portocityguide.com

Welcome to Portocityguide.com! Here you will find an insider's guide to all things Porto -- plus tips on what to visit in the Douro wine region and Northern Portugal more generally. Our goal is to be the most comprehensive, selective, reliable, and independent source of online information on what Porto has to offer! If you enjoy what you find here, you may want to consider subscribing to our RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

D. Tonho (DON TO-gno) is the best place to eat traditional Portuguese food in a contemporary setting. Owned by singer-songwriter Rui Veloso, it consistently attracts a lively crowd across ages and walks of life. It is located right next to the river in the heart of the Ribeira (riverfront) medieval neighborhood. There is also a smaller outpost right across the river in Gaia, which is equally good, especially for lunch. The chef prepare most of the top dishes in Portuguese traditional cuisine consistently well.

The main D. Tonho restaurant is in a lovely XVI-XVIII centuries stone building. The dining room features a sober contemporary decor and has a view of the river and the exquisite nearby D. Luiz I bridge. The Gaia outpost is a glass and metal stand-alone structure right next to the river, making the most of the magnificent views.

You can’t miss the ameijoas a Bulhao Pato (clams in a garlic, white wine, and parsley light sauce) as an appetizer. Try also the roupa velha (old clothes), which consists in a mix of bacalhau (salted cod) with vegetables slowly sauteed in olive oil — what most families have as a first course on Christmas Day, prepared with the left-overs from the traditional cod dish that features prominently on the Christmas Eve supper menu. If you still have room, go for the pataniscas de bacalhau (salted cod fritters), a staple of Portuguese XVIII century fast food.

As for main courses, try the lamprey (a seasonal large eel that is much appreciated in Northern Portugal) either cooked in wine (a bordalesa) or with rice (similar to a risotto). The menu also includes several great bacalhau (salted cod) dishes, including bacalhau assado nas brasas com batata a murro (char-grilled cod with greens and baked potatoes, which are punched half-way through baking so as to acquire a softer texture). Among the fresh fish, we highly recommend the robalo ao sal, a whole sea bass baked in a salt crust. The seafood section also includes polvo (octopus), masterfully grilled or baked. But our favorite is undoubtedly the cataplana de bacalhau com ameijoas (salted cod and clams steamed with herbs and white wine in a cataplana, which is a large clam-shaped copper pot that looks like two woks on top of each other and that can be hermetically closed, allowing the food to slowly cook in its own juices; used in many fishermen villages to prepare fresh fish). Among the land-based dished, the arroz de pato is a terrific rice with duck, smoked sausages, and cheese, drier than a risotto but equally delicious. Highlights must also include the tripas a moda do Porto, which is the flagship of Porto’s culinary tradition. It is a bean stew similar to a cassoulet, featuring different kinds of smoked sausage besides the tripe (tripa) after which the dish is named.

The Gaia outpost (check out the view on the bottom picture) also includes several francesinhas on the menu. These are hot sandwiches unique to Porto, stuffed with coarse fresh sausage, wet-cured ham, linguiça (known in New England and Hawaii as “Portuguese sausage”), steak or roast meat and then covered with thin slices of a Portuguese Gouda-style cheese called flamengo and baked until the cheese melts. Before coming to the table, a hot thick sauce with beer, brandy, tomato, and hot peppers is poured over them. You will not forget these. In fact, you may well feel the need to come back to Porto for more!

Short dessert menu, featuring a few local specialties. Rabanadas is something all Portuguese have for Christmas, and could be described as a more sophisticated version of French toast, with a sauce that includes Port wine, tea, honey, spices, etc. The pera borrachona (drunken pear, cooked in red wine) is also well worth a try. Member of a family that was popularized world-wide, the leite creme caseiro is the Portuguese version of the crema catalana.

The wine list is very good, having won the prize for best Port wine offerings in 2005. It features around 250 table wines and 150 Ports. Ask the sommelier for suggestions among the many great Portuguese wines and don’t pass the opportunity to have a good Port for dessert.

Service is professional but friendly.

Price point: around 30 euros plus drinks.

Address: Cais da Ribeira 13-15, Porto; Esplanada do Calem, Gaia.

Website: http://www.dtonho.com/

Opening hours: open daily for lunch (12:00pm-3:00pm) and dinner (8:00pm-12:00am).

Reservations: recommended, especially for dinner and during the weekends; call (+351) 22.200.4307 (Porto; main dining room); or (+351) 22.374.4875 (Gaia outpost).

Getting there: difficult access by car; taxi recommended. If your driving from downtown Oporto, take Rua Mouzinho da Silveira down to Praca do Infante, turn left, go through the tunnel and turn sharp right as you exit the tunnel before crossing the bridge. The restaurant is 100ft down the street on your right side — on your left side is the river. Parking is difficult, so it is better to leave the car in the underground parking at Praca do Infante and walk down Rua do Infante until you get to the river. Turn left and follow the river; the restaurant will be on your left just before you reach the D. Luiz I bridge. If you’re not driving, you can walk from downtown (around 30 minutes downhill) or take a taxi (5 minutes). In order to get to the Gaia outpost, you must cross the lower level bridge and turn sharp right as soon as you are on the other side, in order to stay on the riverfront. Park and look for a long glass pavilion about 1/4 mile from the bridge.

In Portuguese, Sessenta Setenta (seh-SEN-tah seh-TEN-tah) literally means “sixty seventy” but can also sound like “if you seat yourself, you tempt yourself.” So it is.

Sessenta Setenta is located (or, perhaps better, hidden) in the ruins of the Monchique monastery. You take a narrow winding street down the hill to get there and halfway through you’ll find a metal door with the restaurant’s logo. You enter through a tunnel. At the end of the tunnel, take a moment to enjoy the view of the ruins with the river on the background — by night the ruins are particularly pretty with spotlight illumination — before you enter the restaurant. The dining room has stone walls and narrow windows that capture the magnificent view of the river right there at your feet. (You can also dine al fresco when the weather is pleasant, say, from May to September.)

Chef Francisco Meireles’ menu consists mostly of Mediterranean and contemporary Portuguese cuisine. Beyond the seasonal dishes, there’s typically six cold appetizers, nine hot appetizers, four fish courses, twelve meat, poultry, and game courses, and a dozen desserts.

Among the appetizers, we recommend the crab mousse, the chicory salad with parmigiano cheese (which features a bacon and walnut crumble), or the patatu (a mixture of potatoes, fava beans, olives, and goat cheese au gratin).

Main courses include a sea bass with saffron; a couple of good bacalhau dishes (among which the a Frexieiro, baked with bread and olive oil, stands out); baked potato stuffed with game over leeks; a pigeon with chila (sweet preserved pumpkin); a lamb carre; and several good stakes — including a tuna steak. Great desserts, among which the passion fruit tapioca, the apple pie, the fruit puree with ice cream, and the Grand Marnier souffle stand out.

Seasonal menus include great stuff, like the savel (shad) de escabeche (a way of preparing fish in vinegar and herbs in order to soften the bones), lamprey (a seasonal large eel that is revered in Northern Portugal) cooked in wine, Stilton cheese with apricot butter, and a glacee apple in saffron and starched anis.

The wine list has around 80 choices, many of them excellent Portuguese wines, most at reasonable prices. The Port Wine Institute has awarded the restaurant for its top choices.

Service is friendly and attentive; the chef is often in the dining room or at the door.

The decor is dark and a bit minimalist, which fits the monastic environment well. It also matches the foggy river close by.

Price point: around 35 euros plus drinks.

Address: Rua Sobre o Douro 1 A, Porto.

Website: unavailable.

Opening hours: open Monday through Friday for lunch (12:45 to 14:30pm) and Monday through Saturday for dinner (8:00pm to 1:00am).

Reservations: highly recommended for dinner; call (+351) 22.340.6093.

Getting there: difficult to access by car; taxi recommended. If your driving from downtown Oporto, take Rua da Restauracao downhill, heading toward the river. Around halfway through, there is a low contemporary white house on your left (easy to find because on that section of the street there are few other houses on the left side, only the downward slope). Enter the narrow street next to that house (you actally have to go through the main street’s sidewalk to do that) and continue to go down, only now in the opposite direction. After a few sharp turns, you’ll find the restaurant on your right. Parking is usually easily available, but you need to be accustomed to parking on narrow streets. When you exit the restaurant, continue to drive down and you’ll hit the riverfront road. Take a left to return downtown or a right to go to Foz (the seafront). If you’re not driving (or if you don’t feel comfortable driving in very narrow streets), take a taxi. It should take only fifteen minutes to get there from downtown.

Artemisia (r-teh-MEE-zee-ah) focuses on spices — “artemisia” is both the name of a herb and that of a Greek goddess, so we guess the point is that the chef strives to become the god of spicy food (by which we mean aromatic, not hot).

The menu is eclectic, drawing on different continents. Cold appetizers include a nordic gravad lox with wasabi and apple puree; a Portuguese contemporary crab salad with beans, sichuan pepper, and ginger; and excellent shots — one of gaspacho, the other of red pepper pesto with avocado and parmigiano cheese. Among the hot appetizers, we recommend the goat cheese souffle with tomato sauce. Several good fish entrees include a top-notch fish massele (a herb and spice mix) from the seychelles archipelago as well as a snapper with chermoula (a herb-based marinade used in the Maghreb to flavor fish and seafood) and celery puree. Highlights in the meat section include a turkey loaf with chestnuts, apricots, and prunes; and a duck breast with three different fruit chutneys. There is also a good pasta and risotto section, where a Malabar risotto with spices from that coastal region of Southern India (where the Portuguese traded heavily since the XVI century) stands out. The green tea ice cream with caramel sauce and peanut praline is not to be missed.

The wine list is not long, but features several great selections of Portuguese wines, especially from the nearby Douro region.

The lunch menu has several good daily specials, like the white sea bass with spring onions and coconut sauce on Wednesdays. We’re told specials vary with the seasons, so check in advance.

If you’re visiting the gallery district, go there for coffee, tea, or hot chocolate and indulge in the fig scones.

Comfortable setting and an lively clientele of art dealers — the restaurant is close to Rua Miguel Bombarda, where most art galleries are located. Which also explains why it’s open till so late — 1:30am.

Service is professional and attentive. Though we didn’t try anything that was too hot, don’t hesitate to ask about spice levels.

Price point: expect to spend 30 euros plus drinks; half that at lunch-time.

Address: Rua Adolfo Casais Monteiro 135, Porto.

Website: http://www.restauranteartemisia.com/

Opening hours: open daily for lunch (12:30 to 3:00pm) and dinner (8:00pm to 1:30am); the coffeeshop section is open from 12:30pm to 1:30am.

Reservations: recommended; call (+351) 22.606.2286.

Getting there: difficult access by car; taxi recommended. If you’re driving from downtown Porto, go up Rua de Ceuta. Do not enter the tunnel. Continue going up. At the top, turn left on Rua Jose Falcao. Take a right on Praca dos Leoes, stay straight, pass a church (Igreja do Carmo) on your right and go to the large granite building at the end of the square — the Sto. Antonio hospital. Turn right and go slightly down. Go around the park on your left — Jardim do Carregal. As you start going up, take a right on the first narrow street. This will lead you to Rua do Rosario (one block away). Take a right, and stay straight on Rua do Rosario until you reach Rua do Breyner. Turn left. Park when you reach a small square — Largo da Maternidade. The restaurant is in the beginning of Rua Adolfo Casais Monteiro, to your left as you enter the park.. If you’re not driving, a taxi from downtown will take ten minutes to get there.