Showing posts with label Portugal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Portugal. Show all posts

Saturday 24 February 2024

Madeira (4): Eira do Serrado and Câmara de Lobos

This is a new post though it describes the events of the 21st of April 2023.
It will be moved to the appropriate date in due course.

A Deep Valley, a Glass of Madeira and a Seaside Village

A Brief Introduction


Portugal
Madeira
Madeira, as you probably know, is a Portuguese Island in the Atlantic, 1,000km south west of Lisbon and 700km west of the Moroccan coast. It measures 50km from east to west, 20km from north to south and rises to 1,861m (6,106 ft) at Pico Ruivo. It has 250,000 permanent inhabitants, half of whom live in the capital, Funchal. Our hotel was in the Lido district, 40 minutes' walk along the coast west of central Funchal.

Madeira

A Disappointing Morning

We had booked and paid for an afternoon excursion, our plan for the morning was to make it up as we went along, but even that simple strategy went wrong. Madeira’s benign climate makes it a 12-month tourist destination, but the high mountains can at any time snag a passing cloud, thus ensuring sufficient rainfall to keep the island green, the gardens blooming and the crops healthy. Without rain Madeira would be like the nearby Islas Desertas, unsettled and without visitors, but like every other tourist we had selfishly hoped the rain would fall on somebody else’s week, not ours

It cleared up sufficiently for us to venture out for coffee and cake – a regular pleasure on the mainland, but not one that had hitherto fitted our schedule here. The café, a few steps down from the road and festooned with patrons’ wet weather clothing, felt like a damp basement. The coffee was fine, but our pasteis de nata fell Algarve's best – or was that just the weather?

We wiled away the rest of the morning with a little shopping and sheltering. By lunchtime the rain had gone and we sat outside the café opposite out hotel and drank a beer. A little later we were at the bus stop waiting to be picked up for our excursion,

Miradouro Pico dos Barcelos

Our driver filled his minibus with people waiting expectantly by other bus stops or outside hotels and drove us towards Santo António, a parish in the northwest corner of Funchal. From the coast the land rises steadily to the foot of the mountains, but just below Santo Antonio a ridge rises to some 335m (1165ft). The summit offers 360° views, so the municipality has thoughtfully constructed a miradouro (viewpoint).

Westward we looked across Funchal and the Atlantic …

Funchal and the Atlantic Ocean from Pico dos Barcelos

… while to the north the city climbs the first wave of the interior uplands.

Looking north from the Picos dos Bracelos

Also looking north, but down from the ridge, is Santo António itself. The typical local church is where a young man who would bring fame to Santo António took his first communion. Cristiano Ronaldo, arguably the greatest living Madeiran, was born nearby on the 5th of February 1985. Almost universally regarded as the best European footballer of his generation, his career included spells at Sporting Lisbon, Manchester United, Real Madrid and Juventus, and over 200 international appearances Portugal.

Santo António

Miradouro Eira do Serrado

The rather more dramatic Miradouro Eira do Serrado is 10 km north, the drive into the mountains normally taking around 20 mins, but not today. Just outside the city the road runs through a narrow defile which was blocked by a broken-down digger. Rather than wait for the rescue equipment our driver headed back into town to find an alternative route.

Before reaching the countryside, we passed the stadium of Maritimo, Funchal’s leading football club. Founded in 1910 they started playing in the Portuguese League in 1973, first reached the top tier in 1977 and have remained there since 1985. [Update: they would lose that status at the end on 2022-23 season and now play in the second tier alongside Nacional, Funchal’s other professional club.]

Three hundred metres further on we passed the ground – stadium would be an overstatement – of Andorinha Football Club where Cristiano Ronaldo’s played as a child. He moved to Nacional juniors aged 10 and two years later was signed by Sporting Lisbon after a three-day trial. He made his debut for the first team at 17, and at 18 moved to Manchester United.

The route took the best part of an hour’s driving, leaving Funchal and entered the municipality of Câmara de Lobos.

The Miradoura at 1095m (3,600 ft) looks down on the isolated village of Curral das Freiras sitting on a step on the lip of the valley. When first settled the land belonged to João Gonçalves Zarco one of the island's co-discoverers, but at first only the desperate tried to wring a living from this isolated valley.

Curral das Freieras

More organised agriculture arrived in 1462 when Zarco granted the land to João Ferreira and his wife Branca Dias. In 1480 their grand-daughter sold the land to Zarco’s son, João Gonçalves da Câmara, who donated it to the Convento of Santa Clara. The valley was the perfect place for nuns to do whatever nuns do without interruption and the settlement previously known as Curral de Sierra – corral of the mountains – became Curral das Freiras – corral of the nuns.

Much work was done terracing the valley sides below the village…

Terracing opposite central Curral das Freiras

….and eventually it was linked to Funchal by a tunnel.

The modern road linked to Funchal by tunnel

Wild flowers are abundant on the valley side including one known as Pride of Madeira. I know little about flowers but these look like lupins to me, maybe they are.

Pride of Madeira

Barbeito Madeira

Our descent was aided by the newly cleared and reopened defile. From there we veered further west, away from the city, though there was plenty of development in the ‘countryside.’

Above the village of Câmara de Lobos we took a minor road to the Barbeito winery.

Barbeito

The company was founded in 1946 by Mário Barbeito de Vasconcelos and remains a family company. They specialise in making Madeira wine, the fortified sweet wine, oxidised by heat before bottling. I described the process for making Madeira when we visited Blandy’s in Funchal and will not repeat myself here though I will note that ‘normal; wines are made on Madeira too, but they are labelled Madeirense not Madeira..

Stainless steel tanks, Barbeito Winery

The heyday of Maderia was the late 18th and early 19th centuries. At one time there 70 British owned Madeira houses, and many others besides, but their best export market were the British colonies in North America and then the new-forged United States of America. The second half of the 19th century Madeira was cursed with diseases of vines, first odium, then phylloxera and as the American market struggled to recover along came Prohibition. There are now 8 Madeira producers, Blandy’s (AKA The Madeira Wine Company) are the only surviving British family firm.

p
Barbeito

Barbeito started when the Madeira market looked doomed, but they survived. In 1991 they dropped out of the bulk trade feeling they were too small, and concentrated on quality. A brave decision at the time, but Madeira’s recovery could only come from concentrating on quality.

Barbeito barrels

The showed us round their facility, gave us a lecture and finally a glass of wine, or more precisely, Rainwater. When barrels stood on the quay awaiting export some were, inevitably, rained on. It was thought this produced a lighter wine and the Rainwater style of Madeira was born, It is made deliberately these days (the meteorological method was always more in the imagination than on the palate) and was always popular in the United States. Barbeito’s Rainwater was light, fresh, clean and medium dry, like a softer version of Blandy’s sercial. I liked it very much, it would make an excellent aperitif and would be a better companion for cheese than the heavier sweeter wines. We were told they are having some success in reviving the American liking for Rainwater, and I would not object if some of it came our way.

Câmara de Lobos

Leaving the good people of Barbeito, we drove down into Câmara de Lobos, the main settlement of the eponymous municipality. Câmara de Lobos was given city status in 1996, but the centre looks more like a village surrounded by banana-packed amphitheatre.

Câmara de Lobos - all those bananas are watching, you know

When João Gonçalves Zarco first landed here he also saw the amphitheatre, enhanced by the two rocky peninsulas….

Eastern side of the Harbour, Câmara de Lobos

…that create the natural harbour.

Western side of the harbour, Câmara de Lobos

The harbour and beach were full sea mammals, sounding and looking like a debating chamber (câmara in Portuguese). Soon the settlement was known as Câmara de Lobos – Chamber of Wolves - but Madeira has no wolves. There is a story that Zarco’s sailors could not tell the seals’ barking from the howling of wolves, but I cannot believe that. The ‘sea mammals’ were probably monk seals, they have gone now (they dislike humans) but there is a colony on the Islas Desertas, the only one outside the Mediterranean. But the Portuguese for seal is selo. I looked up Portuguese Wikipedia and it used the phrase lobos marinhos and Wikipedia’s translate facility renders this as sea lion. So that settles it, except that Google translate insists that sea lion is leão marinho (lit. sea lion) while lobo marinho means sea wolf. I might be overthinking this, so let’s settle for Parliament of Seals and hope they do a better job than the non-seals we elect.

There are few boats out in the harbour, they are all on what might elsewhere be the car park.

Parked boats, Câmara de Lobos

The actual car park is further back. I rarely, if ever, photograph car parks, but cropping out the vehicles as far as possible…

Bougainvillea, Câmara de Lobos

…leaves the spectacular bougainvillea on the rear wall.

Câmara de Lobos is a pleasant little place, but we only had time for a quick look round. It made me wonder why it is the focus of so many tours.

Winston Churchill paused in Madeira in 1899 as a young army officer on his way to the Boer War. He returned as a tourist in 1949 and 1950 after his wartime stint as prime minster and again in 1956 after his second stint, staying at Reid’s Hotel. He enjoyed painting, and frequently visited Câmara de Lobos on painting trips. This is its USP, and the reason why British tourist are always taken here.

Winston Churchill Paining in Câmara de Lobos
I do not know if this photo is still in copyright, if it my apologies to the copyright holder

I admit to a frisson of excitement when (pre-blog) I climbed ancient steps in Egypt’s Siwa Oasis to the room where the oracle told Alexander the Great that he was the son of Zeus. Sadly, standing where Winston Churchill once painted a picture does give the same feeling. Even less exciting is the information that Margaret and Dennis Thatcher spent their honeymoon in the Savoy Hotel, just down the road from Reid’s. Both hotels feature in the post Madeira(2).

Câmara de Lobos was the end of our tour.

Tuesday 17 October 2023

Eating the Algarve 2023

A Complete 2022 Re-write and Update of the 2011 Post of the Same Name with Many Additions and Improvements from 2023

Introduction


Portugal
For me food ranks high among the pleasures of travel. Eating local may involve endless mutton in Mongolia (there is no choice) or two kebabs a day in Iran (I hear menus have diversified since 2000) but also the multifarious delights of Thailand, China, Vietnam, India, Malaysia (this list could be much longer) and, closer to home, Portugal.

We first visited the Algarve, Portugal’s southernmost region, in 1982, returned several times in the 1990s and have not missed a year this century (except 2020, the Baleful Year of Covid). I admire the way the locals accept that, for a part of the year at least, they are a minority in their own town, yet deal calmly and honestly with the invading hordes. I love the October warmth, the sunshine sparkling on the sea, the colours of the bougainvillea trailing across freshly painted white villas, but most of all I love the food.

The Algarve (Carvoeiro underlined) and its position in the Iberian Peninsula (shaded red in inset)

Portugal is often thought of as a Mediterranean country. Portuguese is a Latin language, the climate, particularly in the Algarve is Mediterranean as is the food. Tomatoes, garlic and peppers are important while olive oil is the essential cooking medium, condiment and salad dressing. All it lacks is a Mediterranean coast.

Warm and blue, but definitely the Atlantic Ocean, not the Mediterranean Sea

The Algarve is a tourist region and thus prey to foreign influences - tapas and sangria from Spain, salmon from northern Europe and (2022’s fashion) ceviche from South America. Carvoeiro, our Algarve base for the last 18 years, also offers Chinese, Indian, Thai and Nepalese cuisine – and all-day English Breakfast should that be the limit of your horizons. There are an increasing number of tapas, Italian and ‘Mediterranean’ restaurants, but the majority could still be described as tipico, where fresh, local ingredients are treated with respect.

Carvoeiro

I have nothing against Indian restaurants or ceviche, but this post is about Portuguese food, mostly with a distinct Algarve accent. It is not fine dining (though the Algarve has its Michelin starred restaurants), nor exclusively about restaurant food, it is about good food at everyday prices – something Portugal does supremely well.

Breakfast

We do not go out for breakfast, and there is nothing special about a Portuguese breakfast, but I must crowbar in a mention of presunto. Portuguese has two words for ham, fiambre is wet cured ham, pink, flaccid and forgettable while presunto is air cured – very like the Spanish Serrano Ham. Of the many ways to enjoy presunto, none is better than smeared with a warm, runny egg-yolk.

Presunto, a sadly broken fried egg and an over-large breakfast

Although we eat presunto for breakfast regularly, this is not a regular breakfast, this is the final day, 'clear the fridge' breakfast - well, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

Morning Snacks

Coffee and cake! A section of I Don’t have a Sweet Tooth but… is dedicated to Portuguese coffee and cake. I shall not repeat myself here, but I cannot resist a picture of coffee with a pastel de nata, my absolute favourite.

Cafe con leite and a pastel de nata

It does not look much, but melts away leaving a legacy of lovely, lingering flavours. It’s like Portugal, not always showy but full of depth and richness.

Light Lunch

As will become obvious in the 'main courses' section, we do occasionally go out for lunch, but not for a 'light lunch' - keeping it 'light' would be nigh on impossible. But to control a regime noticeably leaning towards over-indulgence, light lunches are a necessity. We need salad - lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, garlic, a sprinkle of herbs, a dash of vinegar and a drizzle (or downpour) of olive oil - and in the Algarve what better accompaniment than sardine paté.

Salad and sardine paté

Or a few slices of chouriço

Chouriço Piquante da Beira (spicy sausage from the Beira region)

…or maybe some cheese, though cheese is often eaten at the start of a meal. Portuguese cheeses can look similar, most are semi-hard but some are mild and some are not. Cow, goat and sheep milk are used and generate a spectrum of cheesy flavours. The biggest problem is to know what you are buying. Most comes from Alentejo, the next district to the north or from the Azores, 1,000km out in the Atlantic.

Two cheeses

On the left is an Alentejo sheep cheese. It is close textured with a gentle flavour, but a pleasing tang in the finish. On the right an Azores cheese made with mixed cow, goat and sheep milk – I don’t know of anywhere else that mixes milks. It is soft and creamy with a delicate flavour but a sumptuous texture.

Main Courses

Fish and Other Denizens of the Deep

Some 100km West to East and 50km North to South, the Algarve is a roughly rectangular with the Atlantic Ocean on two sides. Unsurprisingly, it is blessed with the freshest of fish.

Dourada e Robalo. Sea Bream and Sea Bass are ubiquitous. The tourist-driven fashion of late is to fillet them, but they used to be plated whole....

Robalo, Casa Palmeira, Carvoeiro 2023

....and still are at Casa Palmeira in Carvoeiro.

Dourado, Casa Palmeira, Carvoeiro 2023

...while at the Restaurante Atlântida on the beach at Alvor, Lynne’s Dourada was filleted at the table by the waiter.

Dourada, Restaurante Atlântida, Alvor 2022

Sardinha. Sardines are available in (almost) every restaurant in the Algarve and are often the cheapest main course.

Since 1982 we have been making what has become a pilgrimage to the Algarve’s second city of Portimão to eat sardines. The scruffy trestle tables on the dock have long been tidied up, but ducking under an arch from where they used to be brings you to a small square where Dona Barca, an old-style restaurant with communal tables, grills fish in the open air. Since we discovered it with Brian and Hilary in 2001(ish) we have never felt the need to go anywhere else for our sardines.

Dona Barca 2022, with Brian and Hilary
Sardines, salad and boiled potatoes, so simple, so satisfying

It is a treat we have often shared with friends, usually Brian and Hilary. Dona Barca is inexpensive, the food is excellent (they have a full menu, it’s not just sardines) and it is one of very few restaurants we visit with as many Portuguese customers as tourists. Sadly, the long communal tables disappeared two years ago – more victims of Covid?

Espadarte. I like an occasional swordfish steak. At lunch at the Atlântida they offered an Espadarte Algarvia. There is no agreed definition of ‘Algarvia’ or ‘Algarve style’ but I expected something with tomatoes, peppers and garlic. What I got was different.

Swordfish with orange and almonds, Restaurante Atlântida, Alvor 2022

Oranges and almonds are important local products, but I was not prepared for a slab of fish to be doused in orange (juice and pulp) and sprinkled with toasted almonds. ‘Oranges and fish!' I thought, 'No! No! Thrice No!’ But, believe it or not, it was the best thing I ate all week. Like Lister’s triple fried egg, chilli, chutney sandwich it was all wrong, but perfect.

Perhaps there is a fashion growing here. This year (2023) I found a restaurant offering 'swordfish with coconut and passion fruit'. After discovering the pleasures of fish and passion fruit in Madeira earlier this year I thought I might try it, then I read the restaurant reviews and decided not to bother.

We lunched at the Atlântida at the suggestion of my (distant) cousin Ricky, long- time Algarve resident, fluent Portuguese speaker and now a Portuguese citizen. See Finding a Long Lost Cousin.

Ricky and me, Restaurante Atlântida, Alvor

Lula. Squid has long been a favourite of both of us. They were disappearing from menus a couple of years ago, but I am glad to see they are now making a strong recovery. This year’s squid (a portion of three) was, like, last year's eaten at the Bela Rosa in Carvoeiro.

Squid at the Bela Rosa, Carvoeiro, 2022

Perfecting squid is tricky. I am of the opinion that the very finest squid was served at Maria's, a breath of fresh air, proper Portugal and sensible pricing on the beach beyond Vale de Lobo/Quinta da Largo. After several decades of sterling service Maria sold up. The restaurant is still there, I believe the name is unchanged, but the new management is fully invested in the creeping Californication of the Algarve.

Lynne and a squid, Maria's, Quinta do Largo, 2011
Fish is always best eaten within sight of the sea

Polvo. We often ate  Octopus, more precisely, Polvo à lagareiro in Martins Grill in Carvoeiro, Sadly Jan (Martins) Zegers died some months before this photograph was taken and Martins's Grill is no more.

Polvo à lagareiro, Martin's Grill Carvoeiro 2019

Lagareiro is a style of cooking often applied to octopus, cod and more in which the grilled or roasted fish is brushed with olive oil.

Bacalhau. The Portuguese love affair with salt cod dates from the days before refrigeration. It was once the people’s major source of protein and there were, allegedly, 365 ways of cooking it, so it could be eaten every day. It remains popular, and has started to appear more often in tourist orientated restaurants. Sadly, Lynne was not delighted by her Bacalhau à Braga, the fish, she thought, was a little overcooked.

Lynne and Bacalhua à Braga, 2022

Arroz de Marisco. Seafood rice usually comes as a dish for two. A large earthenware bowl is placed on the table and, after the waiter has given it a judicious stir, you spoon out the contents, rice, langoustine, crabs, prawns, mussels and anything else that might have been in the market that day. Fingers are required to liberate tasty morsels from shells and it all gets wonderfully messy (bibs are normally provided).

Arroz con Marisco, Casa Palmeira, Carvoeiro, 2023

In 2022 we tried out the Marisqueira Portugal in Carvoeiro. It is, I think, new and is trying to be a touch more elegant and inventive than the opposition.

Marisqueira Portugal, Carvoeiro

They fiddled with a classic, the broth was not the usual tomato-based delight, apart from the clams and mussels the seafood was served separately and they used short-grained rice instead of long. They almost got away with it, the flavours were good, the crab legs were very fine indeed – and they helpfully provided crackers to provide easy access to the sweetest of meat in the spindly legs – but if you mess with a classic, you really have to nail it, not just be a bit different.

Lynne and a langoustine, Marisqueira Portugese, Carvoeiro

Ensopado de Enguia.The restaurants we use in Carvoeiro and along the coastal strip describe themselves as 'tipico' but their clientele is largely tourists and however tipico they want to be, they all have an eye on what will appeal to the north European palate.

This year (2023) my cousin Ricky (see above) took us to the restaurant in her village. She told us they feed local workers on weekday lunchtime and on Sundays (when we visited) people drive up from Portimão (the nearby city) for country food. Wherever the clientele came from they were overwhelmingly Portuguese

A Oficina, Mexilhoeira Grande

A Oficina gave us access to several dishes that do not make it onto the tourist menus and I could not resist trying ensopado de enguia, eel stew. Disks of perfectly cooked eel floated in a somewhat rustic sauce consisting largely of blitzed tomatoes strongly flavoured with coriander. It was accompanied by a plate of chips and fried bread, which would have been perfect if I spent my day labouring in the fields, but for an idle so-and-so like me, was more carbohydrate than I needed. The eel, though was delicious, the white, delicately flavoured flesh falling willingly from the spine.,

Eel stew, A Oficina, Mexilhoeira Grande, 2023

Amêijoas. Clams have always been important in Portugal but the last twenty years have seen serious over-fishing. Amêijoas à Bulhão Pato, clams in a garlicky broth, was once a cheap starter, it still appears on menus but now costs more than most main courses.

You can still find a bag of fresh clams at a reasonable price in a supermarket and cook them at home.

The former contents of a bag of clams

I have never essayed Amêijoas à Bulhão Pato, but I borrow from the French and do Amêijoas marinière (to mix languages and mess with a classic!). Using a big pot, I soften up some onion and plenty of garlic in olive oil, pour in a bottle or so of white wine and add salt and pepper and a handful of herbs. Using a quality wine is a waste, but I found this in the same supermarket…

Cheap wine!

… a tetra-brick of white wine from Badajoz across the border in Spain. It cost €0.95, was barely drinkable but perfect for clams.

Let the wine boil a little, throw in the clams, give them a shake and job is done.

Clams marinière frites
I messed with a classic, but I only had to please my resident food critic and she had no complaint.

A cataplana is a cooking vessel unique to the Algarve. It consists of a pair of hinged copper shells which enclose the ingredients sealing in all the moisture and all the flavour. It can also be put on the heat either way up. A fish cataplana, usually serving two, will contain several pieces of fish - whatever is available that day - and, typically, prawns and mussels. The smell when your cataplana is opened at the table is memorable.

Cataplana, Vimar, Carvoeiro 2011

The cataplana in the picture was expertly cooked, but among the fish is a slab of Scottish farmed salmon, and in front are New Zealand green-lipped mussels. Local produce is excellent and promoting it is even more important now than it was in 2011.

Another dish traditionally cooked in a cataplana is pork and clams, and in 2022 I enjoyed them in an individual cataplana at the Casa Algarvia in Carvoeiro. This apparently strange combination was made in the Algarve, but undoubtedly designed in heaven.

Pork and clams in a cataplana, Casa Algarvia, Carvoeiro. 2022

As that last cataplana involved pork, it is time for the meat.

Meat

Borrego. Throughout the Algarve there are patches of scrubby land with a few sheep and a shepherd. The shepherds are uniformly the sort of old men who feel they still need to do something useful (an affliction I have never suffered from). Lynne felt that as they went to so much effort it was rude not to eat some lamb.

Lynne’s rack of lamb at the Casa Algarvia was top quality meat, perfectly cooked. It was marred, though, by a squirt of commercial mint sauce at the side of the plate, partly over some salad. I suspect unimaginative British tourists have for years been telling Portuguese restaurateurs that ‘we always eat lamb with mint sauce’ and this is the result. Mint sauce has its place in a British-style ‘roast dinner’, but it is just inappropriate here.

Rack of lamb, Casa Algarvia, Carvoeiro, 2022

Frango Piri-piri. Chicken piri-piri was on (almost) every menu in the Algarve long before Nando’s existed. That abomination was co-founded in South Africa by Fernando Duarte, a Portuguese Mozambiquan who gave the dish the fast-food franchise treatment and aligned himself with the other gastro-criminals of KFC, MacDonalds and the rest. There are mercifully very few fast-food franchises in Portugal (though there is a Burger King with a ludicrously large sign in Lagoa) and chicken piri-piri is cooked individually by each restaurant in their own style. It is traditionally our lunch on our last day in Portugal.

Chicken piri-piri, O Barco, Carvoeiro 2022

Portugal and the chilli: a small digression

The chilli pepper was first cultivated in Mexico some 10,000 years ago. Several millennia later It was taken to Asia by Portuguese traders, arriving in India in the late 16th century and recasting the whole cuisine of south-east Asian. Vindaloo, the ultimate test of British diner's machismo, originated in the Portugal's Indian colony of Goa, as an example Portuguese/Indian fusion.

They took the variety that would become piri-piri to Africa and it made its way to the Portuguese mainland from their colony of Mozambique. Chilli does not appear in traditional Portuguese cookery but sausages (chouriço piquante) and sardine paté with piri-piri are widely available, as is piri-piri sauce, suggesting it is much used in home cookery.

Desserts

Dessert menus usually involve a large glossy folded card produced by a manufacturer of synthetic desserts and ice creams. Stuck somewhere on the card there will always be a small, sometimes hand-written, list of the grown-up desserts, many of them made in-house. Ever present is pudim flan, a rich eggy caramel custard, which is perfect when you have too little room for anything heavier. Sometimes it is just perfect.

Lynne and a pudim flan, Martin's Grill, Carvoeiro 2019

If you have a little more space left, there are bolos (cakes) and tartes (translation unnecessary) made from local produce including (but not limited to) almonds, figs…

Fig and almond roll, Atlântida, Alvor, 2022

… carobs, oranges…

An amazingly light yet full flavoured orange cake, and an affogato of sorts
O Barco, Carvoeira, 2022

and apples. The cakes are usually made with one egg more than would be normal elsewhere and are universally wonderful.

And there is always the mysterious little package known as Dom Rodrigo.

Dom Rodrigo, Marisqueirra Portugal, Carvoeiro, 2022
Very enjoyable, but rather small once you get in there

Extroduction

I have omitted nibbles and starters, and the mandatory eating of olives that precedes every meal, but I have already gone on too long and should stop now.

Bread, olives and white port - well why not?

*This is not an exhaustive list, I could have mention France, Italy, Laos, Moldova, Albania and many others.