Places to visit

Dining with Ana Moura in Porto Côvo

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We’ve been following chef Ana Moura since her spectacular debut at Cave 23 in Lisbon. So, when we heard she had opened a restaurant in Porto Côvo, a fishermen village on the coast of Alentejo, we went on a pilgrimage to see how her cooking has evolved.

Ana called the restaurant Lamelas, after her mother’s family name. The Lamelas have lived in Porto Côvo for generations and Ana spent her childhood summers there. 

The restaurant has a beautiful terrace overlooking a small harbor.  It was there that our lunch began, with glasses filled with rosé from a local winery called Herdade da Cebolal. Marta, our genial server, brought small plates with appetizing starters: Alentejo bread with an orange butter made with pork fat and red pepper paste; almece, a local cheese, topped with cured fish; a salad made with hake eggs that were so fresh we felt as if the sea had moved closer to our table.

Marta filled our glasses with a delectable white from Herdade do Cebolal to prepare our palates for the next dish: a luscious abrótea (a local fish) with clams, green sauce, and toasted bread. Next, there was a rice made with robalo (seabass), pargo (snapper), and shrimp. We admired the perfection of the confection, all rice grains perfectly cooked, all flavors in harmony. 

Migas, a bread-based preparation, accompanied pork ribs and a purslane salad. It was an explosion of flavor that paired well with the grand reserve red from another local winery, Herdade da Carochinha. 

The meal ended with sweetness from a chocolate mousse lightly seasoned with fleur de sel, a cheese cake, and sopa dourada (golden soup). 

Throughout the meal, we could see Ana cooking in the kitchen. She was in a state of intense concentration, tasting everything and making last minute adjustments.  

We lingered at the table drinking coffee and trying some local brandies made from medronho, waiting for Ana to finish the service. When she came to greet us, we told her that the meal had been unforgettable. She blushed with humility and spoke with passion about her team and the local producers she is working with. 

We asked Ana whether there were any other local restaurants we should try. She praised the cooking of many local chefs and we left with a long list of suggestions. 

We said our goodbyes and started to research Ana’s list. But we had found an epicurean paradise and it made no sense to leave it. We called Lamelas and made lunch and dinner reservations for the following day. It was an inspired decision. We tried many more gastronomical jewels: a stunning açorda made with sole, magnificent mullets, perfect cuttlefish, delicate abrótea livers, and delicious “carabineiro” shrimps. Just when we thought we had sampled the whole menu, Ana sent something new for us to try: pasteis de massa tenra (turnovers) with a boulliabaisse filling. They were fantastic! 

There’s an old Arab tale about someone who travels the world searching for a treasure, only to find it in the courtyard of their childhood home. Ana traveled the world to apprentice in great restaurants. And now, in the beach of her childhood summers, she created a culinary treasure.  

Lamelas is located at Rua Candido da Silva 55a in Porto Covo, tel. 924060426.

Dining with Miguel Castro e Silva at Quinta de Ventozelo

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We have for years admired chef Miguel Castro e Silva from the distance. We dined at his restaurants, read his cookbooks, tried his recipes (his marinated sardine preparation is a staple at our table). So it was a great privilege to have dinner with him at Quinta de Ventozelo. 

We met at Cantina, the restaurant that occupies the place where the old farm canteen used to be. Miguel arrived with a bottle of wine. “Do you want to try the wines I make at Ventozelo?” he asked as a way of introduction. Soon our glasses were filled with a white Viosinho from 2017 that is fresh and vibrant. It went perfectly with our first course, river fish “escabeche.” 

We told Miguel how much we had enjoyed the food we had for lunch in the picturesque esplanade of Cantina:  wild boar covilhetes (a version of the small pies popular in nearby Vila Real), a warm soup made with beets and apple, grilled octopus, and a peach tart that celebrated the natural sweetness of the peaches. We asked how does he manage to achieve such high standards in all his restaurants. Miguel told us that he inherited both his organization skills and creativity from his German mother. He writes meticulous recipes and coaches his cooks in their preparation until they meet his exacting standards.

Miguel started cooking professionally only at age 31. Born into a family of doctors in Porto, he was expected to study medicine. He studied biology in Germany but lost interest and became a musician. To earn a bit of money on the side, he started cooking. When he returned to Portugal, his friend Dirk Niepoort asked him to prepare food for his wine tastings. Dirk would describe the wines he planned to serve and Miguel had to come up with food that paired well with the wines. It was an experience that allowed him to perfect his cooking skills and learn a lot about wine. 

This enological knowledge is evident in the next wine we tried, a remarkable white that combines Viosinho with a blend of red varietals. It was a perfect complement to our second starter: a sausage called “alheira” topped with a fried quail egg. 

Miguel tells us that he is reviving and refining the cooking traditions of the Douro valley. Every Sunday, the cooks at Cantina prepare a roast in an oven fired with vine wood. The soup is made in old iron-cast pots on a large outdoor fire. All the ingredients come from the farm. The animals are naturally raised and everything from nose to tail is used in the kitchen.

Our main course, a suculent stewed rooster, was a perfect example of the refined, satisfying rustic food that Miguel is devising. It combined well with a delicate red wine aged in oak barrels previously used to make white wines.  

Several fruit-based desserts arrived. Once again, we admired the sparse use of sugar that gives the fruits their chance to shine. As the dinner came to an end, we made a few toasts with some old Dalva tawnies.

But there was one more thing. Miguel ordered a pot of tea. Ventozelo produces a wonderful gin with the aromatics that grow on the farm. Miguel had the idea of making an herbal tea with the same aromatics: lavender, lemon thyme, Portuguese thyme, and globe amaranth. It makes a fragrant infusion that was the perfect ending to a perfect meal. Thanks to chef Miguel Castro e Silva the food at Cantina is as spectacular as the view.

Click here for the web site of Cantina, the restaurant at Quinta de Ventozelo and here for Miguel Castro e Silva’s website.

Culinary magic at Cura

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We first met Pedro Pena Bastos as the chef at Herdade do Esporão when he was only 25 years old. Sitting at a table overlooking the vineyards of this iconic Alentejo estate, we were taken on an unforgettable culinary journey.

We met Pedro again at Ceia, the elegant restaurant in João Rodrigues’ Santa Clara 1728 hotel. We remember sommelier Mário Marques welcoming us in the courtyard outside the restaurant with glasses of natural sparkling wine from Quinta da Serradinha. Sitting at a long wooden table with a small group of fellow culinary travelers, we experienced once again the wonders of Pedro’s cooking.

As soon as we landed in Lisbon, we made reservations for Pedro’s new restaurant, Cura, at the Four Seasons Ritz hotel. We arrived a few minutes early and knocked on the imposing glass and metal door that separates the restaurant from the hotel. The genial Mário Marques came to greet us and showed us around.

It is difficult to create a new space in the Four Seasons Ritz. Inaugurated in 1959, the building’s modernist geometry serves as the canvas for a stunning art collection that includes works by the great painter Almada Negreiros and many of his contemporaries. Cura’s dining room, decorated by architect Miguel Câncio Martins, integrates well the old and the new. A large metal sculpture hanging from the ceiling harmonizes with the wood panels designed by Fred Kradolfer, a brilliant Swiss graphic design artist who lived in Lisbon. The colorful chairs reference the playful use of color popular in the 1950s. 

While we were chatting with Mário about wine, a plate arrived with long strips made from chickpeas and pumpkin sauce seasoned with marjoram oil. This simple start bears the hallmark of Pedro’s cooking: the constant search for new harmonies and textures that enchant the palate. 

After much pondering, Mário opened a bottle of white Tourónio from Quinta de Tourais in the Douro valley. It is a bright white wine that kept pace with the festival of culinary sensations that followed.

Black pastries filed with veal from the Minho region made a striking appearance on our stone table top. They were pitch black on the outside and succulent on the inside. 

A translucent tagliatelle dressed with a hazelnuts and bergamot sauce came topped with a dollop of caviar.  We recognized this classic trompe l’oeil preparation from Pedro’s repertoire– the “tagliatelle” is made from thin strips of fresh squid.

Slices of breads made from ancient grains were served with butter from the Azores’ Flores island and the magnificent spicy olive oil produced by Pedro’s family. There was also a delicious brioche and some breadsticks made with cheese from the Azores.

Then, a fillet of red snapper came floating on a sauce made from the liver of the fish and perfumed with parsley and saffron. Next, a succulent piece of black pork from Alentejo was accompanied with a beet purée, orange, and foie gras. The dessert featured an original, delightful combination of Jerusalem artichokes, cocoa and arabica coffee. 

We were enjoying one more glass of wine when three little “mignardises” arrived. Mário recommended that we try them in the order, from left to right. The first was made from Belgium biscuit, artichoke and black garlic. The second, made with egg and honey, was an homage to the recipes that came from Portuguese convents. The third, a sphere made from raspberry and lavender, was crispy on the outside and liquid on the inside. It was a final sleight of hand in a dinner full of culinary magic.

Cura is located at Rua Rodrigo da Fonseca 88 in Lisboa. Click here for the restaurant’s website.

A rooftop restaurant in Lisbon

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As soon as we exited the elevator, on the 5th floor of Hotel Bairro Alto, we walked to the terrace, attracted by the generous view of the Tagus river. Our waiter suggested that we stay outside and enjoy a few appetizers before going into the living room. And so we sat down and watched the Lisbon skies change into their evening colors. 

The restaurant, called BAHR, offers a menu designed by Nuno Mendes, a Portuguese chef who has earned many accolades in London. It is hard to choose–everything sounds great–so it took us some time to place our order.

After a few minutes wait, a savory aroma heralded the arrival of a plate with rissois de berbigão, fried turnovers with a cockle filling and a hint of curry. We noticed that they were breaded with Japanese panko instead of with traditional bread crumbs. But we were still surprised by the first bite. It was perfect: the crispness of the exterior contrasted with the moist flavorful interior creating an harmonious combination of texture, taste and temperature. 

A plate of percebes (goose barnacles) served on toast arrived next. The percebes looked normal but their smokey taste accentuated by a buttery sauce was exceptional. They were followed by roasted carrots dressed with a mouthwatering citrus sauce.

The temperature was dropping, so we retired to the living room. Our plates were served with a vegetarian version of a Lisbon classic: codfish Brás style. The codfish was replaced by a roasted cauliflower accompanied by a sauce made from broccoli cooked in a salt mass, spinach and parsley. Seldom has a cauliflower shined so brightly. On the table, there were sides of potato chips cut razor thin with a Japanese mandoline.

Next, we tried codfish confit with açorda (a bread-based preparation) from Alentejo. The codfish was superb. When we asked what made it so special sous-chef Nuno Dinis came to the table to explain that we were enjoying skrei, a codfish from Norway that is only available between January and April. It arrives fresh at the restaurant where it is cured with sugar and salt to accentuate the taste of the sea. The codfish was dressed with a savory yellow sauce made with a fricassé of sames (the stomach of the codfish) and a broth made from bones and gelatin.

The meat entrée was black pork with two sauces, one made from clams the other from spinach, parsley and coriander. It is a happy marriage of the flavors of two Portuguese classics: clams Bulhão pato and pork with clams.

The meal ended with queijadas that tasted of lemon and salt. We can’t wait to return to BAHR to enjoy this food that so perfectly combines simplicity, tradition, and refinement.

BAHR is at Hotel Bairro Alto, Praça Luís de Camões nº 2, in Lisbon. Click here for the restaurant’s website.

The chalet of the Countess of Edla

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We stood outside the charming house hesitating. Should we go in? What gives us the right to see this royal love nest? But it was a cold, windy morning. With this feeble excuse, we stepped inside the cozy chalet where king Ferdinand II lived with his second wife, the opera singer Elise Hensler.

The king’s first wife was queen Dona Maria II. When they married, he was a dashing young man with an impressive mustache and a regal name: prince Ferdinand Georg August of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. The couple enjoyed a blissful marriage. Together, they had 11 children.

Ferdinand avoided interfering in state affairs, devoting his time to various artistic interests. His most important project was planning and building the fairy-tale Pena Palace and turning the barren surroundings into the lush landscape we enjoy today. When the queen died of childbirth in 1853, Ferdinand was devastated. He was offered the throne of Spain but preferred to stay in Portugal, living in peace in his beloved Pena Palace.

A night out at the opera in 1860 changed his life. The king saw Elise Hensler on stage at the São Carlos Opera in Lisbon and fell in love. They started a passionate love affair that culminated with their marriage in 1869. Elise received the title of the Countess of Edla.

The prince and the countess built this lovely chalet on the grounds of the Pena palace. Inspired by alpine architecture, it is meticulously decorated with references to nature. Cork is used as both insulation and decoration. The exterior walls are painted to simulate wood.

The Pena and National Sintra palaces project power and wealth. At the chalet everything is intimate and private, the power of the state surrendered to the power of love.

Click here to book a visit to the chalet of the Countess of Edla.

A rested pudding

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One of our favorite destinations in the Douro valley is a charming village called Ervedosa do Douro. Its main attraction is Toca da Raposa, a restaurant that prepares the traditional food served in local aristocratic homes. 

The ingredients are immaculate and the cooking is sublime. The preparations look deceptively simple, but they require knowledge of all the small details that make the difference between good and exceptional.

Dona Graça, a cook who worked for Douro families before opening Toca da Raposa with her children, has a large repertoire of recipes from the time when food was prepared in wood-fired ovens and cast-iron pans. We’ve been trying to convince her to collect these recipes in a cookbook. But codifying all her experience is a huge task and she has no time–the restaurant is always full.

Recently, Dona Graça started writing down some recipes. She shared one of these recipes with us. It is called Pudim de Laranja Descansado (rested orange pudding) because it takes time to prepare. You should try it only when you’re not in a hurry. We hope this recipe is the first of many pages that preserve Dona Graças’s culinary artistry.

Rested Orange Pudding

Pudding ingredients

7 eggs

300 grams of sugar

250 ml of freshly squeezed orange juice

Port-wine caramel

150 grams of sugar

50 ml of port wine

Mix the pudding ingredients at night and let the mixture rest. Cook the pudding in the morning.

To prepare the mixture, combine the eggs and sugar in a mixer. Three seconds after you start the mixer at medium speed, slowly pour the orange juice into the mixture. Once all the juice has been added, keep the mixer on for an extra 30 seconds or so, until you see foam made from small bubbles. Stop the mixer and use a wooden spoon to the pudding ingredients with a movement from top to bottom until you no longer feel any sugar at the bottom of the bowl.

Once the mixture has rested, make the port-wine caramel and use it to coat the pudding mold. Pour the mixture into the mold and place the mold inside a pan filled with two fingers of water surrounding the pan. Cook on the stove on a small burner at medium heat for 40 minutes. Take it out of the mold and let it cool. Enjoy!

Toca da Raposa is located at Rua da Praça in Ervedosa do Douro, tel. 254 423 466.

The Vintage House

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We can take the winding road that leads to the elegant bridge designed by Gustav Eiffel. Or ride the old train that stops at the local station, decorated with bright blue tiles. Our preference is to arrive by boat, carried gently by the river. But no matter how we get to Pinhão, a quaint town at the center of the Douro valley, we always feel like staying.

The perfect place to stay is a sprawling yellow edifice on the bank of the river. It was once a warehouse that stored the precious brandies used to produce port wine. In 1997, the building was converted into the Vintage House hotel. 

What makes the Vintage House unique are the generous views of the Douro. We can wake up, open the window and sense the mood of the river. Everyday is different. Sometimes, the Douro dresses in festive blues and greens. Other times, it chooses yellows and browns, to give the small tributary that named the town (the Pinhão river) a chance to shine.

The roads of the Douro valley are narrow, forcing us to drive slowly and admire the glorious landscape. There is so much to see that we crisscross the valley many times. At the end of the day, we are always tired. And we love falling asleep in the Vintage House, knowing that in the morning the river will be there to greet the start of another memorable day in the Douro valley.

The Vintage house is located at Rua António Manuel Saraiva, 5085-034, Pinhão, Douro, Portugal. Click here for the hotel’s website.

Quinta de Ventozelo

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There is a new jewel in the Douro valley called Quinta de Ventozelo. The setting is not new, the estate has produced wine since the beginning of the 16th century. But there are 29 new gems–luxurious rooms with magnificent vistas located in various houses throughout the quinta. Some houses have old roofs built with the same schist used to brace the terraces that hold the vines. Others are built out of giant balloons that once stored 80,000 liters of port wine. 

The sprawling estate is the perfect place to create wonderful memories. Of the rolling hills descending towards the river to bade in its green waters. Of the breeze caressing the silvery leaves of the olive trees. Of the restful silence punctuated only by the sounds of nature. Of the joy of sitting outdoors at sunset savoring a glass of wine in the company of friends. 

You can drive to the quinta, but it is much more spectacular to take the boat from Pinhão and arrive at the dock by the river. Arriving is the easy part. Leaving is hard to do. 

Quinta de Ventozelo is located in Ervedosa do Douro, S. João da Pesqueira. Click here for the quinta’s website.

The Douro historical train

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Our journey begins with the clatter of a steam engine pulling five rickety wooden carriages into the Régua train station. Trains like this one have trod on the steel tracks that connect Régua to Pinhão since 1879. In 1883, the line was extended all the way to Foz do Tua.

Once all passengers get on board, the chimney blows a cloud of black smoke and we see Régua recede in the distance. The train moves slowly and yet there is not enough time to take in all that there is to admire, from the myriad colors of the river to the wondrous vine terraces sculpted into the mountain sides. 

A group of folk musicians walks through the carriages singing traditional tunes accompanied by accordion, triangle, “cavaquinho” (a small stringed instrument), and a drum made out of goat skin and wood. The musicians’ faces are weathered by a lifetime of work in the fields. But they sing with joy the tunes that lift the spirits of the laborers during the harvest. 

We arrive at the Tua station and the train stops for a well-deserved rest. As our journey resumes, we marvel at the feat of 19th-century engineering that allows the train to go back without turning around. The locomotive’s engine simply goes into reverse, pushing the carriages towards Régua. We travel on the same tracks as before, but the landscape looks different. The light has changed and the blues and greens are now mixed with yellows and oranges. 

The train crew serves us a glass of port wine and some traditional candy. We stop at the picturesque Pinhão train station to admire the 1937 tile panels that depict in blue hues the inimitable colors of the Douro landscape. Then, it is time to return to Régua. The locomotive screeches and puffs as it reaches the place where our journey ends.

It is a privilege to travel in this relic of the industrial revolution that saw the world change and the beauty of the Douro endure. 

Click here for more information about the Douro Historical Train. You can buy tickets online. The best seats are on the right side of the train since you can see the Douro valley from your window both on the way to Tua and on the return.

The incomparable wines from Colares

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One of the coolest places you can find during the Portuguese Summer is the cellar of the wine cooperative of Colares, a bucolic town near Sintra. It is a place where large barrels fashioned out of exotic woods from Brazil rest, protected by thick walls that keep the temperature cool.  

The wines these barrels store are cool in attitude. They come from a unique “terroir” near the ocean where two varietals, Malvasia and Ramisco, grow on sandy soils. The roots of the vines have to stretch deep into the sand to find the moisture necessary to stay alive. 

All this toil paid off in the 19th century when phylloxera decimated European vines. Protected by sand, the vines of Colares escaped the bug’s voracity. 

These hard-working vines produce wines with exuberant tannins that need to be tamed. The reds age in barrels for almost a decade before bottling. Once bottled, both reds and whites continue to age beautifully, enjoying remarkable longevity.

Francisco Fezas, the resident enologist, told us that Adega Regional de Colares is the oldest wine cooperative in Portugal. The local wine makers got together in 1931 to buy the 19th-century cellar owned by a famous wine merchant, José Maria da Fonseca. In 1938, the government gave the cooperative the monopoly of production in order to guarantee the quality of the wine produced in Colares. The cooperative sold the wine to different distributors who bottled it under brands like Chitas, Adega Beira Mar and Viúva Gomes. 

In the 1960s, Colares had more than one million hectares of vines that produced more than one million liters of wine. Then, the vines were attacked by a foe more formidable than the phylloxera: urban sprawl. Many farmers succumbed to the temptation of selling their land to property developers who wanted to build houses near the ocean. As a result, the cultivation area dwindled to a paltry 23 hectares which produces a mere 18 thousand bottles, making Colares one of the world’s rarest historical wines. 

Francisco’s first harvest in Colares was in 1999, at a time when the cooperative was struggling financially and the future looked dim. Since then, there has been a remarkable renewal that preserves the future of the incomparable wines from Colares.

Adega Regional de Colares is located at Alameda Coronel Linhares de Lima, nº 32 in Colares, tel. 219 291 210, email geral@arcolares.com.. Click here for the adega’s website.