Porto

[ramnes]

Wow, we choose our week perfectly! We'll see if we decide to join the festival or to go to a quieter place.

[Prelim]

how are you enjoying Porto @ramnes?

[ramnes]

It's perfect for now!

We walked around the city the first day, then we've been to the Leça de Palmeira beach for the second day. Yesterday we visited a lot of monuments, enjoyed the view at the Torre dos Clérigos, and ended up with this...





It's okay, but definitely not the best thing we've eaten here.

About eating... There's a pastry I really liked, but I can't find what it is on the interwebs. On the bill it's written "FAITA MACA", but it looks like it just means "apple slice". Do you see what it is?

By the way, tomorrow we'll have to take our luggages with us, do you know if there's a place in Porto where we can safely let them? We didn't see any baggage room at the estação Sao Bento, is there any other place to look at?

[Prelim]

ahaha, good days then... I hate "Francesinha" , for me has nothing to do with typical Portuguese (mediterranean) food.

As for pastry, we also have the famous "pastel de nata" and some very good conventual's confectionary sweets... make sure to try some

pls wait for @rddm to help with the luggage question, as I have no clue :/

[sphinx]

It's perfect for now!

We walked around the city the first day, then we've been to the Leça de Palmeira beach for the second day. Yesterday we visited a lot of monuments, enjoyed the view at the Torre dos Clérigos, and ended up with this...





It's okay, but definitely not the best thing we've eaten here.

About eating... There's a pastry I really liked, but I can't find what it is on the interwebs. On the bill it's written "FAITA MACA", but it looks like it just means "apple slice". Do you see what it is?

By the way, tomorrow we'll have to take our luggages with us, do you know if there's a place in Porto where we can safely let them? We didn't see any baggage room at the estação Sao Bento, is there any other place to look at?

Pastries is my specialty. Could you describe it a bit more? Was it a slice of cake or just a small cake like thing ?

[Prelim]

I'm sure he meant to say an apple pie slice (Fatia de Macã lol).

it's a very trivial desert in Portugal, there's a lot more things way better to try in Portugal... for instance, ask in good pastry shops for "Pasteis de Tentugal" or something similar

[rddm]

I can't help you with the luggage, I don't really know. Maybe if you ask some hotel in Aliados, or just buy a hostel place it's arround 10-13€ and you can store the things and sleep ehehhe.
Tuesday you saw the student's parade in Aliados?

[ramnes]

We just came back from the Lello & Irmão library... Biggest tourist trap ever...

ahaha, good days then... I hate "Francesinha" , for me has nothing to do with typical Portuguese (mediterranean) food.

As for pastry, we also have the famous "pastel de nata" and some very good conventual's confectionary sweets... make sure to try some

Here is what we just eat today:



Way better than francesinas, and also way cheaper! But man, those portions are huge... I think those tripas à moda de Porto could feed at least two persons in France.

I finally tried Sagres, after SuperBock yesterday. They both feel pretty close to me, and both are really light.

And yeah, pastei de nata are famous even in France! We tried one here to see if there is any difference with those sold by Portugeses in Paris, but they are identical (to me, at least).

Pastries is my specialty. Could you describe it a bit more? Was it a slice of cake or just a small cake like thing ?

No, it wasn't a slice of cake. It was just some dough with a very small quantity of orange cream inside. From what I can find on the web, it looked a bit like a guardanapos but it was folded differently, and the dough was thiner and crisp. Its shape was like a horseshoe. There was some icing sugar on top of it.

I'm sure he meant to say an apple pie slice (Fatia de Macã lol).

it's a very trivial desert in Portugal, there's a lot more things way better to try in Portugal... for instance, ask in good pastry shops for "Pasteis de Tentugal" or something similar

Like I said, it wasn't an apple pie slice. Actually, it looked a bit like a pastei de tentugal, but with less cream and a different shape.

We're eating some other pastries right now!



I kinda like the orange one, but it's super fat! The one on the top right is really weird. The other ones are good but not really my taste.

[ramnes]

I can't help you with the luggage, I don't really know. Maybe if you ask some hotel in Aliados, or just buy a hostel place it's arround 10-13€ and you can store the things and sleep ehehhe.
Tuesday you saw the student's parade in Aliados?

I think that's what we're going to end up doing...

Yeah we saw the parade, that was impressive! I wished that we could have something similar in France, looked like a lot of fun. And we even saw some college girls puking on the street, yay.

Who are the guys in red? I took a video of one of their song, it was awesome.

[rddm]

It can be engineers, justice or economists students.

[Prelim]

ahhaah, you are turning into a North portuguese fellow!! you even eat "Tripas" @@ (I also don't like it, guess I'm a strait south boy lol)

I don't know what the horseshoe pastry was :/ those pastries on the photo are regular ones, top right is just a little almond pie (not weird, you should have more less the same in France ). The orange one is "egg sweet" based so it's a sugar kamikaze (as I like ) but not really fat at all

how about the wines, already tried something?

[ramnes]

Oh yeah, forgot to mention that. We tried three red wines for now: Reynolds Reserva 2009, Esporão Reserva, and a Quinta Nova 2011. My favorite one was the Quinta Nova, but the other ones were good also. Though, Portugueses wines are much more brutal than French wines, with much more tannin, and that's not something I'm really fond of.

I also tried a Graham's LVB. It was much more fruity and lighter than any Porto I've ever drunk! First time I try a LVB, but I think I'm going to try another one before leaving. Hips!

Still haven't tried the Moscatel de Setúbal yet! This is going my mission for tonight or tomorrow.

[Prelim]

nice to hear that! well, there are many wines and it's a matter of choice... Quinta Nova is a Porto region wine, while the Esporão/Reynolds is Alentejo. There are major differences between North and South wines, I prefer the Alentejo wines because they are less harsh, more sweet and fruity overall.

be sure to try the Moscatel meanwhile (just drink it chilled but WITHOUT ice, with a lemon peel only), and buy a bottle to take it to France

[ramnes]

Sadly, I can't take a bottle with me in the plane, as we only have cabin baggages.

Maybe a store will be open at 5AM in the duty free, but I doubt.

[Spikebolt]

I think the stores at the airport are always open o.o

[sphinx]

We just came back from the Lello & Irmão library... Biggest tourist trap ever...

ahaha, good days then... I hate "Francesinha" , for me has nothing to do with typical Portuguese (mediterranean) food.

As for pastry, we also have the famous "pastel de nata" and some very good conventual's confectionary sweets... make sure to try some

Here is what we just eat today:

http://i.imgur.com/ARpufZf.jpg

Way better than francesinas, and also way cheaper! But man, those portions are huge... I think those tripas à moda de Porto could feed at least two persons in France.

I finally tried Sagres, after SuperBock yesterday. They both feel pretty close to me, and both are really light.

And yeah, pastei de nata are famous even in France! We tried one here to see if there is any difference with those sold by Portugeses in Paris, but they are identical (to me, at least).

Pastries is my specialty. Could you describe it a bit more? Was it a slice of cake or just a small cake like thing ?

No, it wasn't a slice of cake. It was just some dough with a very small quantity of orange cream inside. From what I can find on the web, it looked a bit like a guardanapos but it was folded differently, and the dough was thiner and crisp. Its shape was like a horseshoe. There was some icing sugar on top of it.

I'm sure he meant to say an apple pie slice (Fatia de Macã lol).

it's a very trivial desert in Portugal, there's a lot more things way better to try in Portugal... for instance, ask in good pastry shops for "Pasteis de Tentugal" or something similar

Like I said, it wasn't an apple pie slice. Actually, it looked a bit like a pastei de tentugal, but with less cream and a different shape.

We're eating some other pastries right now!

http://i.imgur.com/mmxut0j.jpg

I kinda like the orange one, but it's super fat! The one on the top right is really weird. The other ones are good but not really my taste.

is it any of these:

Parra
Chausson de Maçã
Rim

[ramnes]

Nop. It wasn't a puff pastry, it was thin and crip (except the cream inside). And again, it had a horseshoe shape, but much longer and flatter than your last picture.

The place were we've bought that excellent pastry is the Pao Quente Leça Mar.
I've been throught all their photos on Facebook but I can't find it.

[miguelbazil]

You gotta start asking the names if you wanna try to get them overseas haha I'm glad you're enjoying your time here Sorry about the latest bad weather though.

[ramnes]

I'm already back in France.