Portugal: a culinary social (r)evolution
Friends in the kitchen, allies in gastronomy: resilient, resourceful, revolutionary? We talk about the wave of new taberneiros, from NKOTB to Calhau.
Today we come to you with two of the same: the concept is a traditional and popular food of Portugal1.
The development of this concept is discussed through two parallel, coexisting, equally important approaches to the issue of how to ferry gastronomic memories into the future.
We talk about taberneiros and tabernas.
Sitting at one of them is, incidentally, one of the coolest things you can do in Portugal in the last few years.
Not that the fine dining sector and the green restaurant sectors aren’t moving. But they aren’t moving the way this sector is, with a complete rebirth of a concept from the ashes of a past that is still present but has no future.
Here the question is: what will become of traditional eateries, once their ageing owner will fade out? Is there an alternative to the franchise model for the “very typical places”? Is “cheap but tasty dining” over?
The Kids Are ALIGHT
I wrote (in Italian, on my Portuguese gastronomy edit Oltre il Baccalá) about this collective of chefs, cooks and waiters that can be ascribed to the “new wave of tavern” style.
They called themselves New Kids On The Block (NKOTB), and they came together under the banner “The Kids Are Alright” starting various food experiences, pop-ups, takeovers, and restaurants of their own.
But beyond the commercial aspect and the mutual support network they have created for their businesses and themselves, they have started to speak out loud about mental health, job sustainability, crisis and cooking.
Sociologically and socially, this group amplified the voices of those who were talking about just pay, mental health, equality, identity and ethnic mixing.
There is no congress or culinary event now where these concepts are not heard now.
And not only talk: they have been among the first in walking the talk in their establishments, trying to improve the working conditions for themselves and their peers.
These kids surely are alright, and alight and ablaze with ideas that they do not leave in drawers: they make these ideas into realities.
For a few years before the pandemic, the centre of this collectivization that brought together customers on one side of the counter and cooks on the other were two restaurants in Alfama, belonging to the same owner and his partners: Salmoura and Sal Grosso. The two restaurants were located near the Santa Apolonia train station in Alfama (they are now closed or changed hands).
For a few years, these two spaces have been the meeting place for cooks and foodies, patrons and journalists.
Everyone, even the pickiest gastronomes, has been there at least once.
Curiosity, word of mouth, who knows?
There have been recurring patrons, casual tourists, fortuitous encounters, friendships that have grown stronger, stories of love and passion and above all there has been a real culinary reinterpretation of the concept of a Portuguese taberna.
It is in these two restaurants, as well as at Prado, that between 2016 and the end of 2019 a sort of widespread and participatory gastronomic "slow movement" was created, in which patrons ceased to have a passive role and instead compared to posting their food adventures on social media, especially Instagram and Zomato.
From the screen to the table, various more or less homogeneous and more or less recurrent and cohesive groups have thus formed which have begun to dialogue online about gastronomy, restaurants and food.
The new taberneiros
The most famous face of this new wave of tavern keepers is Zé Paulo Rocha, chef and manager of the iconic O Velho Eurico. In his early twenties, he decided to start his own business and take over what was a mediocre typical Portuguese restaurant to transform it into what has become the place par excellence for meeting and experimenting with this new way of making a tavern.
His business partner Fabio Algarvio has been involved since the opening of the tavern. Together, they changed the demographics of the restaurant: from middle-aged Spanish and French patrons craving a plate of meat, rice and potatoes to a young crowd of Expats and locals alike, all familiar with the concept of small, shared plates and innovative twists on Portuguese classics.
With them from the beginning, directly from Rotterdam is João Pedro the Chefe da Aldeia. He worked in Rotterdam at the Caribbean and conceptual restaurant Just where I met him. He was eager to return home and was choosing between various options of fine dining. It was just when Zé was looking for people, and when he got in touch with the crew of O Velho Eurico, it was immediately love at first sight.
I might have been Cupid here, I admit it.
It is at Velho Eurico, the natural heir of the culinary tertulia that began in Sal Grosso, that the new tavern wave is shaping itself, evolving on two fronts.
On one hand, there is an understanding of the work team centred on safeguarding the physical, mental and moral health of those who work. On the other hand, there is a natural acknowledgement of the multicultural identity of Portuguese traditional cuisine, centred on its creole essence and the cultural mix of those who are part of it.
They have also started feeling the boundaries of typical Portuguese preparations and started challenging the banality of “salt and pepper q.b.” of the muse of the last fifty years of this gastronomy, madame Maria de Lourdes Modesto. They did so by bringing up to the patrons’ tables food that they have eaten in their journeys, including the journey of life.
Some of them have a proud Creole background in any shape or form, and this nature comes up in their cooking, ever so beautifully. Up to now the population of foodies and Instagrammers and even tourists hadn't noticed it yet: it was this recent work of proselytism (often in English) that brought many, including tourists/ex-pats, closer to these lost culinary roots.
Until now there hadn't been a similar interest in the rediscovery of "other" roots by the tavern and tasco cuisine, more committed to defending a Portuguese identity linked to the cuisine of the last century, dominated by the somewhat cumbersome presence of Ms. Modesto and with recipe books in which at most the spices were pepper and salt as required.
They have been defined recently as “a breath of fresh air, a new generation of cooks with identical values, who practice an uncomplicated and flavourful cuisine, that have been questioning gastronomy and are engaged in the improvement of life-work balance in the kitchen”. And you can find them animating cool events, like the takeover of a very beautiful winery for a day of cooking and music.
There are other components of NKOTB of course: see note2 .
Taberna by design: product first, then a tavern
In the case of Taberna do Calhau, the fortunate eatery of architect turned chef Leopoldo García Calhau, the focus is all on the product, which is of excellent quality, mostly SlowFood style?
Of course, the price reflects this excellence, which is a concept that is very difficult to digest for people used to eating dishes with the same name but with ingredients of abysmally low quality, alas for a fraction of the price.
Products are getting expensive, especially fish and meat, and having to source local and little producers for high-quality ingredients has also a cost in terms of time and dedication. As customers, we need to factor this in.
This space sits at the other spectrum of this gastronomic taberna revolution happening in Portugal.
It is a space designed by an architect who also happens to be the chef and the owner, and every detail is beautifully curated. The passion for wine and the search for quality ingredients make Taberna do Calhau the perfect spot to taste food as it should be. Traditional and popular recipes find their match in the selection of prime and pristine ingredients, and they are corroborated by twists and inventions on the classics.
The latest is to take a typical, traditional and popular dish (rissol, a sort of envelope fried pastry with a savoury filling) and turn it inside out, serving the filling alongside the envelope. Leopoldo says this is the way he ate this dish when his grandma was preparing it: he was unpackaging it first, a true architectural designer in the making.
He is changing the way how people interpret popular and traditional cuisine: by adding Michelin-star-level ingredients, see how the tables turn!
It is extremely interesting to witness this change and to see it diffusing slowly around, spreading like a river in droplets that create emulators, copies, and also original creators that decide to follow the same path of excellence.
Curiously, both O Velho Eurico and Calhau are located in the same neighbourhood.
They are situated at the opposite sides of the Mouraria area of Lisbon, the area that is at the same time the most authentic in Lisbon (Fado was born here) and the most multicultural in Portugal and probably Europe,
Home of the expelled Moors after the catholic conquest of Al-Andalus, is now home to 190 nationalities, with their shops, restaurants and habits.
A true melting pot, clearly brewing local innovation.
Transitioning everyday Portuguese cuisine into the future of this country’s gastronomy.
I use here popular in the combined sense of “of the people” as well as “famous”.
I might not be super up-to-date with their adventures and whereabouts, but here is the research I did for the piece in Italian last fall. Tiago de Lima Cruz is the maker of the most famous cachoupa in the city, it is said, and he is the flag for the fight for the recognition of Creole identity, multiple and multifaceted in Portuguese gastronomy. Together with Pedro & Pedro, the soul and heart of the late Sal Grosso, he now moves on various projects and is a volcano of ideas.
His inseparable friend Pedro Abril, a refined chef who loves strong flavours and with a passion for ramen and Asian noodles, now manages the Musa da Marvila but he too has a past in Salmoura and Sal Grosso. Since the birth of his daughter, he has been actively fighting to ensure a family life for kitchen staff, battling 90-hour work hours and burnout.
Pedro Monteiro is the most famous beard of the Mouraria, where he opened the Tasca Baldracca to infuse the most multiethnic neighbourhood of Lisbon with a Brazilian flavour. Born in Minas Gerais, he brings saudade from his native land on his skin, and in his dishes, he evokes his home cooking, with a twist of ingredients and a love for the dendè oil that he uses for frying. With Spanish, African, Portuguese and Lebanese ancestry, his cuisine and heritage are also Creole, bringing together Asia, Portugal, America and his childhood memories in Brazil.
Leonor Godinho is Portuguese and a cook (cozinheira), she was the soul of Musa da Bica, the outlet of the Musa brewery in central Lisbon (Elevador da Bica area) where she has been cooking since 2019, filling the room and terrace with patrons. She now collaborates with Vago, Madame Bo, and Cucamonga Discos.
Ana Leao is a muse of the north and an incredible talent. I met her at a lunch at Cucina Popolare della Mouraria where she prepared a series of dishes with herbs and aromas from the Australian bush, a country from which she had just returned. The pandemic blocked her in Portugal while she was supposed to be travelling to South America. She's the best for us: after a visit to the kitchens of Velho Eurico to prepare Middle Eastern specialities, she integrated Torto Porto and is in Porto cooking her adventures.
Vitor Charneca, trained as a pastry chef, a placid oasis of calm and eyes fixed on the food pass: as he served, no one, especially to the rhythm of certain nights in Salmoura. Since the pandemic, he has moved to cook in Povo in Lisbn’s Pink Street, the most Instagrammable in Lisbon.
Miguel Rodrigues, the Viking of Caparica. A kind of human-machine, he could feed an entire restaurant with one hand on the grill and the other on the knife. He worked in Salmoura, and then moved close to home, on the other side of the Tagus.
Bernardo Agrela has worked in Portugal, England (from Bacchus, Viajante and The Loft by Nuno Mendes), Spain, Luxembourg, Japan, China, Maldives and Seychelles. Upon his return to Lisbon, he was the chef of the beautiful Torel Palace, Cave 23 restaurant. More recently, he was part of the A Praça do Hub Criativo do Beato project, as he now manages West Mambo, Casa Capitão, collaborates with Vitor Charneca da Povo, and with Pedro Abril integrates the podcast O Nosso Conceito é a Partilha.