Portuguese Cuisine: More than just Port

Upon arrival in Lisbon, our Airbnb host was driving us from the airport to our apartment and asked what we were looking to do while in the city. Hmmm? I had been so wrapped up in Norway that I had barely thought about Portugal. And we had only made the decision to go to Portugal about two weeks prior. My response…enjoy the cuisine and the ambiance. Lisbon is not known for any blockbuster must-see sights, and I honestly wasn’t sure what to expect. But, after a trip to Spain a couple years ago, I knew the people of the Iberian peninsula could cook. On top of that, we were in the birthplace of one of my favorite beverages, port wine. So, enjoy the cuisine and ambiance, we did! From Lisbon to Porto, we enjoyed a unique cuisine with influences from all over the globe including their former colonies in South America, Africa, Asia, and India. How could we not fall in love with this cuisine!?!?

BACALHAU – A NATIONAL SENSATION

Of course, Portugal is going to be known for its seafood due to its location on the Atlantic. However, the national dish is actually cod, a fish only found in cold, northern waters. During Portugal’s discovery period, they fell in love with this fish and used salted/cured cod for long voyages. Over the years, everyone developed a taste for the salted and cured variety called bacalhau. Today, there are over 365 different recipes in Portugal for preparing bacalhau (or over 1000 depending on your tour guide). Very few people actually eat fresh cod known as bacalhau fresco. One of the most popular recipes that we tried and fell in love with is bacalhau à brás.

Almost like a frittata, “à brás” style refers to shredded cod prepared with scrambled eggs, fried shoestring potatoes, onions, and spices. This definitely made my list of favorite fish dishes.

Another popular bacalhau dish that was also quite tasty is called bacalhau com natas. This dish has numerous versions but essentially combines heavy cream with diced potatoes, spices, and shredded cod that is baked until bubbly and brown on top.

Of course, you can’t talk about bacalhau in Portugal and not mention the bolinhos de bacalhau, the salted cod croquettes.

Simple, delicious, fried balls filled with potato, egg, and cod puree that can be found on almost every menu.

Although there are numerous recipes for bacalhau, Portuguese also like the simplest of preparations…canned bacalhau in garlic and olive oil. Canned fish is so popular in Portugal that many stores sell beautifully decorated tins of bacalhau, sardines, and other fish. This was a hard one for me to try, but I did it. Eaten with a warm, crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside roll, the flavor was not as fishy as I would have thought.

We have had some people ask us our opinion of Scandinavian cuisine since we didn’t talk about it as much in our blogs, especially in Norway. After seeing the creativity in Portugal with hundreds of ways to prepare bacalhau, we finally had a comparison to help illustrate our thoughts. We found most of our meals in Scandinavia absolutely delicious; however, we tired of the cuisine quickly due to lack of variation. They certainly know how to prepare delicious, fresh fish as well as all their cured varieties like gravlax and herring. In Norway, we had cod and salmon multiple times as combo fresh fish skewers. Cod has been one of the leading industries in Norway for centuries, but we found it quite interesting that for some reason Portuguese came along and traded for the fish and made imaginative creations from it. The Norwegians just kept things simple. Perhaps true seafood lovers would prefer the simple, Norwegian style, but we had more fun tasting the unique Portuguese bacalhau preparations. And don’t get me started on how amazing the Spanish bacalhau dishes are. I’m sure I’ll be gushing about those again when we head into that country next.

POULTRY AND MEATS – TRADITIONAL CUISINE

For us meat lovers, we were happy to see that the Portuguese got creative with their meat and poultry dishes just like their beloved bacalhau. As mentioned earlier, the Portuguese were greatly influenced by their European neighbors as well as their former colonies. The spices brought home during their discovery period can be tasted in their pica pau pork/beef.

This spicy meat dish is made with tiny pieces of fried beef or pork with garlic, piri piri chilies, and beer.

One of our favorite meats that we ate multiple times during our couple weeks in Portugal was the alheira sausage. Surprisingly, the alheira sausage is made out of poultry meat and bread, and its creation is a sad but interesting story. During the Inquisition, Jews were forced to convert to Christianity. Many in Portugal continued their faith behind closed doors but wanted to appear to be Christian for their safety. Avoiding pork is a telltale sign of a Jew, so they developed a recipe that looks like the typical Portuguese pork sausage but is actually made from bread and poultry.

Today, the alheira is often served with rice and a fried egg. They must spice the crap out of it because I never would have guessed that it is poultry. We will be craving alheira from now on and hope to find it somewhere back in the states.

Inspiration was drawn from the French for the famous Porto sandwich the Francesinha, or “little French girl.” The Portuguese chef who invented the dish was smitten with French women and the French croque monsieur. He came home and developed a sandwich made with FOUR different kinds of meat (normally ham, steak, fresh sausage, cured sausage) smothered in cheese, a tomato beer sauce, and a fried egg. And served with fries.

Oh wow, we ate this as a glorious dinner, but this meaty monstrosity would have made the best drunk food ever! Forget Taco Bell if you have the Francesinha.

Obviously, steak and pork sandwiches are a big deal in Portugal. We had the famous prego no pão (steak sandwich) in Cascais (see details in our Sintra blog). In Porto during a food tour with Taste Porto, we were introduced to a specialty created at Flor Dos Congregados – an unforgettable pork loin and cured ham sandwich paired with a sparkling Portuguese wine.

The restaurant was super cute too, and we wish we would have had the chance to go back for a full meal here. Or rather, go back for five of those cute sandwiches each with a couple more glasses of sparkling wine.

Our food tour also introduced us to the famous meat pies from Chaves (pastéis de Chaves), a northern city in Portugal. These pastries are made from a fine filo dough and stuffed with minced veal meat.

This food has been denoted a protected product by the European commission, so only meat pies produced in Chaves can bear the name. Every morning the shop in Porto called Loja Dos Pastéis de Chaves gets the pastries delivered fresh from Chaves.

Lastly, the Iberian peninsula loves croquettes, so we have to end our meat section with one of our favorites…a roast suckling pig croquette.

The bacalhau croquettes are great as are the Spanish jamón (ham) croquettes, but the suckling pig croquette at Taberninha do Manel in Porto…yum, I have no words.

SURF AND TURF – MODERN CUISINE

Aside from all the traditional foods, just like other cultures, the Portuguese are blending traditional ingredients with cutting-edge flare. One of the coolest places to experience this is at the Mercado da Ribeira. At this market in Lisbon, they have assembled the best chefs in town, including two Michelin star chefs. I’ve never seen such exquisite cuisine served from food stalls in a market. All the food at this market by TimeOut magazine has been tasted, tested, and chosen by an independent panel of experts to represent the city.

We chose to eat in one of the side aisles at the bar of O Surf and Turf.

Portuguese Chef Kiko Martins combines the best from the sea and the land along with the bestsellers from his other restaurants. Our favorite, which we shared and then quickly ordered another one, was the pork belly and shrimp sandwich.

Our most creative award goes to the quinoa sea risotto with oyster foam and pork neck croquettes.

And how can you do surf and turf and not include bacalhau and chorizo while in Portugal? Here we have a codfish confit with chorizo crumble on top of mashed chestnuts with pine nut topping.

The presentation of all the dishes was Michelin-star quality while in a laid-back, fun, market environment.

PASTRIES – SWEET ENDINGS

The Portuguese have been perfecting pastries since the Middle Ages. Nuns made them to supplement their income. Eggs, and in particular, egg yolks were plentiful. Supposedly, the egg whites were used for numerous other purposes leaving egg yolks to be creative with. Add in all the sugar coming in from the Portuguese colonies in South America, and you have the perfect storm for the creation of some of the world’s best pastries. The most famous is the pastel de nata, an egg tart. The confectionary that created this treat with a still-secret recipe in 1837 is located in Belém, a district of Lisbon, and calls their version of the pastry, Pasteis de Belém. Our first experience with this delicious treat was actually during our time in Macau, a former Portuguese colony (see our Macau Blog). The Macau version of the Portuguese egg tart impressed us, so we were excited to try the pastry from where it originated.

Our egg tart tasting began with the most famous, but we had many more pasteis de nata throughout our stay and can agree that Pasteis de Belém as well as pasteis de nata made at Manteigaria in Lisbon are superior. The reason…freshness. Both of these shops sell so many egg tarts that you are guaranteed to get one fresh out of the oven. Look at the massive assembly line at Manteigaria.

These pastries taste so much better fresh. Now, between the two shops, Jimmy and I disagree on the best one. He preferred the Pasteis de Belem because of the creamy texture and flavor of the custard. I, on the other hand, thought the flaky pastry was much better, lighter and crisper, at Manteigaria.

Personally, I think the best egg-inspired pastry is the famous travesseiro from Sintra (more details in our Sintra blog). Jimmy just wants to keep eating as many pasteis de nata as he can.

A visit to Confeitaria Nacional is required for any foodie and sweets lover in Lisbon. This lovely, French-style confectionery, the oldest and most traditional in Lisbon, started in 1829.

I tried the Meia Lua, which seemed to be a honey and apple cinnamon cookie, but I honestly have no idea as I think this may just be a specialty from that shop and not a particular Portuguese cookie. Either way, the cookie was soft with a warm spice and mild sweetness. Mmmm.

Oh, the pastries in Portugal are never ending. Shops on every corner tempt you to come inside. The one across the street from our Porto Airbnb had a giant window full of treats that we could see from our living room window, so of course, we couldn’t help but come home with a wide assortment.

Often times, as in this case, the small shops have no signs/names on the treats in the window and nobody speaks English. So, we have no idea what they are…just that they are delicious.

Lastly, we must mention one more Portuguese treat from our time in Porto. Our food tour gave us quite a few sweet treats, but my favorite came from Grandma.

We stopped at a little shop called Bolhão Wine House that mostly serves wine and canned sardines. This stand in one of the city markets known as Mercado do Bolhão has been owned by the same family for decades. Grandma, when she was a little girl, used to work at the stand back when it was actually a flower shop.

Today, her grandson and his wife run the wine shop where we got to try a refreshing Moscatel do Douro wine paired with sardines. But, my favorite part was Grandma’s pastry, a queijada, made from cheese, eggs, milk, and sugar.

We actually first tried the queijada at Piriquita in Sintra, and although they are famous for it, Grandma makes them best.

WINES AND SPIRITS – THE BIRTHPLACE OF PORT

Considering my primary reason for visiting Portugal was because it is the birthplace of port, we can’t leave out a quick section on port and other Portuguese wines and spirits (greater detail coming up in the Douro Valley blog).

In Lisbon, our favorite travel guide Rick Steves introduced us to Ginjinha during his audioguide walking tour around the city highlights. This popular Lisbon liquor is made from the ginja berry (sour cherry), sugar, cinnamon, and brandy. While the nuns were busy making sweets, the monks were satisfying everybody’s thirst with this sour cherry liquor. We stopped in at the oldest kiosk in town for a sample.

Tiny kiosks like this can be found all over serving up shots (for sipping) to the locals at all hours of the day.

In Lisbon, we actually drank more white wine than anything else. The bacalhau dishes paired perfectly with the white wine from northern Portugal, vinho verde. The vinho verde is a light, crisp, refreshing wine that is the perfect drink on warm, summer days.

Finally…the whole reason for coming to Portugal…Port. Port is a fortified wine from the Douro demarcated region made using specific techniques including adding a flavorless wine spirit to stop the fermentation process, blending wines, and aging. Port wine has unique characteristics that distinguish it from other wines, and much variety exists between the different port styles with an enormous range of colors, aromas, sweetness, and flavors.

The two major categories of port wine are tawny and ruby. Ruby ports age for only 3 years in large, oak barrels to retain the natural fruit flavors and deep red color. The higher quality ruby ports, such as the vintage, are aged longer in the bottle. Tawny ports age in smaller, oak barrels for at least 6 years and thus can have flavors such as vanilla, cinnamon, dried fruits, nuts, and oak. The longer they age, the more their color changes from deep red to a rich brown. Tawny ports are normally blends of different years to maintain a consistent product with typical “average” ages being 10, 20, 30, and 40 year.

White ports are also available and are young and fresh and not meant for aging. The current trend with white ports is to use them for cocktails, such as the port tonic.

In Porto, we toured the cellars of Calem and enjoyed their educational museum. Then, of course, we got to try their wines. Their tasting is a perfect example to see the differences between the three styles, from left to right, tawny, ruby, and white ports.

In Graham’s cellar, we got to see a very old bottle of ruby vintage port from 1868.

Classic vintage wines come from a single harvest and are only awarded to the best wines from the best years, which only happens a couple times a decade.

The cellar with our favorite start-up story and logo is Sandeman. The Scottish entrepreneur that started Sandeman in 1790 was the first person to ever brand his wine casks, and his logo was one of the first ever patented and is considered one of the oldest trademarks still in use. The “Don” is recognizable the world over. He wears a cape to represent the Portuguese student because of the port wines produced in Portugal, but his hat is the Spanish shadow hat to represent the sherry wines produced in Spain. While in Spain a couple years ago, we actually toured the Sandeman vineyard in Jerez and learned all about sherry. Of course, I got a photo with the Don in both countries.

BEAUTIFUL, DELICIOUS, LIVELY, INEXPENSIVE – AN UNDER-HYPED DESTINATION

We definitely succeeded with our one goal of enjoying the ambiance and cuisine in Portugal. After spending a couple months in polished Scandinavia, Portugal felt a bit gritty at first, but we fell in love with the narrow streets filled with bars bubbling with life and sultry Fado music, the beautiful Manueline architecture, the gorgeous tiled buildings, the interesting historical monuments, the breathtaking countryside, and obviously the cuisine and the wines. The country is so inexpensive to visit that it deserves much more hype as an affordable, beautiful place to enjoy a culture that loves to party, eat, and drink.

Isn’t the view over Lisbon lovely? For those of you who may not get the same kicks from food and wines as we do, I’ll leave you with a few pictures that give you a feel for Lisbon that shows just how beautiful this city is. Or check out our Douro Valley blog (coming soon) that shows the beauty of Porto and the northern countryside. I promise that the country isn’t just about the food and drinks…but almost.

The Arch of Triumph and Jose I statue in Commerce Square