One of the things that everyone who visited Portugal remembers is, undoubtedly, the delicious culinary tradition that Portugal offers!
Indeed Portugal is an unmissable culinary destination with a unique variety of flavors, aromas and local ingredients!
In this article we present you 5 traditional dishes that you should taste during your tour around Portugal!
It will be easy to have the opportunity to try each one of them. Many Portuguese restaurants offer a wide variety of typical Portuguese dishes in their menu.
To whet your appetite, take an overview of these 5 dishes that you will want to taste:
01. Cod Fish
Codfish is, undoubtedly, the most popular and well known dish of the Portuguese gastronomy.
People say that there are more than 365 ways of preparing the codfish, one per each day of the year!
As an example you have the fried codfish, codfish in olive oil, codfish roasted in the oven with onion rings, baked in the oven with a creamy béchamel sauce and fried potatoes (‘bacalhau com natas’), or ‘bacalhau a Gomes de Sá’ sautéed with boiled potatoes, eggs and onions are just a few of the many other possible combinations.
02. Portuguese Stew
For many, this is considered the most traditional Portuguese dish! Its preparation varies from region to region, but the ingredients are generally based on vegetables, cooked meats and sausages.
03. Francesinha
The emblematic dish of Oporto, which emerged in Portugal between the 50’s and the 60’s. It consists of a large sandwich with various meats, sausage and egg, covered with melted cheese and a sauce of unique flavor.
This is the secret of ‘Francesinha à moda do Porto’, the sauce with tomato and beer, slightly spicy which gives it a delicious and unique flavor.
Actually, there are several versions of this dish as ‘Francesinha’ with shrimps, roasted sirloin or vegetarian.
04. Caldo Verde
In Portugal there is an abundant cultivation of vegetables, so the soup is a dish enjoyed by the most of the Portuguese people and often eaten daily.
The ‘caldo verde’, in particular, is a Portuguese cabbage soup accompanied with slices of sausage, which is part of the menus of the popular festivities, in particular ‘São João’ at Oporto and ‘Santo António’ at Lisbon.
05. Grilled sardines
Another traditional dish that is present in the menus of the popular festivities is the grilled sardines, accompanied with bread, baked potatoes and roasted peppers.
Besides the famous sardine you can prove in Portugal, a large variety of fish and other fresh seafood, due to our extensive coast in the Atlantic. Here you can find the best fish that can be tasted in Europe.
And, if we told you that you can also learn to cook one of these dishes? With an experienced cook in a warm and typical location of each region? A unique and unforgettable opportunity?
Get to know our private tours with cooking workshops, at Alentejo!
Enjoy your meal!
