–Lisbon

Touta, the sensuous cuisine of Lebanon in Lisbon

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We heard from the culinary rumor mill that a famous Lebanese chef had moved to Lisbon and opened a restaurant called Touta. So, on a warm spring evening, we climbed the hill from Estrela to Campo de Ourique to try it out.

Rita Abou Ghazaly welcomed us into the gracious dining room decorated with Middle Eastern motifs. She served us hibiscus and rose-petal kombucha while Lebanese music filled the air with the same microtones we hear in fado.  

Dinner started with a basket of Lebanese bread and cheese bonbons—crispy cheese treats wrapped in phyllo dough. Next came a plate of hummus, a combination of chickpeas and tahini sauce that is a staple of Middle Eastern cuisine. This rendition was the best we ever tried. It was topped with soujak meat, pickles, and aquafaba, a sumptuous emulsion of chickpea water that resembles whipped egg whites. It was quickly followed by grilled cabbage with lentils and beetroots delicately seasoned with cured lemons. 

We tried a delicious soup made with a local fish called mero. It reminded us of cação soup, a traditional Alentejo recipe. Finally, we had a spectacular grilled black pork served with black beans, carob marshmallows, and a barbecue sauce made from molasses. Dessert was a simply perfect sweet croquette. 

“What made you decide to open a restaurant in Lisbon?” we asked Rita. “Ask Waël,” Rita said, laughing, “it’s all his doing.” Waël Haddad told us he has had a crush on Lisbon since his first visit ten years ago. “I kept returning and brought my friend Rita and my cousin Touta, a celebrated Lebanese chef. With every visit, our love for the city deepened, and so we started looking for a restaurant location. We explored various neighborhoods until we stumbled upon this perfect spot with a ‘for sale’ sign. Now, here we are, living our dream.”

Chef Cynthia Bitar, affectionately known as Touta, came to greet us. She inherited her passion for cooking from her mother, a famous Middle East caterer. Touta has always been obsessed with cooking.  “When I was a child and went on play dates, I often cooked in my friend’s kitchens. I think about food during the day and dream about it at night.” 

She returned to her family’s catering business after training at the Paul Bocuse Academy in Lyon. But, like Waël and Rita, Touta fell for Lisbon’s charms. She was drawn to the similarity between Lebanese and Portuguese cuisines, the quality of local ingredients, and the warmth of the people. “I found amazing produce in the farmers markets. Try this carrot.” She sliced a small carrot in half so we could experience its aroma and enjoy its sweet taste.” 

Touta took us to the grocery store at the back of the restaurant. Its shelves are full of products from Lebanon and jars with pickles, jams, fermented drinks, and preserved citruses that she prepared. We stayed past midnight, bewitched by Touta’s sensuous cuisine, sampling everything from molasses and infusions to spices like sumac and za’atar.  

In the 15th and 16th centuries, trade with Africa, Asia, and South America turned Lisbon into a hub for global talent. The diverse influx of people profoundly influenced Portuguese culture, cuisine, and art. It is wonderful to see Lisbon once more attracting people who will bring the city to new heights.  Welcome, Waël, Rita, and Touta!

Touta is located at Rua Domingos Sequeira 38 in Lisbon 960 49 49 49. Click here to go to the restaurant’s website.

Ceia, our favorite place for supper

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The initial thrill of a new experience often fades with repetition, a phenomenon psychologists call hedonic adaptation. Somehow, this human trait does not manifest itself at Ceia, a restaurant in Lisbon that keeps reinventing itself, serving food that is always interesting, new, and delicious. 

Ceia’s culinary team is currently headed by Chef Renato Bonfim, who previously worked at Adega, a Michelin-starred Portuguese restaurant in California. The menu is inspired by the pristine produce from Herdade no Tempo, a beautiful estate in Alentejo that follows regenerative agriculture practices. 

The restaurant, which is part of a project called Silent Living, is located on the ground floor of Santa Clara, an intimate hotel with privileged views of the Tagus River and the Pantheon. Kristin Liebold, a member of the Silent Living team, welcomed us to the spacious courtyard of the historical building that dates back to 1728. She presented us each with glasses of Ode, a refreshing wine crafted near Lisbon from Arinto grapes. As we mingled with other guests, Kristen appeared to whisper a magical incantation. Then a door swung open, unveiling a dining room so perfect it could be the setting for a Vermeer painting.

As we gathered around the table, Renato and his teammates Ricardo Cruz and Tiago Ramos came to greet us and, like the three kings, they brought three offerings. First, slices of sourdough bread accompanied by a sumptuous butter from the Azores and a luscious spread crafted from butter and a type of sausage called alheira. Second, a crispy tartelette made with perfectly seasoned lírio (greater amberjack) and vegetables. Finally, exquisite polenta cubes topped with aioli, garlic, and cheese and nestled in wooden boxes filled with bright yellow corn. Dardas, a bright vinho verde (green wine) made with the Avesso varietal, kept us in great company.

As we debated which of these offerings had most captivated our taste buds, Ricardo introduced a new chapter to our culinary adventure: an algae chowder. It is based on shio koji, a salted Japanese pudding encircled by algae cooked in a Bulhão Pato style. The preparation was crowned with a leaf of the rare Mertensia maritima. We were instructed first to eat the leaf, savor its unique oyster flavor, and then blend a small glass filled with chowder with the algae. The result was an unexpectedly delightful harmony of flavors.

As our glasses filled with a silky Dona Paulette from Quinta de Lemos in the Dão region, we were brought plates of octopus grilled in charcoal, topped with kale, and seasoned with an inventive mole made from grilled peppers and pomegranate—another unusual but perfect combination of flavors and textures.

The next dish featured crispy sarraceno wheat mixed with chanterelles and shiitake mushrooms seasoned with a sauce made from shallots, beer yeast, dehydrated apricots, and raisins. There was so much flavor to process that we closed our eyes to let our brain focus on the gastronomic sensations. A late harvest from the Douro Valley called Aneto complemented the earthy flavors of the dish with a delicate, effusive sweetness.

A sparkling wine made by Sidónio de Sousa in Bairrada ushered the arrival of a turbot from the Azores delicately cooked, dressed with beurre blanc and kombucha, topped with fermented turnip and kohlrabi and finished with a few drops of garum. This Roman fish sauce, which is once again being produced in the Troia peninsula after a hiatus of 15 centuries, added a unique depth to the dish. 

The meat course was a succulent black pork served with a rich purée made from Jerusalem artichokes, chestnuts, and purple onion. It was served with a robust vinhão, a red wine made from a dyer grape called Sousão produced in the vinho verde region by Vale da Raposa. 

The first dessert was an ensemble of panna cotta, chocolate, and matcha powder, garnished with leaves from Madeira that taste like passion fruit. A white port made by Alves de Sousa called Oliveirinha added a velvety smoothness to this symbiosis of flavors.

The second dessert was ginger and pumpkin cooked with Chinese spices, a praline made from pumpkin seeds and seasoned with pollen. 

Our meal concluded with a refreshing lemongrass tea, quindin, a Brazilian coconut pudding, and truffles crafted from 70 percent pure chocolate from the island of São Tomé.

We lingered at the table, talking with the other guests about the culinary experience we had just enjoyed, so replete with unexpected pleasures and delights that we felt like we were dining at Ceia for the very first time.

Ceia is located at Campo de Santa Clara, 128. Lisbon. Click here for the restaurant’s website.

Jezzus Pizzaria

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Blessed are those who open affordable restaurants that serve delicious food, for they bring joy to the world. Diogo and Tiago de Jesus, two brothers born into a family of restaurateurs, opened a pizzeria in Rua da Guiné, a quiet street near the busling Almirante Reis Avenue. Tong in cheek, they called it Jezzus.

Inside the small restaurant, a dedicated team of cooks fires up mouthwatering Napolitan-style pizzas in an Italian oven fitted with a volcanic stone from Mount Vesuvius. The menu offers a mix of classics, like the timeless Margherita, and inventive creations inspired by Portuguese cuisine. These nouvelle pizzas include “Bulhão Pato,” which tastes like the namesake clam sauce, “Oh Pear,” featuring Rocha pears, and “Oh Diabo!,” adorned with slices of sinnfully spicy Portuguese sausage. 

The five-cheese pizza adds to the traditional parmesan a tetrad of Portuguese cheeses: blue cheese from Azeitão, a rare velvet cheese made from the milk of serpentine goats, and “grande do viso,” a cow milk cheese with a rind washed in red wine. Our favorite pizza is Holly Sardine, made with immaculate marinated sardines from the Algarve.

While you wait for your pizza to cook, you can feast on a plate of savory black pork sausages or try the luscious artisanal burrata with tomato confit and basil pesto.

The exceptional quality of the ingredients, sourced from small, local producers, stands out. The pizzaria buys its flour from Paulino Horta, an artisanal miller. They ferment the dough from 47 to 72 hours using sourdough yeast, resulting in a light, easily digestible crust.

Diogo and Tiago say that making pizzas as good as theirs at home would be a miracle. We wholeheartedly agree.

Jezzus is located at Rua da Guiné, 1A, Lisboa, tel. 21-814-2186. 

Belmiro

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Belmiro is the kind of restaurant that is increasingly hard to find in Lisbon. It does not prepare food to look good on Instagram. It does not seek originality for its own sake. Instead, it cooks classics of the Portuguese cuisine with good-quality, seasonal ingredients. 

The restaurant is named after Belmiro de Jesus, an old hand who’s been a chef at places like Salsa & Coentros. Belmiro is famous for his mouthwatering “empadas,” small pies with delightful fillings. And he is a virtuoso at cooking partridge and hare. He prepares them with rice, in “açorda,” with beans, and much more. The menu is seasonal, it changes to reflect what’s fresh in the market. If you can’t decide what to choose, a good rule of thumb is to order anything cooked in a “tacho” (a saucepan). 

We like to go to Belmiro with friends and ask the chef to prepare a few entrées we can all share. Accompanied by some good bottles of wine, the meal always turns into a party. 

Belmiro is located at Paço da Rainha 66, Lisbon, tel. 21 885 2752.

Enchantment at Ceia

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Standing in the shadow of Lisbon’s old pantheon, we knock on an inconspicuous door that opens into a courtyard erected in 1728. On our right is the entrance to one of Lisbon’s most hallowed dining rooms: a restaurant called Ceia. Those who’ve been here before experienced much more than superb food, exquisite wines, and courteous service. We had an enchanted evening.  

João Rodrigues, Ceia’s owner, is an alchemist who knows how to transform a meal that nourishes the body into a celebration that nurtures the soul. He gathered a star team, headed by chef Diogo Caetano and sous-chef Tiago Silva, and trusted them with precious ingredients: pristine organic produce freshly picked at Herdade do Tempo in Alentejo.

Ivo Custódio, the sommelier, greets us with an old acquaintance: a white wine made by Luís Mota Capitão, the iconoclast winemaker of Herdade do Cebolal. We enjoy the wine and the conversation with the other guests. Then, Ivo invites us into the dining room. We gather around a long wooden table to hear him explain that the meal is a journey through Portugal’s culinary and enological landscapes.

The voyage starts at the bottom of the ocean with tuna tartare on crunchy seaweed crackers, seaweed sponge cake, and gooseneck barnacles. An Atlantis rosé made with Negra Mole on the Madeira Island enhances the sea flavors.

We rise to the ocean’s surface with the taste of briny oysters paired with tart apples from Alcobaça and seaweed ice cream. The oysters come with a magnificent 2014 white wine from Colares, a small region near the sea where the vines, planted in the sand, survived the phylloxera scourge that decimated Europe in the 19th century. Made by Chitas (the nickname of an old producer called Paulo da Silva) it is a complex wine that fascinates and delights.

We arrive at the beach with a delicately cooked turbot seasoned with smoky olive oil powder and served in a Bulhão Pato sauce. It is so delicious we barely resist the urge to ask for seconds. 

But we find new joys in the lowlands where a sourdough bread fermented for three days and a cornbread baked with dried fruits await us. They come with Amor é Cego, a piquant oil made from Galega olives. There are also plates of luscious butter from Pico, an island in the Azores archipelago.

Ivo serves an elegant 2012 red from Quinta de Lemos in the Dão region. It is made with Jaen–a grape varietal brought to Portugal by pilgrims who traveled to Santiago de Compostela. Like the wine, the conversation flows freely around the table.

In the plains, there is rabbit served with an ice cream made from escabeche, a traditional sauce prepared with vinegar and olive oil. Kompassus, a sparkling wine made from Baga, a red grape from Bairrada, refreshes our palate. 

We climb up the mountain with a roasted purple cabbage dressed with a pennyroyal and champagne sauce. It comes with Sousão, a vibrant red wine from Vale da Raposa in the Douro valley. 

At the top of the mountain, we taste pigeon and potatoes from Trás-os-Montes served with a fermented garlic sauce. There’s also a mystery box with a delightful croquette and a scrumptious Philo-dough cup filled with sorrel leaves. 

Ivo serves a celebratory Breijinho da Costa, a fortified wine made in Setúbal with purple muscatel grapes. The meal ends with sweet fireworks: a noisette pave, petals of roasted peach, thyme ice cream, and lemon curd. And there are mignardises: a traditional Abade de Prisco pudding, coconut biscuits, cinnamon and strawberry truffles.  

Everybody lingers around the table feeling a sense of camaraderie. Then, we say our thanks and goodbyes and walk into the warm night in a state of enchantment. 

Ceia is located at Campo de Santa Clara, 128. Lisbon. Click here for the restaurant’s website.

Dinning with Marlene

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When we dined at Marlene Vieira’s new restaurant, appropriately called Marlene, the place was packed. But, like a star performer, Marlene made us feel like she was cooking just for us, often coming to our table to chat about the food she served. 

The meal started with a variation on one of her classic themes, the “filhós de berbigão” that she serves at Zun Zum, her more casual restaurant. This time, the filhós, a star-shaped shell made from fried dough, was gloriously stuffed with foie gras, reineta apple, and a Madeira-wine gel. 

Next, came a trompe l’oeil preparation. It looked like cheese topped with prosciutto. But the cheese turned out to be an egg cooked at low temperature that, mixed with the prosciutto, created a festival of umami sensations.

We were taken to the sea by a delicate combination of violet shrimp from the Algarve accompanied by a gazpacho made with the shrimp’s head, topped with a percebes tartlet. 

Then, we returned to land with two crusty loaves of bread, one made with wheat and rye and the other with white corn. They came with fragrant olive oil made in Trás-os-Montes at Quinta de São Miguel do Seixo. 

The next menu entry was a delicate part of the codfish called cocochas seasoned with parsley and pine nuts. We reached the mid-point of our culinary journey with tasty white truffles and morel mushrooms stuffed with requeijão. 

They were followed by a ravishing sole dressed in an asparagus sauce, butter, and caviar. We reached the climax with a savory pudding made with an eel broth seasoned with saffron and topped with the eel’s skin. It is sublime!

Dessert was a delightful pine nut mousse with apple granita and pineapple from the Azores. The petit fours were lovely: merengue with a strawberry cream, tangerine leaves, and macaroons stuffed with almonds and eggs.

We’re lucky to have a chef like Marlene Vieira, who studied the past to invent the future of our culinary tradition!

Marlene is located at Av. Infante D. Henrique, Doca do Jardim do Tabaco, Lisboa, tel. 351 912 626 761, email marlene@marlene.pt.

Marlene Vieira’s Codfish Recipe

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The Portuguese culinary tradition does not come from palace kitchens. It comes from the cooking of humble people who, in every season, took the best ingredients that nature offered and prepared them using recipes perfected over centuries. The food presentation is often rustic, but the taste is delicious because everything is harmonious and natural.

Many chefs are reinventing the cuisine of Portugal. But the truth is that there’s no need for reinvention. What we need is an evolution, the creation of new recipes that, like clams Bulhão Pato and Caldo Verde, bring joy to the dining tables of Portugal. Easy to say, but who can do it? 

We know one chef who can: Marlene Vieira. Her Zun Zum and Time Out restaurants are indispensable stops in any culinary tour of Lisbon. Her food is creative, not because she wants to surprise or shock. Marlene’s originality stems from her ability to intuit new, delicious ways of preparing Portugal’s great food products. 

Marlene started cooking at age 12. Her father, who owned a butcher shop, took her on a delivery to an Oporto restaurant that served French-inspired food. The chef invited Marlene to sample what they were preparing, and she was hooked. She loved the taste, the refinement, and elegance. Marlene spent holidays and school vacations helping out at the restaurant. She relishes the organized chaos of a professional kitchen, and cooking proved to be an ideal outlet for her bountiful energy. 

At age 16, Marlene went to culinary school. She graduated as the best student and stayed as a teaching assistant, while working as a pastry chef at a boutique hotel. Up to this point, all her cooking had revolved around French techniques. 

At age 20, a friend invited her to work at a Portuguese restaurant in New York. For the first time, Marlene had to cook traditional Portuguese food. She remembered fondly the food that her mother and grandmother prepared, but she did not know how to cook it. More than three thousand miles away from home, this young chef started to study the cuisine of Portugal. And for the first time, she realized that she had a role to play: embrace Portuguese cuisine and make it her own.

Marlene returned to Portugal inspired to learn more about traditional cooking. She continued to work in fine dining, but her cooking became more and more Portuguese. A breakthrough moment came when Time Out magazine chose her dish featuring a large shrimp called “carabineiro” served with an almond brulée as the year’s best recipe. This dish has the hallmark of Marlene’s cooking: it draws on combinations of ingredients and techniques that are hard to envision but feel utterly natural once you try them. 

We asked Marlene whether she could share a recipe with our readers. She generously gave us a codfish recipe. 

Portugal has many codfish recipes, but only a few have stood the test of time, like those of Brás, Zé do Pipo, and Gomes de Sá. Perhaps one day, this recipe will be known as Codfish Marlene. Enjoy!

Codfish Confit with Sweet Potatoes Gnocchi, Low-temperature Egg, and Pea Emulsion

Ingredients for four people

600 grams of codfish filets

2 garlic cloves

1 laurel leaf

400 grams of sweet potatoes

5 eggs

100 grams of flour

70 grams of onion

70 grams of leaks

300 grams of peas

Microgreens for garnish

3 deciliters of olive oil

200 milliliters of whole milk

Sea salt

Preparation

Pre-heat the oven at 150 ºC.

Clean the codfish fillets, removing the bones. Divide into 12 portions. Smash the garlic, leaving the skin. Place the garlic, the codfish, the laurel leaf, and 2 dl of olive oil on a tray. Set aside.

Place 4 eggs in a pot with water. Heat the pot until the temperature reaches 63.5 ºC. Use a thermometer to control the temperature and keep it steady for 45 minutes. Once the time is up, place the eggs in an ice bowl to lower the temperature.

Cook the sweet potatoes with the skin on. Let them cool, peel them, and make a purée. Mix in a bowl the flour, the purée, and one egg. Blend until the mixture is homogeneous. Make small cylinders and cut them into gnocchi. Bring water and salt to a boil. Once it is boiling, add the gnocchi, cooking for 3 minutes. Remove them with a slotted spoon and drain the remaining water by placing the gnocchi on paper towels.    

Slice the onions and leek. Put olive oil, the onion, and leek in a pot and let the vegetables sweat for 10 minutes in low heat. Add the peas, season with salt, cover with milk and cook for another 15 minutes. Blend the mixture with a hand blender and strain.

Place the codfish in the oven for 10 minutes. Heat a frying pan with a bit of olive oil. Once the oil is warm, add the gnocchi and let them cook—season with salt and pepper. 

Heat up the eggs in tepid water for 10 minutes. Remove the eggshell.

Warm the pea emulsion and blend with a hand blender until it makes foam. 

Serve on a deep plate, placing the gnocchi at the bottom, then the codfish and the egg. Finalize using the pea emulsion and some microgreens. 

Click here for Marlene Vieira’s website.

The thrill of Loco

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Dining at Loco is like attending a jazz concert–there’s a feeling of excitement in the air. The restaurant lighting is soft, but the tables are lit like a stage, ready for chef Alexandre Silva’s performance. 

We sat down and studied the interesting wine list curated by Mário Marques, an old acquaintance from Ceia and Cura.

The performance started with a series of delicious food riffs presented on a wide variety of backgrounds: stones, coal, shells, and much more. The tempo was fast, like John Coltrane playing Giant Steps. We recognized culinary motifs inspired by the classics of Portuguese cuisine. For example, there were disks of crispy chicken skin that tasted like the traditional roasted chicken with piri-piri sauce. 

Then, the rhythm slowed down to a ballad tempo, like Thelonious Monk playing ‘Round about Midnight. A basket of artisan bread came with rich butters and a bowl with sauce from the traditional clams Bulhão Pato. There was also delicately cooked, perfectly seasoned black pork, pumpkin dumplings, and pristine fish dressed with colorful sauces. 

The desserts were playful, pomegranate granita and supple ice cream topped with hibiscus crystals. Finally, there were some encores–miniature sweets that please the eye and charm the palate. It is a thrill to dine at Loco!

Loco is located at Rua dos Navegantes nº53-B, Lisbon, tel. 21 395 1861. Click here for the restaurant’s website.

Mister grape

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When João Rodrigues invited us for dinner in Lisbon, we wondered where he would take us. João knows how to orchestrate memorable dining experiences like the jubilant dinners at Ceia or the soul-nourishing rustic lunches at Casa no Tempo in Alentejo.

He drove us to the Estrela neighborhood and parked the car on a vertigo-inducing hill. Then, we crossed the street to Senhor Uva (mister grape). Stephanie Audet and Marc Davidson, a Canadian couple, opened this vegetarian restaurant three years ago. Stephanie is the head chef and Marc curates the wine list, focused on European natural wines.

The restaurant is small and cozy, with large windows that offer low-angle views of the cobblestone street. We sat at the counter that overlooks the tiny kitchen. João asked our congenial server whether she could choose the food for us and pair it with wine. Soon, we were holding stylish wine glasses made in Austria by renowned wine critic René Gabriel, filled with a delightful white wine called António. Casal Figueira makes this wine near Lisbon in the windy hills of the Montejunto mountain. 

We were clinking our glasses when a plate arrived with black rice balls cooked with shitake mushrooms, leeks, eggplant, and a fermented Japanese fruit called umeboshi. The umami flavors of the rice made the wine feel richer and more intense.

The three cooks on duty that night joined efforts to make a stunning ceviche from green jackfruit. It arrived with another enviable white wine, Thyro, made in the Douro valley. Who could guess that a vegetable ceviche could rival a fish ceviche?

Next, we tried a delicious cauliflower cooked in a black beer sauce with black garlic and radishes. João noticed that all dishes have a perfect balance of fat, acidity, and crunchiness. Our next entrée vindicated this observation. It contained grapes marinated in rice vinegar, Jerusalem artichokes, beets, and new potatoes served with a delicious mole sauce. Vacariça, a lovely wine made in Bairrada from the local baga varietal, accentuated the chocolate flavors of the mole sauce.

The savory part of our meal ended with delicate shitake mushrooms cooked in the oven with corn “xerem,” miso, hazelnuts, and pecorino Romano cheese. 

Then came the sweet part. First, a perfumed pineapple from the Azores cooked in three ways, accompanied by labneh, ginger, coconut, and yogurt sand. Second, a luscious roasted quince served with buckwheat, pear and hazelnut puree, and a Madeira wine reduction. 

Just as we were leaving, a reggae version of the famous Blood, Sweat, and Tears tune “You make me so very happy” poured out of the sound system. It is an apt hymn for a restaurant taking vegetarian cooking to joyful heights.

Senhor Uva is located at Rua de Santo Amaro 66A in Lisbon, tel. 21-396-0917. Click here for the restaurant’s website.

ZunZum

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It is so much fun to eat at ZunZum! The restaurant, headed by chef Marlene Vieira, has a great location, with the Tagus river on one side and the Pantheon on the other. The food is as wonderful as the location.

We sat for lunch in the esplanade under a large red umbrella on one of those perfect sunny days that Lisbon residents take for granted. The simpatico waiter suggested a rosé made from bastardo at Quinta de Arcossó in Tràs os Montes. It has nice acidity and flavors of cherry and tropical fruit. “Do you want to choose from the menu or be surprised by the chef?” the waiter asked. Surprised, we chose without hesitation.

The “couvert,” a set of delightful little bites that start the meal included codfish tempura (“pataniscas de bacalhau”) and a sourdough brioche. 

The first appetizer was a luscious ceviche made with unusual ingredients: popcorn, red onion, and passion fruit. It was followed by tasty mini pizzas topped with trout eggs, a spider crab called sapateira, and avocado. The pizzas were coated with a traditional spider-crab filling.

Then came “filhoses de berbigão.” They are a feast, the cockles large and juicy floating on a star-shaped bed made from fried dough filled with a cream of cockle broth, coriander, and lemon. 

The fish entrée was a bowl of creamy, savory rice made with clams, cockles, razor clams, and mussels. The rice, a carolino variety from Bom Sucesso, has large grains that soak the appetizing sauce made by the seafood. 

The meat entrée was a slice of delicious black pork accompanied by fried corn and pickles made from cauliflower and celery.

Our first dessert was a yogurt parfait on a bed of strawberry jam. The fatness of the yogurt and the sweetness of the jam are a perfect yin and yang. The second dessert was “toucinho do céu” (bacon from heaven) a pudding made with egg yolks and bacon. It is so tasty that it could, indeed, be served in heaven.

We left ZunZum deeply satisfied and certain that if Robinson Crusoe could eat Marlene Vieira’s food on his desert island, he would never want to leave.

ZunZum is located ar Av. Infante D. Henrique, Doca Jardim do Tabaco in Lisbon, email hello@zunzum.pt, tel. 915 507 870. Click here for the restaurant’s website.