Portugal: Our best meals in Lisbon

BY ONEIKA RAYMOND

Our best meals in Lisbon, Portugal at two restaurants you absolutely must give a try.

I chuckled inwardly as I gazed upon the massive spread of food before me.  I was in Lisbon, and any hopes I had had of sticking to my diet over the course of my three days in town had just flown out the window.

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Portugal is rife with food that excites your tongue and expands your waist, and Lisbon, being both the capital and the largest city, is one of the best places to sate a capricious belly .  There is meat and seafood galore, good wine, and pasteis de nata.  Restaurants here are cheaper than, say, London or Paris, so you can eat a five-star meal on a three-star budget.  The weather is good most of the year, which makes dining on a terrace as you’re serenaded by a skilled — if over-zealous — fadista (singer of a Portuguese musical genre known for its mournful lyrics) entirely possible.

The only question, then, is where to go eat.

Can I give you two suggestions? Here are the two best meals we had in Lisbon and all the deets on the restaurants they were at.

Cervejaria Ramiro

Av. Almirante Reis, nº1 – H, 1150-007 Lisboa

We came here on the recommendation of my friend Jarmo, travel blogger over at Arctic Nomad, and boy, was I ever glad we took his advice. We knew we were on to something good when we got to the restaurant and there was a queue that stretched out of the doorway and snaked all along the sidewalk. Thirty minutes after our arrival, we were seated and salivating over the offerings on the next table.  Ramiro is a traditional restaurant that specialises in seafood.  Heavily aromatic and endearingly greasy and salty, we ordered garlic shrimp, crude ham, clams, and copious amounts of bread dripping in butter.  The food is a cholesterol lover’s dream — definitely not for the faint of heart.  Though a tad on the expensive side considering how simple the menu is (we paid 8 euros for the bread alone), the food is divine.

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Can the Can

Praça do Comércio 82  1100-083 Lisboa

If Cervejaria Ramiro is an example of a traditional Portuguese restaurant, Can the Can is the poster child for modern dining. Turismo de Lisboa, Lisbon’s tourism authority, invited us to dine at this restaurant, which is known for putting a  new twist on old Portuguese favourites.  The chefs use a lot of canned food in their dishes (hence the name of the restaurant) and their goal is simple, if ambitious: catapult Portuguese canned food to gourmet status.  We tried the bacalhau, which was extremely salty, but tasty. We dabbled in tuna tapas and squid selections presented so prettily that I was reluctant to eat them. While the food is good, the location is even better: not only does the restaurant sit on the Praça do Comércio (the city’s main square), but if you eat on the terrace you are guaranteed a view of the Tagus River.

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And there you have it: our best meals in Lisbon. Have you ever been to Portugal or eaten Portuguese food?

Many thanks to Turismo de Lisboa for inviting us for a complimentary meal at Can the Can. All opinions are mine.

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144 Comments

  • No chance you can stick to a diet with food like that on offer… no chance ma’am! I’ve never been to Lisbon, but I hope to make it one day.

  • I love Portugal. One of the things I learned early on is that in most of the places you pay for the bread and condiments like a surcharge. If you don’t touch it or ask for them to take it away you won’t be charged.
    One time in Sintra, we feasted on the bread and all the yummy spreads only to find out 12 euros later they weren’t free. I gotta say, one look at the scenery made up for it.
    Ok, now I’m hungry 🙂

  • The dining culture in Lisbon is incredible. I was very fortunate to go on a press trip there and had some amazing food in amazing restaurants. A dish that really stands out in my memory is a Mozambique influenced crab curry – so good.

  • Portugal is next on my list of places to go in Europe. It looks beautiful and delicious! 🙂

  • I absolutely love Portuguese food! I went there in February and I feasted on a lot of grilled meats, I especially love grilled chicken. The best one was in Porto! It was sooo good. I also ate a lot of the bifana sandwich for lunch Now, I’m hungry and I want to go to Portugal for lunch 😉

  • Oh wow, this food looks absolutely GORGEOUS! I have to admit, though I love food and eating my way through destinations generally fuels most of my trips (hence why my husband and I have spent the bulk of our RTW in Asia… 14 months in and we’re still here! :D), I know embarrassingly little about Portuguese food. I’m really looking forward to finding out more when we arrive, and now I’ll have two restaurants to give us some perfect hands on experience when we hit up Lisbon!

  • Hi Oneika,
    I read your article in Huffington Post and agree with and have experienced all 20 things you have to say about traveling. I’ve been going for over two years now and am completely addicted. And I loved seeing your post on these amazing Lisbon restaurants. I was just living there for two months helping create a Portuguese cookbook. O Ramiro and Can the Can were two of my favorite spots. Ramiro may be the best meal I have ever had in my life, and that says a lot. And Portugal won my number 1 spot for favorite country. Maybe we will meet on the road one day. What a beautiful and blessed life. Thanks for sharing.
    Nicole

  • No, I’ve never been to Lisbon and I’m sick with envy. But my friend did, and he ate at Ramiro as well. Word on the street is that the wait staff will come drop food off on your table before you’ve ordered and if you eat it you pay, if you don’t eat it they take it away. An interesting method to keep the coffers filled.

  • I ate shrimp that looked just like those ones while I was in Lisbon a couple years. A whole big bowl of them with bread to dip in the oil. So simple, yet divine. I love the idea of the canned food restaurant. It’s impressive that they make it work! And I love the traditional tiling used in the restaurants. Such a nice detail.

  • I’m sad I missed Ramiro, from all accounts it looks delicious! I did read that the area around the restaurant was a bit rough. I was travelling (an eating!) alone so in the end I skipped it :/ I absolutely loved Lisbon. I still dream about the sweets from Pasteis de Belem. Mmmm, and the coffee! I had really good grilled chicken at Bonhardim and even better grilled pork at Os Jeronimos in Belem. I can’t wait to go back to Portugal!

  • We went to Lisbon last month and loved it as well! The food was to die for. If you return, we also suggest Floresta de Santana Restaurant. Thanks for sharing these restaurant suggestions.

  • Well, some of it is fish, good for your health, so you’re not really doing any “big damage” to your diet.

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