Take a trip to VeneBites in Tallahassee for a taste of Latin flavor

Posted on by Vaseline

Rochelle Koff
| Tallahassee Table

VeneBites is a great restaurant in Tallahassee that you may have missed. Time to set that right.

The place is almost hidden in a small street between Thomasville Road and Monroe Street, but once you discover this sunny spot, you’ll be looking forward to your next visit. This Midtown cafe is a friendly oasis serving homemade Venezuelan food.

VeneBites’ culinary repertoire includes arepas, platters, empanadas, side dishes like cachitos (ham patties), tequeños (white cheese wrapped in a crispy dough), sancocho (soup/stew), pasticho (Venezuelan-style lasagna), quesadillas, and the occasional paella — and the menu continues to expand.

Launch during COVID

On July 27, Lida Yajure and her business partner, Chef Abraham Quintero, will celebrate their fourth year at the helm of VeneBites. Lida was an investor when the business opened in 2019 under various ownership.

“At that point, I was a silent partner and a full-time operating room nurse,” Yajure said. When her partners decided to leave the business, she decided to take the plunge. It was 2020 and Covid was wreaking havoc on people and businesses.

It was extra hard for her and her family because her father died of COVID.

“I’m a nurse and we were sent home when elective surgeries were canceled due to COVID,” Yajure said. “I thought if I was ever going to try anything in the restaurant, this was the perfect time.”

But during the height of COVID, and in the years after, running a restaurant was tough.

“It’s felt like we’ve been in a blender for the last few years,” Yajure said. “We’re in Midtown, but there’s still a lot of people who don’t know we’re here. But we’ve finally hit the ground running.”

Paving a new path

Yajure is originally from San Felipe, the capital of Yaracuy, Venezuela. She attended Tallahassee State College, Florida State University and received her nursing degree from St. Petersburg College.

Yajure met Abraham Quintero through mutual friends. He was professionally trained in culinary arts in Venezuela and also studied and cooked in Peru. Quintero was a customer of VeBites and often gave his suggestions. Quintero was based in the United States and working in construction when Yajure contacted him.

“It was a magical coincidence,” she said. “I said to him, ‘Now it’s your turn.’ We had a full menu that was already created, but no recipes. He had to recreate all the recipes.”

Abraham developed those recipes, added his own creative touch and expanded the menu. On Father’s Day, Abraham made elegant paella dishes.

‘Everything is fresh’

The food at VeneBites “is like home cooking, like your mom is cooking for you,” said Quintero, originally from Valencia. “Everything is fresh and made from scratch. Nothing processed or canned.”

Yajure noted that they use King Arthur flour, which does not contain bleach, bromate or artificial preservatives, for their tequeños and cachitos. For arepas, they use a corn flour called Harina Pan, which is gluten-free.

If you can stop by when VeneBites is making cachapas, it’s a really good day. They buy field corn from farms when it’s available, grind the corn, and make corn pancakes.

It’s a labor of love for Quintero, who has loved cooking since childhood.

“I used to watch my aunt cook all the time,” he said.

When Quintero was old enough, he helped with cooking the soup and later with other dishes.

“She told me what to add and got things moving,” Quintero said.

Home cooked meals

At VeneBites, he’s shaken things up, creating dishes like pasticho, a creamy, cheesy Venezuelan take on lasagna; burgers shaped into patties with caramelized onions and avocado; sancocho, a hearty beef and vegetable stew; and patacon, a lavish platter of shredded beef, tostones, coleslaw, cheese, and avocado.

VeneBites has a long list of at least 20 arepas. Venezuelan-style arepas are traditional cornmeal bags. They are naturally gluten-free.

Arepas are cooked on the griddle so that they are slightly crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. You can find a wide variety of fillings that are served with the cornmeal pockets.

Quintero’s arepas range from simple versions with cheese, chicken, or tuna salad to more elaborate combinations like one of our favorites, the arepa de Pabellón—a generous platter filled with shredded beef or pork, black beans, and fried sweet plantains in an arepa (so much food, the arepa overflows).

Extensive menu

You can also find egg arepas that work any time of day, but we opted for the arepa de perico for a Sunday morning. The arepa is filled with scrambled eggs with chopped and fried onions, green peppers, green tomatoes, and jalapeños. It’s homey and bold at the same time, with flavors that pop.

Patacon al ajllo is another favorite. The dish features plump shrimp cooked in a fragrant buttery garlic sauce, served with sliced ​​avocado and pico de gallo.

Tequeños are a treat not to be missed. You can order five or ten. If that seems like a lot, you’ve never had a tequeño. They’re irresistible. VeneBites calls them “white cheese fingers wrapped in crispy dough.”

VeneBites serves Venezuelan beer, café con leche and other coffees, plus chica, a Venezuelan rice drink similar to Mexican horchata.

Sweet treats

Yajure makes the desserts, including a delicious tres leches, a sponge cake soaked in three types of milk: evaporated milk, condensed milk and whole milk with whipped cream. Lida also makes flan and churros (fried dough sprinkled with sugar and cinnamon), with Nutella or chocolate dips.

VeneBites also offers a children’s menu with tequeños, chicken tenders, mini burgers and salchipapas (hot dogs with fries and pink sauce).

In addition to the food, VeneBites is a fun destination that caters to families. The wooden outdoor deck is covered with a tent top (the other top was destroyed in the tornadoes) and is brightened up by lots of plants, another passion of the chef.

Quintero has done so well with orchids he grows on the patio that customers have started bringing him their boring plants to save, which he does. Quintero also has a lot of cacti now, most in clay pots.

“It’s my therapy,” he said. Customers ask him for tips all the time. “People ask me — how do you do it? I say, ‘Love, water; love, water; love, water.'”

Inside, customers order at the counter and the food is brought to the table. One of the friendly faces behind the counter is Lida’s mother, Nancy Montes.

VeneBites seats 67 people inside and out, plus there’s a private dining room that seats about 15 to 20. There’s no official fee to use the room, but VeneBites charges $5 per plate, which goes directly into the service tip jar, Yajure said. People can order individually, or the party can order something special, like an arepa bar with lots of fillings.

Sometimes there is entertainment at VeneBites. Come on July 27th (VeneBites’ anniversary) for a Latin night with DJ Hender.

More to come

Yajure, Quintero and Abraham work on various projects to continuously improve their restaurant.

“We don’t want people to just come and have something to eat,” Lida said. “We want them to like the ambiance, to enjoy the experience.”

Fans are very enthusiastic about their experiences at the restaurant.

“We love VeneBites,” said customer Alix Kalfin. “I normally order the arepa catira (with shredded chicken and grated white sharp white cheese), but all the arepas I’ve tried have been delicious. Make sure to add cheese if your arepa doesn’t come with it.

“You also have to order the tequeños,” Alix said. “There’s plenty of room inside and outside on the cute patio. You can’t go wrong at VeneBites.”

Rochelle Koff writes about food and dining at TallahasseeTable.com, on Facebook@TheTallahasseeTable and Twitter @tallytable. Reach her at [email protected].

If you go

What: Vein bites

Where: 217 E. Third Ave.; 850-727-7641

Opening hours: Wednesday to Friday from 10am to 8pm, Saturday from 11am to 8pm and Sunday from 9am to 3pm

Website: venebites.com

Entertainment: July 27th is Latin Night with DJ Hender — and the rumba — from 9pm to 2am Enjoy Venezuelan food with Polar beer. It’s $10 for men and free for women; ages 21+

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