientes sepan la situación del lugar, los 100 dólares mas malgastados de mi vida. read more

If you are disable on Friday night you can not park on the disability parking space per management. They said it is night club night and you can not park in here after I park even to eat. Rude security acting like the SWAT Team. Guess who was parking at the disable parking the security. You are violating our rights. Food and drinks were not that great! read more

Food tasted great and was well presented. The server was super attentive. I have been eating at La giraldilla for about 6 years.

Wonderful Paella for a birthday celebration. Nice staff Clean restaurant. Excellent portions ! The Yucca was delicious! We highly recommend! read more

La Giraldilla - Our Birthday Paella - Cuban Near Me - Tampa, Florida

Not good at all. Si eres cubano buscando un lugar de comida cubana no pierdas tu tiempo. Estuve una semana con maleza estomacal por una carne vieja recalentada read more

Service was awesome and I can honestly say this has been my favorite pollo a la plancha in all of Tampa! Juicy and flavorful. read more

La Giraldilla - Cuban Near Me - Tampa, Florida

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Muy mala comida una crema Virginia fria, el jugo con gusto s viejo y el vaso con olor a huevo no se lo recomiendo a nadie

This place is amazing, I have been visiting it since it opened years ago. The food is delicious the cuban pizzas, creams, but my favorite that I tried today was the 8oz Lobster $24. I got what I paid for it was enormous delicious. Best lobster i have ever tried in the US. They gave you free bread with oil and garlic toasted, was awesome. Cant recommend it more. The customer service was great and the staff was very friendly. My congratulations to the chef. read more

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Pretty good! The pescado empanizado, cafe con leche, and bread were very good. The Cuban sandwich was good with real pork. And it's open on Sunday's. read more

Been there twice , excellent food and service both times. Chorizo pizza was great. Glass of wine was mammoth!

This is one of my favorite restaurants in Tampa. Delicious, authentic, Cuban food. Love it here!

Service really good and fast .. fried pork good.. garden salad horrible looks like it's old nothing fresh.. don't get breaded steak really bad and hard.. sangria great ! read more

Very disappointing. Slow service and after 45 minutes of waiting for our food to arrive, we finally offered to pay for our sodas and leave. Someone should have approached us to explain the delay. Inexcusable customer service. NO STARS! read more

Went there on a Sunday night. The parking lot was full but not many customers inside. We went inside and the lady that was at the register just said go ahead and seat wherever you want without even looking at us. We picked a table and waited there without anyone acknowledging us. If you are not Cuban prepared to be ignored, they definitely discriminate people. After 10 minutes we just decided to leave. They didn't even attempt to ask us to stay. If you want pizza just go across the street to ABC pizza. Don't even bother or waster your time at this place. We just wanted to try something new but clearly they are not interested on earning your business. read more

Really great and authentic Cuban cuisine. I come here often and every dish I have had from the palomilla to the pizza is delicious. All plates are very large and fairly priced. Great bang for our buck. read more

Horrible experience . We been there yesterday with some friends. Long time waiting, costumer reclaim for food never come to the table,somebody ask for pizza they just forget including in the order and when they bring to table was no ready. We order milanese steak wao!!!!! Extremely overcook you cant even cutting ,beans come to the table late and the banana plantain was just ridiculous. We choose this place yesterday but am not recommended to nobody. read more

Mediocre cuban place. Service one word BAD. not that treat you bad just one waiter for 10 tables obviously she cant cope. I had to leave because started to wonder if i was invisible.. Then another time sticky it out nd had to wait wait too lo longfor such small place read more

I do not understand the bad reviews for this restaurant. I haven't had the food, just the pizza. So, this review will be for the Cuban pizza and the service. The girl that waited on us was wonderful. She was extremely nice, with all the warmth and welcoming disposition of the Cuban people's culture. The pizza was outstanding, so was the mango shake, and the espresso at the end to seal the meal. I will be definitely going again. read more

Horrible service and food. Just went and Cuban pizza was tasteless. Arroz Moro wasnt hot. Platanitos maduros were dry. Asked waitress for a kids menu and the couldn't find it. So she said the had chicken fingers, I told here I wanted that with rice and beans for my 2 yr old son. When food was brought out, she brought tenders and fries plus a full order of rice and beans. I told her that didn't make sense. She said she understood, but seemed clueless. Didn't remove rice and beans even thought they weren't eaten. Definitely horrible experience. read more

Visited there on a Thursday night. Service was very slow when we were there. Sat at the bar and it took forever. Also, and this is probably the worst part, we don't know Spanish and when we went in there was nobody working there who spoke English well at all. Won't return, which sucks because we had high expectations as we live nearby. read more

First and foremost I didn't even see my husband's plate of food because he practically inhaled it. It was a busy night, but we were still given great, quick service. Our waitress was very attentive and quite friendly. I ordered the ropa vieja with yellow rice and yuca. Sadly they ran out of yuca earlier. As I picked up the pieces of my broken heart off of the floor, I decided to settle with tostones. Just kidding, that's super dramatic - I do enjoy yuca but this place had so much promise that I didn't even mind. My husband apparently had the pollo empanado with arroz moro but like I said, it was inhaled. My food came out and with it came my husband's fork reaching across the table. After an exchange of unkind words (don't touch my food) I was able to enjoy every bite of the mess of colorful rags before me. We'll be back here next week. read more

If there was anything less than a star this restaurant would get it. I close by and my husband and I have driven past this place so many times we decided to finally get food here. When we came inside there was only 1 groups of 5 people sitting ordering in while we were sitting at the bar ordering out. We made an order of 4 things, my husband and I ordered steak with moro rice, shrimp in sauce with rice, and an appetizer of fried yuca. We sat and waited for 1.5 hours waiting for our order. We even ordered 2 drinks at the bar while waiting which took about 15minutos for us to get service. When asked about our food we were told that they where still cooking our food meanwhile the groups of 5 had eaten and left and another group came in and where starting to get served and our take out was still being prepared. After the long wait and finally given our order we were still missing the fried yuca and paid a bill of over $100.00. I didn't want to wait anymore so we took our food and left. We get home to finally eat and the food was cold, the steak wasn't properly cooked, the rice was old and the shrimp was either over cooked or double cooked. The food absolutely disgusting. At 8 o'clock at night I had to still make dinner because we spent over 100.00 bucks waiting 1.5hours for food that at the end wasn't even edible. Comes to find out they charge an 18% tip automatically. Did not know this as it wasn't posted anywhere. When I called the restaurant they said they could remake the food if I was willing to come back in, but that there would be a wait once again. I asked if I could just bring back the food and get my money back and I was told no. Never again. My husband uses the name of this place as a joke when referring to terrible food and service. FYI I was pregnant and starving for far too long. read more

I went to buy pizza at this place and they looked like they were made 2 days before i ordered it. This people really dont care about their costumers selling microwaved pizzas. The crust was was like old and it wasnt even hot like they just microwaved it for 30 seconds. read more

A very disappointing experience. I had decided to stop in for lunch today with my parents and this has been without a doubt the worst food, service, etc...I have ever received. Let me elaborate: I sat down and ordered two mango shakes, a Media Noche sandwich and two frita sandwiches. (no frills regular and quick Cuban lunch typically). After 10 minutes the girl brought us a little bit of bread with garlic and no water at all to drink and ran away. After another 10 minutes, I saw her walk by and asked her to please bring me some more bread while I waited for my food along with water to drink (I feel I should never have to ask for water in a Restaurant) and the girl said "If I bring more bread, then I have to charge you for it"- so I said "No, that is okay" this is just un tasteful to say this to a paying customer. Ok, so here we are waiting for the frita and media noche sandwich, well after 45 minutes waiting I get irritated and ask for my check so I can leave, I said to another girl, forget the sandwiches just ring me up, and she talked me out of it, she said it was on its way, so I said OK let me wait another few minutes. About 5 minutes later the food comes out, the food is cold and to make matters worse, the Media Noche sandwich is totally GROSS!! I have never seen a Media Noche sandwich with mayo and ketchup before, honestly! This thing had two pickles , Ham, Cheese, and ketchup and mayonaise and no pork, ZERO! So when the girl comes back I said to please retire my sandwich, that I really am horrified at the mere sight of it, she said OK and leaves. After five minutes, the owner comes out to ask me what was wrong, and I politely said the sandwich is terrible, that it does not even have pork, what kind of media noche is this? So she then starts to explain to me how I do not know what I am speaking about, and Blah Blah Blah...and that "if I did not like the food or place not to come back again" So, I think at this point I had enough abuse and finally left this place forever. They are very rude to their customers and the food is the worst Cuban food ever! ( I am Cuban and have eaten this food all my life). Needless to say they will not get any stars from me, I urge people to stay away from this place!! I hope my review helps read more

This was a terrible experience. My husbands friend recommended this place so we decided to stop in. I told my husband he needed to make his friend give us a refund! First off, let me start off with the fact that we were annoyed by flies the whole time we were there. While I'm not a fancy pants and can easily get past flies, it just adds to the overall dissatisfaction of the experience. We got our drinks served relatively quickly, but the wait time for her to come back and take our order was longer than I would have liked, again by itself not the biggest deal, but overall dissatisfaction trumps again! My husband wanted to try the "cuban pizza", My daughter just went for chicken wings for her entree, and my other daughter ordered yellow rice and black beans because she is vegetarian. I went with what was listed on the menu in english as smoked pork. (My husband is Cuban and cannot read, and doesnt understand what im trying to read to him in spanish as I dont speak it) The wait time for the food was extremely long, except for the chicken wings that came out instantly almost and the waitress just walked over and plopped them on the table without saying a thing leaving us to think that our food was on its way also, but no. Enter more flies landing on our heads and flying in our faces. My daughter ended up going ahead and eating the little tiny wing pieces that were breaded and fried like fried chicken (not what she was expecting) so that they wouldnt get cold before our food came. Its not very fun for any party sitting at a table together for one to have entirely eaten their meal while the others just sit there watching them. So finally our food comes out, and the pizza is as good as any frozen pizza I've bought at the grocery store with a little chorizo thrown on it, the smoked pork turned out to be actually ham, which I just decided to keep due to reading/language barrier (although it would have been nice for the menu to accurately translate the food), the rice was hard and flavorless, and the beans were probably last weeks beans reheated from how they tasted. Well then I had to walk up to the counter to ask for some hot sauce because the waitress never came back to check on us, and the waitress just stood there bewildered like she didnt know what I was saying... SAUCE? she said. Yes sauce, hot sauce. SAUCE? So i asked, Um, caliente sauce? She just looked at me. My husband overheard and spoke up, picante? Ohh, picante! I thought again, oh well language thing again. So she started searching everywhere and it looked like she went under a sink or something and came out with this dusty bottle of hot sauce. I took it over to the table and my husband said to me, don't touch that hot sauce! When I took a second look at it I realized it was rancid! It was a funny color with bits of mold in it! Maybe they never have heard of hot sauce before! I dont know... and last but not least, when we recieved our check, which was totally rediculous for some ham and frozen pizza, they just added an 18% gratuity to the bill! It was not written anywhere on the menu or stated at anytime that they would add a gratuity! I thought that legally had to be posted? All in all a really sad experience. I would reccomend anyone looking for good cuban food to pass this place on and go somewhere else! I dont even want to give it one star! Oh, but if you do go, bring a fly swatter! read more

Today was my first visit. When we arrived, we did not know if we could seat ourselves or wait to be seated. The only 2 staff member we could see were too busy looking at their phone and socializing. We finally sat down ourselves. Eventually, one of the 2 servers came over and gave us menus. Then they went back to socializing. Finally one of the female bosses came in. She saw us waiting to order and asked the servers if we had been taken care of. It was only then one of the servers took our orders. If the boss had not arrived, we would still be waiting. The Cuban sandwich my partner ordered was delicious. I ordered the grilled chicken breast with beans and rice. The chicken could have had more flavor. The waitress was very attentive, finally, but only after the boss got on to both of them. Our server did not understand English and had to refer to the menu with its English/Spanish writings. I don't think I will eat there again due to the lack of concern over the customers' well being. read more

We have been there several times during the holidays and past Sunday 1/04, the food is delicious and tasty & strong cocktails ! ! the service has been great and timely....so visit again and you will change your mind. Also the entertainment Fridays - Sunday is SUPER, we ate, drank, danced & had lots of fun. My guests and I had a very good time & experience....remember if the server is not what you deserve ask for Yany "the owner" she'll take care of you...See you SOON read more

I'm at a loss to understand the negative comments. I have been going to this restaurant on a fairly regular basis, and I have found the food to be excellent, especially the Cuban pizzas and pork sandwiches. The café con leche is very good also - probably the best I have tasted in town. The atmosphere is cozy and inviting. read more

I always order food from them, customer service is good, food is always good. Hours are great they open early and close at 12am.

Very rude customer service waitress there last night made my friend who was visiting the Tampa area feel very un welcomed with her attitude asked her for a recommendation on a drink that may be a favorite in the location and was told to "look on the menu" literally , food is disappointing, our whole experience was just horrible . read more

Came here with the whole family thinking we were going to have good Cuban food since we always eat at the "giradilla" located in Miami, however that was NOT the case. The rice (arroz Moro) tasted as if it was mixed with rocks it was old and hard lacking flavor... The white rice my younger sister had was also very crunchy and hard. The tostones were super greasy and had additional oil and garlic drizzled on top... We are on vacation but we are cuban and know good food... What a let down. This is my first restaurant review and I took the time to make an account to let others know what crappy experience we had and to save them the trouble. The waitress was nice, no comp or I'm sorry or refund what we did get was an addition 18% tip included in our bill... The restaurant Is NOT high class or fancy totally unnecessary... Never going back there again... I'll stick to the true " Guiradilla " in Miami. Thanks but no thanks. read more