Fish, fado and flowers –
welcome to Portugal in April
Lagos, April 2005
Wednesday, 12 April:
Ah, the benefits of budget air travel. A three-hour flight and we exchange neighbours scraping ice from their windshields for neighbours coating each other with sun cream.
Spring can be a great time to visit the Algarve – if you catch the weather. It is a lot less crowded than the summer and the landscapes are fresher,and greener, with wild flowers carpeting the hills in blues, pinks and yellows.
“April in Portugal,” as Portugal's great fado singer Amália Rodrigues once crooned, “Can love exist anywwher but Portugal in April?”
These days, some parts of Portugal's south coast strip have a less romantic reputation, getting a bad rap as a haven for cohorts of northern lager swilllers. But come out of season or stick to the balmy and largely undeveloped east coast east between Faro and the Spanish border, or head west to the windward shore beyond Portimao and you can find a land of unlimited charm, with the best beaches in Europe, fabulous seafood and a laid back lifestyle that makes for the ideal escape from the rat race.
Lagos is an 80 kilometre drive from Faro airport, along the new Via do Infante motorway.
We stay at the expanding Marina complex across the river from the town centre. The new wing of the Marina Club hotel is just opened – minimalist design, flat scene TV, big roomy apartments opening onto the kidney shaped pool. A two-bedroom flat is 145 euro a night.
Cheaper options can be had in the nautically themed Estibordo building or by renting privately in its twin Bombordo.
The Marina has shops, cafés restaurants, overlooking the luxury yachts bobbing in the harbour. It's a five minute walk to the old town, ten to the wonderful 6 km, curve of soft sand that makes up Meia Praia beach.
Newly built on the crest of a dune overlooking the western end of Meia Praia is São Roque, which after three or four visits has become one of my favourite restaurants.
It has everything: great location, the freshest seafood, good wines and friendly service. The glass façade reveals a seascape ranging from the distant cliffs Alvor and Praia da Rocha, the surf crashing on beach below and the ramparts and church towers of old Lagos just across the river.
There's a broad terrace blending into the sand and an airy interior decorated with colourful abstracts by Vila – the celebrated co-owner of another classic Algarve restaurant – Vila Lisa just down the road in Mexilhoeira Grande.
We are given no menu, but are guided to an ice cabinet where the waiter sweeps away layers of crushed ice to reveal an array of fishy delights.
Lagos fishing port is a stone's throw away and the fish looks like it just came from the nets. There is red mullet, bream, bass, turbot, squid, grouper.
To start we have a portion of amêijoas – sweat clams steamed just enough with garlic and coriander with a squirt of lemon – a wonderful recipe named after an obscure 19th century poet – Bulhão Pato. I can think of no better way to start a meal.
A bottle of a crisp dry white from the Douro – Quinta Seara D'Ordens was the ideal companion. Main course was grilled pargo – a large sea bream. It came whole but sliced down the spine. The waiter expertly sliced off fillets and kindly asked us if we also wanted the head. I have to admit to declining. Delicious, light white flesh, fresh enough to need just the lightest charcoal grilling. It tasted like it had just stopped splashing about in the cool Atlantic waters outside.
Served with boiled new potatoes tossed in excellent olive oil, fresh oregano and garlic, and a great salad of roasted green pepper, carrot, tomato and lettuce.
They have great old Algarvian desserts – carob tart or a wonderful sticky wedge that combines carob, fig and almond – the trinity of regional sweetness.
Thing black bicas of espresso and then we are offered a glass each of the home-made bagaço – Portugal's answer to grappa. Usually it's more than a little rough, but his was the house's own, aged in port barrels and with a taste that matched its warm ruby complexion.
To help it down came a complementary bowl of toasted almonds and dried figs – a really nice touch that rounded off a great meal.
About 30 euro each. Like almost everywhere in Portugal families are more than welcome. At the next table a big, multi-generational family were tucking into a huge dish of massa do peixe – a fish stew with pasta which is a house speciality.
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Thursday, 13 April:
Sun shining bright at 7am. Clear blue skies. We stock up in Lagos municipal market in its newly restored 1920's home beside the river that separates the old town from the fishing harbour.
Fish on the ground floor, fruit and veg above. At this early hour, fish were still arriving from the boats across the river, some still gasping in the air.
The multitude of life aquatic on show ranges from tiny whitebait to great, blood-dripping sides of tuna and corvina the size of a man. We picked up a pair of plump red mullet and a wing of skate. Upstairs there's a great view over the river, port and beach and raucous vendors tout the season's best in strawberries, meddlers, broad beans, onions, potatoes, tomatoes, peppers ...
Then the beach. Lagos' best known is Dona Ana. We parked there – impossible in the summer crush, but no problem today. Then walked south over the cliff tops to Praia do Camilo. The views are breathtaking, the honeycomb cliffs of the Costa d'Oiro running towards Lagos, then the broad sweep of the bay backed by Meia Praia's white sands running off into the distance to the Alvor estuary and the towers of Praia da Rocha on the horizon. Beyond loom the Serra da Monchique mountains. Looking down the cliffs at the deep, dark sea, there are rocky coves and inlets. One small beach for nudists, another even more inaccessible with just two couples soaking up the rays. A myriad of wild flowers, multicoloured butterflies pursued by a cacophony of bird life – rosy hoopoes, dashing beeaters, choughs, screeching gulls battling for pinacples on the cliff tops, bands of larks and finches.
Praia do Camilo is always worth the long climb down. Two crescents of golden sand wrapped by crumbling sandstone cliffs, limpid waters, sheltered by the Atlantic winds. Never too crowded. We explore rock pools and hidden caves that open up to the sky. Look out for the divers hunting octopus and cuttlefish, then swim in the chill water before lunch with sandwiches of presunto (smoked ham) and sardine paste.
Then walk some more to the lighthouse overlooking the rocky outcrop of Ponta da Piedade, where little boats carry visitors in out of the sea caves Drink a coffee in the cliff top café among the Spanish visitors who flock to Portugal during the Easter semana santa.
In the evening we grill our mullet on the balcony, drink a bottle of Planalto wine form the Douro and fall tired and a tad sunburnt into early bed.
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Friday, 14, April:
Good Friday and an armada of low grey cloud blows in with a forecast of rain till Sunday. Along with thousands of other disappointed sun seekers, we head for Algarve Shopping – the giant, post-modern, vaguely Moorish, completely over-the-top shopping centre outside Albufeira.
This is a traditional rainy day alternative. There is a big range of shops _ Iberian home décor at Loja do Gato Preto, Portuguese menswear at Throttleman, alongside international chains like FNAC, Zara, Benetton.
There's also a vast array of fast food joints. We hit O Kilo _ a Brazilian chain found in shopping malls around Portugal, where you load up black beans, shredded cabbage, ground manioc, sausages and a range of spit roasted cuts of beef like the lean salted picanha or juicy maminha. When you've filled your plate, they weigh it and you pay by the gram. Washed down with fruit juice combinations like strawberry-passion fruit or mango-orange. It sure beats chicken nuggets.
Still raining so it's afternoon movie time. Films are almost always in the original language in Portugal, with subtitles. Nanny McPhee was a family favourite.
Dinner at home is favas à Algarvia _ fresh broad beans from the market fried in olive oil with chouriço, morcela (black pudding), torchinho (bacon), garlic, onion, sea salt and a bundle of fresh, green coriander. With it a fine bottle of Quinta dos Grillos – the oddly named grasshopper farm – from the Dão region near Coimbra.
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Saturday, April 15:
The sun is back. We head to the Santa Amaro market to stock up with vitals for a family Easter. Far from the tourists downtown, this market is less well stocked, but cheaper than its main riverside rival. It's currently operating away from its usual site in an old cork factory overlooked by a couple of white storks nesting on a disused chimney stack. A cheerful place with some excellent butchers specialized in porco preto - the acorn-fed, semi-wild pigs from the Alentejo region to the north.
A stroll from Lagos' old town leads to the Paderia Central – the city's best bakery. This is a wonderful old place where locals stand in line for freshly baked bread and cakes. At this time of the year, the rush is for folhar – sweat Easter loaves heavily flavoured with aniseed. Some contain a boiled egg. It's for decoration and Easter symbolism – don't eat it with your cake.
Lunch was a salad of skate and potatoes awash with chunks of garlic and a puddle of olive oil, followed by fresh local strawberries, oranges and meddlers.
After that, a couple of hours by the pool and a long walk along Meia Praia beach as far as the Por-do-Sol restaurant – a great place to sit outside and watch the sun go down over simple grilled fish, or to join the crowds on a Sunday lunchtime, where the Angolan owner cooks African favourites – muamba da galinha (chicken with palm oil and corn or cassava meal) or caldeirada de cabrito (spicy goat stew).
The walk builds an appetite for another of the Algarve's great culinary events – dinner at Adega Vila Lisa.
Tucked away in the big, farming village of Mexilhoeira Grande, just off the road from Lagos to Portimão. This is a superlative restaurant. Unmarked on the main street twisting up though the village, it's in a simple whitewashed Algarve house with bright yellow shutters and the door frame picked out in cobalt blue.
The inside is rustic. You share big tables and sit on rough wooden benches. It may not be the best place for a romantic tete-a-tête, because you'll be in enforced communion with your neighbours, who may well be visiting politicians or TV personalities from Lisbon who have helped maintain Vila Lisa's legendary status in the capital for over 20 years..
It's always crowded, despite the additional space upstairs and in the patio behind.
Contrasting with the rural fittings, the walls are covered with the big bold abstract paintings of Senhor Vila – an artist on canvas as well as in the kitchen who runs the place with his partner Senhor Lisa.
You don't get a menu. The serving girls just bring you dish after dish along with constantly refilled flasks of the anonymous house wine – either white or red or both – they are both hearty, rough and ready brews that go down a treat with the rigorously traditional food.
We start with slices of morcela sausage, triangles of fresh white cheese, potatoes tossed in olive oil and oregano, a little plate of eggs scrambled with tomato sauce served with chewy country bread.
Next up comes sopa de cacão (dogfish soup). This is a nod to the cuisine of the Algarve's northern neighbour, the Alentejo, an unctuous confection with slices of crusty bread, chucks of firm white fish in a tangy juice tasting of vinegar and coriander.
Then broad beans again, with golden fried toucinho, morcela and a slice of fired peixe espada – the long silvery scabbard fish whose toothy grins are one of the scariest sights in Portugal's fish markets.
The next course is pernil de porco – one of Vila Lisa's signature dishes – leg of pork slow roasted to produce the perfect combination of tender flesh and crispy, crunchy skin.
Just when you think you can't take any more, comes sopa do grão – chick pea soup fortified with oxtail broth and handfulls of fresh mint _ the twist in the tale of this gastronomic epic.
Dark, pungent sweetmeats made with figs and almonds come with a pot of excellent coffee and a icy bottle of medronho from which you can drink your fill. This is a fire water made from the sweet red fruit of the strawberry tree which thrives on the wooded hills of inland Algarve.
An extraordinary civilized meal in, one of Europe's great restaurants. All for a fixed price of 30 euros a head. Unbeatable.
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Sunday, April 16:
A family visit for Easter and we prepare a lunch of coastal goodies. Fresh local prawns boiled with sea salt and a dash of piri-piri, Aljomoho – a gazpacho-like concoction using up day-old bread, tomato, green pepper, oregano, and loads of garlic. The main course is caldeirada – fish stew similar to French bouillabaisse. Ours had conger eel, dogfish, skate, grouper, with potatoes, tomato and pepper.
To finish up an Easter sponge cake layered with sweetened egg yokes and topped with toasted almond and doce de gila – a jam made from fibrous pumpkin like vegetable grown around here.
A post lunch walk along the water front past the 16th century Forte da Ponta da Bandeira, which guards the entrance to Lagos harbour – built to counter raids by the likes of Sir Francis Drake. Alongside is Praia da Batata – potato beach – the closest to town. It's popular with local families and teenagers. The water was recently cleaned up and the local diving and sailing clubs are based there offering beginners' courses, beneath the Naufragio bar, which offers great view across the bay.
On the far end of the beach begin the ragged cliffs that are the trademark of the great string of beaches that make up the golden coast running south and west from Lagos.
Batata is a mini Acapulco, where local kids leap of the cliff tops into the sea. Not something I'd recommend after a big lunch.
Batata is a mini Acapulco, where local kids leap of the cliff tops into the sea. Not something I'd recommend after a big lunch.
With the wind picking up, we walk back through the old town walls and past the statue of Gil Eanes – the local hero and one of the first great Portuguese discovers. Lagos was the point of departure of the early voyages and was the base, along with nearby Sagres of Prince Henry the Navigator.
Stop for coffee in the Cafe Central, an old-fashioned favourite in the heart of the city, where tourists sit in the sunny terrace, but locals prefer to enjoy their coffee and cake inside, where the prices are dramatically cheaper.
For dinner we cook Cozido do Grao – an Algarve version of Portugal's national dish of boiled meat and vegetables. It includes beef, pork, a selection of sausages, potatoes, runner beans, pumpkin, chick peas, mint, all boiled up in a hot pot together. The water is strained off and used to cook rice to go with in all. Washed down with a robust Alentejo red.
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Monday, April 17:
Lunch at the Adega da Marina _ a cheap and cheerful place alongside the river in Lagos. Very popular with Portuguese families who will form long queues on the pavement outside to get in.
The immense rooms are decorated with fishing paraphernalia and waiters rush around among the long tables. It's big, brash and noisy.
Part of the popularity must be the price. The dish of the day is less than 5 euros, a plate of grilled sardines 5.80 euros.
But go early, we arrived at 1.30: sardines were off and the dish of the day _ arroz de safio, rice with conger eel _ was sold out.
Instead I went for that old favourite, chicken piri-piri. Not bad, if a bit greasy. The piri-piri sauce came on the side and was satisfyingly spicy. Not a great culinary outing, but good for a budget family lunch.
Later that night we ended up at the Amoras bar on the Lagos Marina, a trendy, laid back sort of place, popular with the yachting set for cut price cocktails at happy hour. It's open terrace overlooks the water, but most eyes were glued to the big screens at either end of the bar _ showing live football from both the Portuguese and English leagues.
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Tuesday, April, 18:
The Easter holidays are over and the city empties out. We had the hotel pool almost to ourselves and spent the day there in the patchy sunlight.
For dinner Galinha Cerejada – cherry chicken – so called because of the ruddy colour the bird is supposed to take on after being fried with garlic in bacon fat and served with rice cooked in stock.
In contrast to the hectic weekend, the city was dead after diner with none of the normal all night summer street life.
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Wednesday, April 19:
Clear blue skies, but that old Lagos bugbear, the west wind, sweeping in from the Atlantic cools things down.
It's a good day for a run along Meia Praia – six kilometres end-to-end, and reward at the eastern extremity of the beach: a glorious view of the Ria de Alvor – a great estuary alive with bird life. Its sands are the haunt of shellfish hunters digging for cockles at low tide. When the tide is in the still waters offer shifting shades of blue and a calmer, warmer alternative to the surf rolling onto the beach.
The water today was almost deserted and surprisingly warm, great to have a dip and dry off running back. like a castaway on all that deserted white sand.
In complete contrast, in the late afternoon we head to Praia da Rocha. I'd not been here for about 15 years and the scale of the new development is astonishing.
The broad, palm lined avenues of tower blocks give it a mini-LA feel. The architecture ranges from modernist monoliths to mock-Moorish fantasies. Along the cliff-top strip, Irish pubs fight for space with hippy trinket stores, pizzerias, vast discos, theme eateries like the Sitting Bull wild west restaurant. The old Penguin hotel is closed down and the elegant Bela Vista – once a haven for exiled world leaders, looks under siege.
I dread to think what this is like on a packed, boozy summer night. Best to keep your eyes seaward on spectacular of sandy beach below, which is long and wide enough to guarantee some space even at the height of the season.
At the far east of the strip, things calm down, there are some older surviving villas and some picturesque gardens tumbling to the beach to recall the resort's belle epoque origins. The Santa Catarina fortress still offers spectacular views along the beach and across the mouth of the Arade river to the tranquil beaches of Ferragudo village on the far side.
We drive into Portimão passed the now mostly disused fish canning factories which were the economic mainstay here in pre-tourism days, then skirt the riverside Praça Manuel Teixeira Gomes square with the charming old Casa Inglesa cafe. Then over the old bridge to Ferragudo.
This beautiful fishing village is a world away from Praia da Rocha across the river. The whitewashed streets wind down a low hill below the church to a little creak that runs into the Arade. Beyond the cafe-lined main square is a warren of lanes lined by well-kept traditional homes. There is a bohemian feel too it with little handicraft shops, artists studios and inviting bars like the Très Macacos – the three monkeys.
Past the quayside market and the stacks of lobster nets, road bends to a famed restaurant – Suoeste. In a former salt warehouse augmented with a glass fronted veranda, it looks out over the river and the Portimão skyline. As we take our seats, the waiter brings over a huge tray laden with one each of all the fish available tonight – three species of bream, sea bass, sole, giant shimp – all gleaming fresh from the sea.
Three of us share a big sole, which is whisked outside where two old boys gut and grill by the harbour, throwing the waste into the water to the delight of the gulls wheeling overhead.
While waiting, we are served a Portimão speciality of carrots pickled with cumin, then plate of whole shrimp fried with garlic and squirted with lemon – lovely.
This place is not much fun for non-pescavores. The best they had on offer was omelette and chips.
The fish arrived whole with a smoky charcoal whiff, super fresh and grilled to perfection. Served with boiled new potatoes and an excellent salad. To drink we had a bottle of Soalheiro vinho verde, crisp and clean.
Deserts arrived with the sun already down and the lights of the city twinkling across the water. A succulent fig tart and carob tart topped with a fine, almond crust like Italian amaretti – both were interesting takes on Algarve classics.
All in all the food and setting were difficult to fault, but the service could definitely have been improved. The sole arrived when we were still eating our prawns and one bowl soup just never came. It's also a bit overpriced at 150 euro for four. Excellent coffee and medronho though.
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Thursday, April 20:
Overcast skies ruled out beach or pool this morning, so the day was spend mainly in town. The Casa de Isabel tea rooms, first in Portimao, then with a branch in Lagos, was a pioneer in reviving regional cakes. The Lagos version lies a block inland from the river is now called cafe Vasco da Gama. It has the same somewhat unfinished attempt to establish old world charm, but the cakes remain as good as ever – egg and almond confections taken from old conventl recipies like touchinho de ceu – bacon from heaven, or the deep dark, chocolately tarta de alfaroba.
An afternoon run takes in the wonderful Praia de Pinhao beach, which is hardly ever crowded, soft gold sand, rocks and coves to explore, calm waters sheltered from the wind and within an easy walk to town.
Dinner at home. Spring lamb cooked with fresh peas and a big handful of coriander, followed by just in season local melon.
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Friday, April 21:
Marisqueira Rui is a temple dedicated to Portuguese seafood situated oddly enough in the Algarve's biggest inland town _ the old Arab capital Silves, a 20 minute drive from the coast.
In a down town pedestrian street, Rui's has litte to distinguish it from the outside apart from the lines of wood-be dinners waiting for a table of summer nights.
What attracts them is certainly not the drab interior with its cork covered walls. The draw is some of the best shellfish in the region, and in particular one dish – arroz de marisco – shellfish rice.
This is Portugal's answer to paella and like the Spanish dish, the quality varies greatly. Rui's is rightly reputed to be one of the best in the land.
What you get is an earthenware pot filled with rice slopping in a tomato and coriander sauce and brimming with crustations and molluscs.
Ours had shrimp, spiny lobster, bits of spider crab, clams, crayfish, razor clams. It is a monumental dish when done well.
Diners not going for the rice, tend to go for a simple mix of shellfish and the room reverberates with the sounds of hammers bashing away at crab claws and salty lips sucking the innards our of leathery goose barnacles. The rice takes a while to prepare, so take care not to fill up on the hot roles and garlic mayonnaise that they bring to ease the wait.
Quite why anybody would want to eat meat here is beyond me, but there are some landlubber alternatives _ several featuring Alentejo black pork.
A good range of fresh fruit and the usual carob or almond desserts. With a good bottle of Marques de Borba white. it all came in at a very reasonable 60euro for four.
Silves itself is a historic riverside city, dominated by its hilltop castle which resonates with old legends of Moorish maidens and dashing crusaders.
The gently sloping land between the mountains and the coast is the called the Barrocal. It's mostly pasture and meadow land planted with citrus groves, vines, almond trees that blossom white in February and wild flowers that coat the ground with colour in springtime.
Clinging to one hillside is Alte, considered by many to be the Algarve's most beautiful inland village. Pristine white houses cluster astride a torrent that tumbles towards the coast. There is a skyline of the lacy, pointed Algarve chimneys. Although there's a handful of souvenir shops catering for bus trips from the seaside resorts in high summer, the village is no tourist trap and was almost devoid of outsiders on this spring day, apart from a few picnickers out by the cascades upstream.
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Saturday, April 22:
Lousy weather, caught up in a downpour. We seek refuge in some cafés, the rather dingy Gil Eanes, in the square of the same name and the more attractive Oceano, with it mosaics of tiles, tropical fish tank and good cakes. It's the nicest café in the centre of town.
For dinner, we let the kids choose and ended up in Café do Cais, in the Marina. An “international” menu that includes some Asian-influenced dishes as well as a few Portuguese classics. The clientèle is overwhelmingly foreign. The kids were a bit disappointed because the menu that attracted them with burgers and salads turned out to be only for lunch. Dinner was more posh – lots of fish and steaks and prices that were almost double the lunch options.
To be honest, things were not so bad. There was a fine view of the stormy sunset over Lagos, cool loungey music and rather neat upscale, beach-bar décor. An original selection of nibbles to start – roast red peppers, olives, Spanish queso manchego and a dip of olive oil and balsamic vinegar, piri-piri and course salt.
Despite the international dishes on offer, we go that for that Algarve gastronomic icon amêijoas na cataplana. This involves a unique Algarve implement, a shiny brass dish that is half-wok, half-pressure cooker. Into this go clams, presunto ham, strips of pork, chouriço, tomatoes, garlic and green pepper. It was rich and tasty and completely authentic- apart from the addition of a bowl of rice – which is not really the done thing. The kids went for steaks, one with mustard sauce, the other with Roquefort – all of which appeared to be in order.
The desserts had a very un-Portuguese feel – lemon baveroise, chocolate fudge cake.
This is not really my sort of place, but it made a change. With half a bottle of the house white _ a reasonable low-budget Alentejo tipple, plus coffee and medronho (not for the kids). It came to 90 euro for four.
Practicalities:
Getting There:
We went Faro with Ryanair, for just over 200 euro a head. The Algarve's international airport is also served by other budget airlines, charters and traditional carriers. TAP Air Portugal has direct flights to several European capitals.
Getting Around:
Local car hire YOR Car was a cheap alternative to the big companies. We paid 204 euro for 11 days in a Hyundai Getz with air conditioning and a CD player.
There is also a train link from Faro to Lagos, which is slow, but offers views along the coast for those not in a hurry.
Restaurants:
Adega da Marina
Avenida dos Descobrimentos, 35,
Lagos.
Tel: +351 - 282 764 284.
São Roque
Urbanização de São Roque – Meia-praia,
Lagos,
Tel +351 – 282 792-101.
Vila Lisa
Mexilhoeira Grande,
Tel +351 – 282 968-478.
Sueste
Rua da Ribeira, 91,
Ferragudo,
Tel +351 – 282 461-592.
Marisqueira Rui
Rua Comendador Vilarinho, 27
Silves
Tel +351 – 282 442-682.
Rua Comendador Vilarinho, 27
Silves
Tel +351 – 282 442-682.
Reading:
Books set in the Algarve are rare, even in Portuguese. One that is translated into English is The Migrant Painter of Birds, a family saga by award winning author Lidia Jorge.
For a darker look into Portuguese thinking try the works of Nobel winner Jose Saramago. His earlier works like Baltasar and Blimunda, or The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis, offer a magical look at Portuguese history. Later novels such as Blindness or The Double are bleaker views of modern society.
Soundtrack:
The Art of Amalia offers a good introduction to the late queen of fado and includes the original track Coimbra, which became April in Portugal in the English version.
For a more modern take on fado, try the albums of Madredeus. The group is from Lisbon but have performed some wonderfully atmospheric concerts in the open air auditorium beside Lagos' medieval walls.
