Food in Lisbon

So, it’s a little late now, but figured I’d put up the rest of what I ate in Lisbon.

I forgot to mention that our hostel did a free breakfast every morning, so Sean and I just ate there mostly. Typically, it was just bread, jam, nutella, and cornflakes, though they had crepes too about every other day. I’ll say this though: I’m looking forward to a glass of COLD milk in the states; they prefer room-temp, ultra-pasteurized milk in Portugal for some reason.

Grilled sardines. Tasty, yet pokey. Dem bones hurt.

Our second day, we stopped for lunch while walking downhill from the castle. Saw a place that had a 10 euro meal of the day, and figured why not. We both got a glass of wine and some fava bean soup, then we got a choice between fish or meat. I continued my trend of really only eating seafood in Portugal, and got the fish option, which was grilled sardines and potatoes. They tasted good, but were really boney and hard to eat. Dessert was just a fruit cup.

Grilled cod and potatoes

Anyway, after that, we came back and passed out, then left for dinner around 9 for a place whose name I’ve already forgotten, though it was quite tasty. I got the grilled cod and potatoes, and Sean got the filet (which was only 2 euros more).

Cod’s actually really big in Portugal and is normally the most expensive (or one of the most expensive) options on the menu, as much as twice as expensive as the salmon or swordfish. It’s funny that it’s such a huge part of the diet here, because they don’t even grow in Portuguese waters. They fly it in from Norway as salt cod and have to rehydrate it for 2 days.

Cod stew

The next day was the trip to Sintra, where for lunch we had a lot of bread, cheese, sausage, and jam for appetizers, then some cod, zucchini, and bread stew made by Sofia, which was far and away the best meal I had in Lisbon and the second best in Portugal (more on the best once I get to writing about Porto). On the way back, we stopped in Belem to get a pastel de Belem, an egg custard tart that’s kind of THE secret recipe of Portugal. No one knows what’s in it, they just make good guesses. That night, we all ate at the hostel, where we got some soup, home-fried chicken, olives, and mango sorbet with berries.

Lunch the next day was pretty basic, since we were leaving around lunchtime: just a pepsi and a ham and cheese sandwich at the train station while we waited to go to Porto.