Food Tours in Lisbon

The Baixa food tour with dinner and drinks is the walk we would pick for a first visit. It is the one that replaces dinner — eight tastings and four drinks is a meal — it runs through the district you are almost certainly sleeping in, and it is the only one of the four whose listing prints no dietary exclusion, which at least means the operator has not ruled you out in advance. The food and wine walk from Rossio is the alternative for a morning: more tastings, fifteen against eight, the biggest review count in the category, and a meeting point anyone can find.

The Devour morning walk is the same length and price band with a stricter exclusion list; choose it if you want the operator's name rather than the platform's.

The class

There is only one on this page and it is the right one to have: the pastel de nata class at €55 for two hours makes the thing every visitor eats and none can explain. Children from six are admitted, which makes it the family food event; the listing excludes people with mobility impairments, so it is a standing class. Eat the ones you bake, then walk the comparison at Pastéis de Belém the next morning, where the shop has baked the same thing since 1837 and prints no prices.

The fado house

The three shows are all 50 minutes and all in the centre, and the choice is price against what is in the glass. The show with wine at €20 has the highest rating and the most reviews; the Lisboa em Fado show at €14 is the cheapest, admits children from four and is wheelchair accessible; the Fado in Chiado show at €23 includes food and drinks and projects the city on the wall behind the singers, which purists mind and first-timers do not. None of them is a fado dinner in the Alfama sense — that is a restaurant with a singer from about 20:00, table booked directly, and the Alfama page names the houses.

The shows are the way to hear an hour of it and still be in Bairro Alto by 22:00.

Bacalhau is the constant — salt cod, in fritters (pastéis de bacalhau) at the counters and in a dozen baked forms in the tascas. Grilled sardines are the summer dish and the June festival's, cooked on street grills around Santo António on 12 June; out of season they are frozen, and a good guide says so. Bifana is the pork sandwich, prego the steak one, both eaten standing.

Caldo verde is the kale and chouriço soup. Ginjinha is the sour-cherry liqueur sold by the shot from doorways at Rossio and Largo de São Domingos, and every walk stops for one. Then the pastel de nata, the custard tart, eaten warm with cinnamon; the Belém version is the original and the one in the class is the one you can take home.

Drinks are vinho verde, the young green wine; the reds of the Alentejo and the Douro; port, which is from Porto and served here anyway; and the local Colares and Bucelas if a guide is showing off. The where-to-eat page says where each is done well, with the list or the venue page that says so.

The couvert rule

Bread, olives, butter and sometimes cheese arrive at a tasca table unasked and are charged if touched, at a price the menu prints; sending them back untouched is allowed and normal. On a food tour the guide handles it; on your own, the safety and scams page has the rule and the Lisbon costs page the typical figures.

All four walks start in Baixa and none goes to Belém. The food and wine walk meets at the Pedro IV column in Rossio, by the metro's green-line exit; the Baixa tour and the Devour walk show their meeting point after booking because it changes with the option chosen; the nata class meets at the Homecooking Lisbon hub, whose address the listing gives on the voucher. The evening walks work the grid — Rua dos Correeiros, Rua dos Sapateiros, the counters around Largo de São Domingos — and climb into Mouraria or down to Cais do Sodré depending on the operator.

The fado shows are in the centre and in Chiado; the venue of the wine show is shown after booking. What none of them includes is Belém, so the pastry shop that started it all is a separate morning on the Belém page, and the tram there is on the tram 28 page's neighbour, the 15E.

Time Out Market in the Mercado da Ribeira at Cais do Sodré is the shortcut: twenty-six kitchens and eight bars, free to enter, Sunday to Wednesday 10:00 to midnight and Thursday to Saturday to 02:00, with the fresh-produce market on its own side in the mornings. Its trap is the table at 13:00; eat at noon or after 15:00. Pastéis de Belém at Rua de Belém 84–92 opens 8:00 to 21:00 every day and to 22:00 from July to September, closing at 19:00 on 24, 25 and 31 December and 1 January; the site prints no prices and neither do we.

Its trap is the takeaway line at midday, which is the coach window; the sit-down rooms are usually the faster queue. Mercado de Campo de Ourique at the end of tram 28 is the locals' version of Time Out and the tram 28 page gets you there; LX Factory's Sunday market under the bridge is real but its official site gave us no hours, so check before you go.