At last call at Soul De Cuba, with Frank Brady and Tea Montgomery. After more than 20 years of serving Cuban cuisine and culture on the corner of High and Crown Streets, Soul de Cuba will be offering only catering and take out services for the next few days before going dark on Dec. 22.At last call on Sunday night, the restaurant’s founder and owner, Jesus Puerto, said the reasons for the closure had to do with financial pressures growing out of the pandemic era and changing realities of business at the street level. Sounding resolute, Puerto said the restaurant’s mission had been accomplished after two decades of providing the Guanabacoa Cuban and Tampa (Florida) based renditions of Afro Cuban cuisine in an environment of culture, history and music. The restaurant’s dining area was known for its well-curated selection of visual art and photographs highlighting Cuban people and images of cultural groups and events. The restaurant dining area often doubled as an art gallery with changing exhibits that provided opportunities for artists and for restaurant goers to experience the establishment’s unique food offerings and cultural vibe, or, as the line printed on the restaurant’s windows fronting Crown Street note, ​”Cuban cuisine and more.” Its presence on the high-visibility corner not only presaged the well-regarded downtown food district, but helped catalyze it.Here is an online statement offered by management:Friends and family, please be informed that this Sunday will be the last day of dining service for Soul de Cuba Cafe in New Haven, CT.For over 20 years we have known ourselves to be blessed for having been given the opportunity preserve and protect the noble and rich traditions of the Afro-Cubans of Tampa, Florida and Guanabacoa, Cuba by showcasing Cuban food art, music on the High and Crown corner of downtown New Haven.We will cease operations with sincerest gratitude and appreciation for all the love and support provided by members of the greater New Haven and Yale University community over the past 20 years. Thank you all so much for helping to share this vision with us and co- manifest it into reality.Sunday December 15 at 9 PM the dining room will close and we will continue operating catering and takeout service until December 22.Soul de Cuba owner Jesus Puerto (right).