Too Much Meat: a Review of a Portuguese Contemporary Restaurant and its "Everyday Cuisine"

"Food for Profit" arrived in Portugal, a country where meat and animal products consumption is astonishingly high

Only recently have I begun to notice how meat-heavy contemporary Portuguese gastronomy has become. Meat, fish, and eggs comprise the central part of meals, the main components of restaurant menus, and the most sought-after foods.

It was as I started to go in the exact opposite direction. Some time ago, I presented you with some recipes for the Renaissance period.

Today, I'd like to rant about the dire state of Portuguese restaurants.

In an effort that sometimes seems strenuous, I prioritised eating plants above all else and only fell back on fish if needed. No meat, no eggs (well, sometimes they sneak into desserts, unfortunately), and no milk (the same applies here, as not every Chef can future-proof their work).

We will not discuss fine-dining menus here—their logic and dialectics differ.

We will discuss instead about how unbalanced these “everyday” restaurant menus are in a dedicated chapter because fine dining is a different set of shoes, and ann could be thought about as exceptions to the rule - but eating a well-balanced course should be the norm.

Here, we are talking of those everyday restaurants - actual or purported.

In April, Giulia Innocenzi presented Food For Profit in Lisbon for the first time.

“Food for Profit is the first feature documentary that exposes the links between the meat industry, lobbying and the corridors of power. It denounces how Europe is transferring hundreds of billions of taxpayers’ money into the hands of intensive farms, which mistreat animals, pollute the environment, and pose a potential danger for future pandemics.”

It is quite a feat in a country where everyone consumes vast amounts of meat, seafood, and fish without a second thought.

But what is the dire status of restaurants, you may ask? Let me take you to two everyday restaurants that everyone loves - everyone, except for the animals and plant-based people.

Laboratory Experiment

I chose this restaurant for this experiment for several reasons: it was one of the most talked-about openings of the past year, won accolades left and right, and everyone and their dog claims this is “the” restaurant of the year.

I am not disclosing the restaurant's name, because the idea is not to criticise them, but to use it as an example for a further discussion.

As a premise, I like the Chefs, as humans and cooks. I also do not want to pick on them or their menu choices specifically; I am using their restaurant as it has been the highlight of this past year for what concerns contemporary Portuguese dining, and I think it is quite an example of today’s gastronomy in the country's capital.

Using this restaurant is fair - it is not a mom-and-pop business, as it is owned by a large investment group, which could do better regarding sustainability and the environment. At least when they would like to be an “everyday restaurant” and a neighbourhood one, concepts they specifically choose in their communication, but are just marketing gimmicks, such as this restaurant and its price ranges, are clearly out of the league for everyday Portuguese. Its location is in a place that has never been a bairro, but this is not the point. I went there and wrote positively about it, so now I can nitpick and be a bit mean.

Portuguese gastronomy is so closely associated with the consumption of animal and fish proteins that “vegetarian” and “vegan” options are emerging as separate restaurants and eateries, rather than menu options.

If you forego animal protein, there are places where you will have absolutely nothing to eat. I complain about Italy, where there is always at least a simple spaghetti al pomodoro. Here in Portugal, there is nothing, even the sides, in some cases.

This is a restaurant whose “cuisine is emotionally Portuguese, but openly Iberian while favouring national products” - they say. Of course, the emphasis on those “products” of the “templos del producto” is skewed towards anything animal-based.

Artichokes—or any other fruit or vegetable—do not have dignity; for “templos del producto,” dignity only lies in animal products.

Let’s start with the daily menu choice.

This one is from the last week of November and was retrieved from their website via a screenshot.

Daily Menu

One vegetarian option on the daily menu is available only on Monday and Tuesday—a soup (Juliana soup is made with potatoes and carrots, and the spinach soup is generally vegetarian and sometimes includes chickpeas). Unfortunately, the Portuguese flagship soup—Caldo Verde—often features slices of chouriço. Similarly, the farmer’s soup has meat, and so does the chicken soup on Wednesday.

Potatoes are the only non-animal ingredient consistently present. Beans are served only once, as a side to fish cakes.

So, vegetarians or those who want to follow the Lancet guidelines will not have much luck here.

Regular Menu

Of the 29 plates on the menu, only seasonal vegetables are available, with romesco as a possible vegetarian option. I went there in spring and had asparagus (with egg, and fish, of course), so there is at least an attention to seasonality and “elite” produce (asparagus, artichokes, lágrima peas come to my mind).

In the side dishes, the option is limited too:

• Boiled potato

• French fries

• Lettuce and onion salad

• Sautéed seasonal vegetables

Non-animal proteins are not available. Simply.

This is quite striking for someone like me, akin to the enormous work SlowFood has done in the last twenty years around beans.

In the dessert section, there are three out of a total of six possible options:

• Seasonal fruit

• Russet apple, (minus the sabayon and pistachio ice cream)

• Roasted quince (minus the ice cream)

As I wrote this article in spring, I went back to the menu to double-check, and in June, the menu was not looking much different.

The restaurant, since its opening, has never prioritised vegetables or adopted a plant-forward approach. Its whole focus was on “catch of the day” and premium meats, with special highlights from animal “templos del product”, all hanging in full sight. Their influencers, communication axes, and whole narrative were aligned with these products.

In the dessert, besides seasonal fruits, you also have a fruit salad as an option. In the mains, they have tomatoes and tomato soup alongside the regular roasted vegetables with romesco.

I fail to understand how chefs and culinary professionals in general fail to understand that vegetarians like eating protein, too.

Anyways.

I am not saying that any restaurant should cater specifically to vegetarians or even for vegans.

I am saying that nowadays, it is incredible that vegetables are not part of modern, coherent, contemporary menus—especially those touting “sustainability” and “everyday choices” as their banners.

Fibres, anyone?

You may ask, thinking the answer is a firm “no”: Should every restaurant offer vegetarian options?

I hear you.

After all, vegetarians can suck it up and eat their fucking beans (and you saw with the example hgere above, not easy to find anyways) and vegetables somewhere else than a regular restaurant, amirite?

Well, the answer to the first question—whether vegetarian options should be widely available and not just in ad-hoc “healthy” and “vegetarian” restaurants—is yes.

The answer to the second question—why featuring plant-based dishes everywhere has more to do with our culture than anything else—is no.

Portuguese food culture has become overly focused on meat, fish, eggs, and cheese over the last century.

This is a fact.

If you go to a restaurant every day, your daily choices will inevitably include animal proteins. In some restaurants, there is nothing vegetable-safe except occasional beans, eternal green leaves, and an unappetizing greenhouse tomato salad as a side all year round.

People “need” to feel they are spending money in exchange for “good” proteins, not poor people’s proteins like beans.

This was not the case in the past.

Portuguese Contemporary Gastronomy

A poor country like Portugal used to have a significant amount of vegetarian produce in its daily diet.

In the countryside, you can still find relics of these habits: in soups, marvellous side dishes, and the abundance of vegetable gardens packed with luscious cabbages.

Alas, nowadays, there is a lot of beef on the plate—way too much for anything healthy.

A diet high in oils, animal fats, and processed meats, as well as a notable lack of vegetables.

There are too many eggs everywhere and too much cheese, much more than the sprinkle of Parmigiano I was used to.

Much too much.

And I said - enough!

Nowadays, I have a simple rule when I have to eat at a Portuguese restaurant - or any other, for that matter.

I order vegetables, vegetables, vegetables.

If available, I will have some beans, as well as homemade bread and olives.

If not, and as a last resort, some fish. Not eating “proteins” at a meal won’t kill me. If nothing is available, I can live with delicious bread and olives.

As a dessert: seasonal or cooked fruits (baked apples or one of the delicious variations of drunken pears, nabada, etc.

If I build my meals outside my home around vegetables—just like I do at home, after all—it is not only easier to fulfil my daily vegetable intake, but I also actively take a stance and perhaps make someone think about the endemic lack of vegetables in Portugal and how to reverse it.

I do not think that the solution lies in “vegetarian” or “plant-based” restaurants - they exclude themselves from what is mainstream and are not an option for regular customers.

As Julius illustrates with his project of chasing vegan recipes worldwide, any culture has traditional vegetarian dishes.

Any restaurant can increase its share of seasonal and local vegetable delicacies. It’s not that hard, especially if customers start requesting them.

I am doing that.

I am privileged to go to a restaurant and ask for the food I can afford. I can also ask questions. I can ask the kitchen why there are no vegetables and why the emphasis is only on animal products.

I can be naughty and scratch below the surface of those “sustainability” and “seasonal” labels that chefs everywhere have been so eager to fill their mouths with.

Sustainability: what does it really mean?

Can a “sustainable” restaurant serve beef steaks?

No way, José, and no matter what the Michelin or Repsol or any other guide thinks of you, and no matter how much “zero waste” bullshit you fill your social media with.

You serve beef.

Therefore, you cannot be sustainable in this age for the sake of commercial gain. Serving beef and to win a “sun”, “green star”, or another accolade, is now deprived of an objective meaning by your serving of beef, eggs, and whatnot.

Very few places can afford the luxury of raising cattle sustainably, offsetting their footprint, and providing animals with fields and sheltered freedom, where they are cared for and pampered. And in some cases, all the “regenerative” farms popping up left and right are not genuine, and sound like tax avoidance entrepreneurial ventures.

That meat is helluva expensive, I am afraid—and helluva little in quantities to feed the ever-growing appetite for cows. So most of the claims are bullshit (where does the rest of the animal go, the one you do not serve on the plate?).

As a non-influencer who does not depend on begging for food (which is what influencers do) or visibility, I can be a demanding customer nonetheless.

And actually, so can you, and so should you.

Food for Profit not only discloses the horror of intensive farms and the political corruption behind it, but with a pool of international experts, it tackles and analyses the many problems related to factory farming: from water pollution to exploitation of migrants and from biodiversity loss to antibiotic resistance.