Day 23 - Lisbon Food

# Pasteis de Nata: 1, Distance Walked: 11.5km, # Floors Climbed: 40

First order of business for today was to take a food tour of Lisbon.  Our guide was a young man called Duarte who was born and raised in Portugal but had spent time in London, Paris and Canada.  He had the oddest English accent.  Mostly he sounded English but at times he could pass for South African.  There were 11 of us on the tour.  All the others were American.  Eight were all ex-New Yorkers couples who now all live in the same retirement community in Florida.  The other 2 were a young couple who'd only got married the week before.  They are here on their honeymoon.  Because it is their honeymoon they are taking a whole 2 weeks off work!  

They were all very kind and friendly but straight out of central casting.  At one point 2 of the women were saying they always try to find a Starbucks or Dunkin' Donuts when they travel as they have to have proper coffee to start their day.  Duarte and I both twitched but didn't say anything.

The tour was a mix of food and Lisbon history.  Duarte was much better at the history than the food.  Our first stop was at a famous old deli where we had the Portuguese equivalent of prosciutto and cheese with quince paste all washed down with a glass of port wine.  We got told all about how port wine came to be made but when it came to the rest of the food it was just "here is some cheese, it's good" (and it was).

The deli was a listed historic shop.  There are many around Lisbon.  Not only is the building protected, so is the business.  If you buy the building, not only are you unable to make significant changes to building, you can't change what business is run there either.  I also think there are limits on how much rent you can charge.  They are marked with signs like this.  When you know what to look for, they are everywhere.  Can you imagine trying to do something like that in Australia?

Next stop was for some Portuguese "fast food".  Duarte was very careful to point out this is food that is for eating quickly, not food that has been made quickly.  Instead, it is bifana which is a sauce made of pork fat, lard, wine and garlic which is simmered over night and then slices of pork are cooked in it slowly.  It is served in a bun with some of the cooking juice.  It was very Good.  We had a glass of green wine with this.

Next stop was in the Alfama district while is much older than downtown as it wasn't (as) damaged in the quake.  It is very steep and with winding streets.  Some are just staircases.  On the way we passed the smallest bookshop in the world.   It is only open when the owner can be bothered.  Here is a picture.  I'm standing in the doorway to take it.  There was perhaps 50cm between the doorway and the only bookshelf.

Are next stop was for samosas.  Portugal used to have a colony in Goa.  When this was given back to India some of the inhabitants felt more Portuguese than Indian so they moved to the nearest Portuguese colony, which was in Mozambique.  When Portugal gave up their African colonies some people came to Portugal itself.  There is now a community that mixes African and Indian cuisines.  The Americans were all amazed by the samosas.  They were good but I've had just as good ones in plenty of Indian restaurants back home.  I had a beer with these.

After this we headed back downtown to a pastry shop where I had the absolutely best pastel de nata of my holiday.  I can remember how to get to the shop but I can't remember what is was called.  I will visit tomorrow, and perhaps Wednesday morning if I can find the time before my train to Evora.  I'll take note of the name then.

Our final stop was back where we started, which was next to a shop selling ginja which is a sour cherry liqueur.  They didn't serve it in little chocolate cups which was a disappointment.

The history lesson (the quake, the colonies and the end of them, the Salazar dictatorship and its overthrow) were interesting but the tour was a little light on info about food.  The Porto tour was much better.

After the tour I headed back up the hill to visit the Castle de São Jorge.  I finally got good use out of my Lisboa card as I was able to completely ignore the queue of people waiting to get in and just waltzed right up to the gate, flashed my card and went straight in.

I spent a pleasant couple of hours wandering around here, but I have to confess I didn't climb all the towers.  I did climb most of them though.  

There are peacocks all around the grounds.  The males are the most ridiculous creatures.  It is difficult to believe those absurd tails are real.  There are signs saying not to feed them but I suspect people do.  They are very tame and one walked up to me when I was sitting down.  I could have reached out and touched it, it came so close.

After leaving the castle I decided to be a terrible tourist and take the famous 28 tram back down the hill.  I decided to be clever and walked higher up the hill in an attempt to get closer to the start.  The trams are quite small and I was hoping to be sure of getting on and, ideally, get a seat.  As I came up to a stop a crowded tram sailed past leaving 2 people waiting at the stop for the next one.

I joined the queue. On the plus side, at least I was sure I was waiting in the right place.  They are meant to run every 10 minutes or so (traffic permitting) but after 30 minutes I gave up and started walking back to my hotel, following the tracks.  I turned a corner and found a sad sight familiar to many Melbournians - a tram jam.  I'm not sure why the lead tram wasn't moving, but it clearly wasn't going anywhere and neither was any others behind it.

I've since discovered the route actually takes a big loop and the stop I was waiting at was nowhere near the start.  The start is actually all of 5 minutes from my hotel.  Tomorrow morning I'll have an early breakfast and then catch the tram from the start, before the bulk of the tourists are out and about.  I'll ride it the whole way while I'm waiting for the museums to open at 10am.

On the way back to my hotel I passed a shop selling Gelato Therapy so, of course, I indulged.  I had pistachio, vanilla with basil, and lemon with rosemary.   The gelati was merely Good but bonus points for the interesting flavours.

I just collapsed in my hotel room for a bit after all this.  I tried watching TV.  I found an English language channel with re-runs of various crime dramas which should have been a harmless why to pass the time.  However, they were subtitled in Portuguese.  I couldn't stop myself from reading them, even though I could barely understand what they meant.  I tried turning off the subtitles but the previous occupant of my room was Polish and they'd set the language in all the menus to Polish.  It took me a good half hour to figure out which menu setting controlled the language.  When I finally got it into English I discovered the subtitles were part of the broadcast and I couldn't turn them off anyway!

For dinner I went to the same Italian place I'd been to on my first night.  This time I had pizza.  The couple at the table next to me started chatting with me.  They are from country NSW.  They couldn't eat all their pizza.  It was too much for them.  I nodded and smiled as I ploughed through my entire pizza and was thinking about what to have for dessert.  I had the tiramisu al limoncello.  This was flavoured with limonello rather than coffee and marsala.  That made it (taste) much lighter than the traditional version.  It was all Good.  However, I think I'll try a different Italian place tomorrow night.