Bom dia.
First Lisbon, than Porto.
Contributed by Jens Hoffmann
Photos: Annamaria Veszeli
The whole world seems to have fallen in love lately with the nearby beaches, old churches, seafood cuisine and historical UNESCO-listed streets of Portugal’s second-largest city.
Yes, we are fans and love to travel.
The Douro wine and atmosphere along the Douro riverfront is magic.
And the home of port wine is keeping pace with a slew of new offerings.
Recent years have seen the opening, upgrading or expansion of museums, art centers, food markets, food halls and hotels aplenty — along with the inauguration of World of Wine, a dining and entertainment district.
Recommendations:
Cozinha das Flores, a nouveau Portuguese restaurant led by one of the country’s most successful international chefs, features design elements from a Pritzker Prize-winning architect, the Porto-area native Álvaro Siza Vieira.
The Serralves Museum, a collection of contemporary art on the park-like grounds of the Serralves Foundation — a decades-old private institution that works closely with the Portuguese government.
Mercado do Bolhão, a 19th-century food market belongs on every bucket list.
© CHLietzmann
The World of Wine district, like a theme park for epicureans, features several food- and drink-themed museums, a wine school, and numerous restaurants and bars.
An efficient bus system and modern metro network cover much of Porto and surrounding areas, from the airport to the city center to the nearby coastal towns.
An Andante card, available in metro stations, allows travel by bus or train in central Porto for €1.40 per ride.
Taxis are fairly cheap.
A person stands in a manicured garden, with several paved paths and a fountain in the center of the frame.
Jardins do Palácio de Cristal
Gazing at the bridges and passing ships on the Douro River is a favorite Porto pastime.
For sublime views far from the dense crush of the waterfront walkways, the Jardins do Palácio de Cristal, a manicured 19th-century park, is a relaxed, bucolic alternative and a favorite with locals.
In addition to tree-shaded lookout points, the park includes ponds, fountains, lawns, flower beds and rotating art exhibitions in the free, multilevel Galeria Municipal do Porto.
As you stroll, keep your ears open for the calls of the park’s resident ducks and peacocks.
We tried resto Cozinha das Flores for dinner.
After decades abroad, cooking alongside international legends like Wolfgang Puck and Ferran Adrià and helming kitchens of beloved London restaurants (Viajante, Chiltern Firehouse), the chef Nuno Mendes has planted his flag once again in his native land, overseeing the precise neo-Portuguese cuisine at Cozinha das Flores, a year-old restaurant along the pedestrianized Rua das Flores.
Try tasty tiny snacks (crunchy sourdough crackers with razor clams), elegant comfort food (Azores squid sliced into pasta-like strands with a zesty stew of chickpeas.
Note the abstract drawings on the pink-and-green mosaic wall: the Pritzker Prize-winning architect (and Porto-region native) Álvaro Siza Vieira contributed both. Dinner for two costs about 120 euros.
Try the bar Fiasco
If you’re keen to avoid thronged streets and blasting music — hallmarks of the Mardi Gras-like Clérigos nightlife district — head east to Bomfim, a laid-back bohemian neighborhood of art galleries and indie boutiques.
Fiasco is both Porto’s sultriest new cocktail bar and a mecca for vinyl record collectors, thanks to numerous racks of rock, rap, indie, electro, world-beat and other albums for sale.
A Lusco Fusco Groove cocktail (Ysabel Regina brandy, Campari, fortified Portuguese wine and coffee) runs you 9 euros. Down the street, Terraplana Café channels an old-time urban saloon (tin ceiling, checkerboard floor) while dispensing original cocktails. The back garden is perfect for a Tropicalia cocktail: ruby port, sparkling rosé and guava-hibiscus syrup, brightened with salt (€11).
A park with manicured lawns and flowers.
A large modern dome of a building rises in the background.
This year, the Serralves Museum — a world-class contemporary art museum that he designed in the 1990s — added a splashy new wing that he also designed. Known as the Álvaro Siza Wing, the jagged white addition displays plans and models from the architect’s long international career, as well as works from the permanent collection, including strange fairy tale-like paintings from Paula Rego and abstract lithographs by Gerhard Richter. An apocalyptic installation by the Thai artist Korakrit Arunanondchai and a haunted playerless piano from the French artist Philippe Parreno.
A display of several wheels of cheese, you will find at Mercado Bolhão.
Joaquim Lucas resembles a scholar as he carefully slices presunto from aged hocks of Alentejo ham.
His stand, Charcutaria Princesa, is one of dozens inside Mercado Bolhão, a recently upgraded 19th-century covered food market in the city center that reopened in 2022. The smorgasbord also includes spice dealers, fruit sellers, cheese specialists, wine stands and more. Raw surf-and-turf comes courtesy of Casa das Ostras — which cracks open sea urchin and shucks Algarve oysters.
For dessert, Doçaria Portuguesa does a chocolate-rimmed pastel de nata , the classic Portuguese egg tart. For a sit-down meal, several restaurants occupy the upper level. And a short walk south is a new food hall from Time Out, opened in May.
Strolling nearby Rua Santa Catarina, a car-free shopping boulevard, provides both a digestive walk and an architectural exhibition. Start at Capela das Almas, an 18th-century church covered with blue-and-white azulejos depicting divine episodes filled with saints, apostles, magi and cherubs. Heading south, you can admire the Art Nouveau façade of A Perola do Bolhão, a fine-food shop dating to 1917, and the grand Belle Epoque interior of Café Majestic, which opened in 1921. Finally, stop in Praça da Batalha, home of the azulejo-covered Igreja de Santo Ildefonso, an 18th-century church, and the Batalha Centro de Cinema, a 1940s Art Deco movie theater that was restored and reopened.
In addition to an eclectic roster of films, the center offers a library, bookshop and bar.
Where to stay:
We slept well in the Six Senses, Douro hotel.
