10/4/2015
We bought the 24 hour metro day pass for 6 euro/person so we
could take the tram to Belem today. In order to buy the day pass, you need to
pay for it at a metro station; you can’t waltz onto a bus or tram and expect
them to process payment for a day pass. Since we were already in underground
(the Baixo-Chiado stop that’s closest to our apartment is literally 10 floors
underground), I thought we save some time by hopping onto the metro and go
directly to the Cais do Sodre stop, where tram 15E happens to intersect. Tram
15E is the only method of public transportation that will take you directly
from the city center to Belem. The ride is approximately 22 minutes, so if you
think you can walk it…have fun!
When we got above ground, we saw the Mercado da Ribeira
right across the street. It’s where I was planning to eat dinner tonight, so
now we know exactly how to get there. Yay!
However.
The tram stop is across the street, and we noticed a whole
bunch of people already waiting in line for it. We got in line, waited about 7
minutes, and the tram comes rolling up. It’s this tiny ass tram; historic it
may be, but practical it is not. And it was already jam-packed full of tourists
from the previous two stops. The driver didn’t even bother stopping at our stop!
He just whizzed on by!
According to the electronic display, the next tram was in 21
minutes. At this rate, we’d never get on the tram! So we decided to walk back a
stop, and hope there wouldn’t be as many people waiting at that stop. It’s only
a seven minute-ish walk to the previous stop (Praca do Comercio), and as the
tram’s second stop in the route, it shouldn’t be all that crowded…right?
Wrong.
It was also packed full of people. Wtf? If they know Belem
is so popular, why wouldn’t they update their public transportation? At this
rate, people have been waiting probably an hour to get onto the damn thing, and
probably will be waiting a lot longer. We stood waiting at the end of the
island, and as the tram rolls up, it opens its doors right in front of Mom and
Angel. So naturally—and thankfully—we were able to hop onto this tram, but
still, for everyone else who was waiting there, how will they ever get on?
Imagine how ugly this will get during peak summer time!
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| Can you see the line of people outside trying to get onto the tram? |
We were stuffed inside the tram, standing there squished
like farmed chicken. It’s a bumpy ride too, so have some comfortable shoes on!
The route runs parallel to the sea, so at least you get a nice view. At last,
Angel spots Pasteis de Belem bakery, which means we’re finally there. Pretty
much everyone pours out at this stop. The stop is right across the bakery and
the Jeronimos Monastery. Angel practically ran to the bakery so to beat the
other people on our ride over.
This bakery has been churning out the most famous egg custard tarts in Lisbon since 1837 (the year Queen Victoria ascended the throne, incidentally). Their tarts are so famous, they have special EU DOP (Denominación de Origen Protegida. Basically a designation that protects certain products in the EU from being copied. Like Champagne, Burgundy wines, Parmesan cheese, Perigord truffles, etc.). Under the DOP, they are the only ones allowed to call their egg custard tarts “Pasteis de Belem”. All other bakeries must refer to theirs as plain old “Pasteis de Nata.”
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| Finally, to the front of the line! The line winds all the way down the street! |
Go home, apparently. While this is the first bakery to serve the tarts hot with cinnamon and powdered sugar, the shell leaves much to be desired. It’s too hard and crunchy, so I had a horrible time trying to take a bite of the tart. It wasn’t just me. Mom can usually chomp through anything, but even she said this was too hard for her. The custard was okay, but nothing to write home about. It wasn’t particularly thick or flavorful, which really sucks because I’d been so looking forward to trying theirs. Pasteis de Belem is also one of the only bakeries that doesn’t discount the natas if you buy 6 (most small stores advertise 6 for 5.50 euro instead of 1.05 each).
And now we’re stuck with 12 of them!
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| Interesting way of stacking egg custard tarts |
It also leaves a weird aftertaste in your mouth. Though, to be fair, most pasteis de natas do too. Not really sure why. Maybe the cornstarch in the custard?
The Discoveries Monument was visible across the Pasteis de
Belem, so I suggested going there first. Because it’s so close to the sea, the
wind was blowing every which way and nearly knocked us over. The monument
honors Portuguese explorers who really blazed the trail for other countries to
go explore America. We know how well that turned out for the Native Americans :T
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| Discoveries Monument |
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| If you look closely, you can see the king and queen are at the very back of this monument (toward us), which says a lot about who's more important in this maritime nation. The explorers! |
From the Discoveries Monument, you can see the Tower of Belem on your right, so
just follow along the ocean and you’ll get there in 10-15 minutes. Since it’s
the first Sunday of the month, most Lisbon museums are free—my favorite kind of
activity! The tower’s free to go up for today only, but the line was so long
and we had a pretty packed schedule ahead.
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| Torre de Belem. The wind is crazy here! But it's not even cold! |
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| I shudder at that line! |
There were some college students posing in front of this wall. Not sure the significance of this wall, so we took a photo too:
Crossing the street, we walked back to the monastery, something I didn’t think was possible as the map shows there are multiple tram stops between these two sites. In my mind, I thought it'd be a long ass walk! But it’s pretty doable, and we stumbled across the maritime museum right next to the monastery:
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| Maritime Museum |
Dad wanted to go in (more to use the bathroom, we think,
than to learn about naval history), and since it’s free today, I said why not?
The museum actually turned out pretty informative. Given that the Portuguese
once dominated the seas, they had a lot of information to draw upon when making
up the exhibits.
We saw the King’s room on his private yacht—pretty posh but surprisingly small:
King Carlos had a lot of pride in his country’s maritime history, was a passionate painter, but he was not the best or shrewdest of monarchs. His wife was pretty unpopular for her spendthrift ways (more on this later haha). He was assassinated later in life along with his firstborn son, the crown prince Luis Philippe.
The nook behind me is the hallway leading from the king's chamber on the yacht to the queen's, for *ahem* those nocturnal activities... *cough cough*:
Jeronimos Monastery had a pretty long line by the time we got there, though it kept moving, so the wait was a decent 20 minutes. It was also free today.
The cloisters garden is what put the monastery on the map with its distinct Portuguese architecture and white stones:
We stopped in Padaria Portuguesa (a recommendation I found
online) for their pastel de natas. They had an outstanding queijadas, a specialty
of Sintra, but delicious all the same in Belem. It’s like an underbaked cake
with the soft texture of bread pudding and a layer of custard in the middle
like Basque cake. Delicious! That’s got to be one of my favorite pastries in
Lisbon.
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| Queijadas |
After our delicious repast, the real work began. Ajuda
National Palace is on top of the hill, and Jeronimos is at the base. It’s a
steep 30 minute climb up, on top of a humid blustery hot day. Weird, right?
It’s very windy, very humid, yet hot at the same time. Go figure.
Ajuda was also free today. The royal residence of Portuguese
monarchs, it’s like Versailles but a whole lot less fancy. Mom said we really
should’ve gone to Ajuda first before visiting Versailles or Schonbrunn, because
after you see those palaces, Ajuda can’t compare. Sorry, Portugal!
I wish they explained the history of the monarchs
better, because I know nothing about them and that’s what I came here to learn!
What we did see was pretty hilarious though. The king gifted his bride on their
wedding night a bedroom bedecked in the best furniture and most lavish
decorations he could find…in dark blue colors and dark mahogany materials.
Really??? I walked into the room and I thought it was the king’s bedroom, not
the queen’s! It screamed bachelor pad, seriously it did.
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| What bride wouldn't love a bear's carcass in her new bedchamber??? |
King Luis himself had a small modest room (his bed is smaller than ours) that looked like a servant’s quarters. Wish they explained his reasoning!
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| This is the smallest king's bedchamber I've ever seen! |
The queen, Maria Pia, loved photography and would take pictures of foreign monarchs and dignitaries visiting her, like King Edward II from England. Portugal was going through some rough economic times, yet she decided to redo the billiards room into a drawing room:
She had a painting done up of
herself in a gorgeous (and most likely crazy expensive) Edwardian dress
befitting Sissi, yet wore no jewelry to “prove” she was not as much a
spendthrift as citizens accused her of being.
Oblivious, hunh? Kind of like Marie Antoinette, off in her own little dream world while the rest of the country is going to shit.
Which is funny because in the morning, as we were getting
ready and eating breakfast, Angel was complaining about too much potatoes in
Portuguese dishes. My response: Not every country is rich, dearie. They need
potatoes to pad out their diet. To which Angel goes: Let them eat cake.
Off with her head. Muahaha
I think Maria Pia definitely wore the pants in the family. Her cabin
on their yacht was twice the size of the king’s bedroom (there’s a short
hallway linking the two, for…you know what haha), and her study room was done
up in very masculine colors. Her desk was a rich dark wood, which gives the
impression of power when she’s receiving visitors.
Once, during a ball, she changed her costume three times. When Parliament criticized her expenditures, she retorted, "If you want a Queen, you have to pay for her." Lol Feisty, isn't she?
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| Angel found the placement of the chandelier with respect to the ceiling fresco hilarious |
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| Throne Room |
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| Official Dining Hall |
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| Ajuda National Palace |
The palace took a leisurely two hours to get through, and
then we went down the mountain to Chique de Belem, another online
recommendation for pastel natas. They were better than Pasteis de Belem’s, but
not as good as the ones we had yesterday. The ones yesterday had more flavorful
custards. The one Angel liked best had a very buttery, egg yolk-like flavor,
and the one I loved most tasted like crème brulee.
It was 4pm at this point, and Angel had the brilliant idea
of finding and going to Primark. She’d seen a lot of people carrying the
Primark bags yesterday as we were coming from the airport to Lisbon, so we knew
there was one somewhere. We jumped on the tram home, searched for Primark and
voila. Found it at a metro stop on the blue line (Colegio Militar/Luz). And even though it’s
Sunday, they don’t close til midnight. Every single day of the week, they
don’t close til midnight. That’s way better than London! Unfortunately, the store
is way smaller than London’s, so the selection wasn’t very good. The jackets
were inferior quality too, compared to what we bought last year. The store is
in a humongous mall complex with lots of American brand names. There’s a
moderately priced Pottery Barn-like store in there called Casa that sells very
cute home goods.
It's chockful of ingredients, from potato to pig ear, cabbage and kale and shredded pork. Dad loved it.
And we had ourselves a little but oh so delicious snack:
It's like a Napoleon, only instead of pastry cream, it's custard cream layered between puff pastry:
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| Absolutely delish! |
I have to say, the whole reason I came to Portugal was to try their egg custard tarts. But I'm finding that all their desserts are mighty tasty. I'm not even a huge fan of custard, but I really liked this cake! It reminds me of the egg yolk custard in dim sum buns.
We stopped at the Cais do Sodre metro stop to go to the
Mercado de Ribeira for dinner. The fruit and vege stands were closed because
it’s Sunday, but the dining scene was going strong. It’s called Time Out Lisboa
and all the restaurants are selected by a panel with discriminating tastes, so
you know it’s good food they’re serving there. Everything looked delicious.
We bought a foie gras burger with truffle mayo at Henrique Sa Pessoa (supposedly a famous chef in Lisbon):
The burger was slightly overcooked, the foie gras sliced too thin, and the bread was very hard to chew. But the flavors were amazing, and the potato chips perfectly fried.
The potato puree was freaking delicious!!! Mom says that’s definitely what we’re making for Christmas this year. The egg was oh-so-melty in your mouth, the color was a vibrant orange I’ve never seen before, the truffle oil a wonderful accompaniment.
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| Just look how thick that egg yolk is! |
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| Whole pig, anyone? |
For our second course, we went over to Tartar-ia and bought
150g each of salmon tartar and beef tartar with potato espuma. The cashier said
the 100g was appetizer portion, 150g was an entrée, and 200g if you’re
starving. They ran out of tuna tartar, so we’re going back tomorrow to try it. Oh my gosh, the salmon tartar was heavenly. I’ve never liked daikon. Ever. But I was a convert after this tartar. The fresh sweet crunchiness complemented the salmon, and there were little crouton-like bits that turned out to be wasabi peas. Angel wants to recreate this dish at home with the wasabi peas.
The potato espuma on the beef tartar was out of this world. Like a thick foam, it was savory and slightly sweet, like there was a hint of mayo in there. The beef was minced (I’d been hoping for diced), but so raw and fresh, the color was a bright blood red. It was delicious, but because we’d eaten the salmon tartar first and were blown out of our minds, the beef tartar didn’t exceed that. Which is sad, because it still was a really good beef tartar. Not like the French, which is overpowered by mustard or Worchestershire.
Look how happy Mom is!
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| Yum yum! |
The hot chocolate was thick, luscious and what I expect of Spanish/Portuguese hot chocolate. Perfect end to the day. And oh, you can bet we’ll be back there tomorrow.
Can you see how thick the skin is on the hot chocolate??? I slurped it up, the glob of heavenly goodness!
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| Time Out Lisboa - Mercado da Ribeira |
Angel: This is Jen at the end of the day:
...She couldn’t breathe for about 15 minutes after walking up the stairs from the metro station. Pathetic! We must put her on a workout regimen when we return.
Jen: In my defense, Angel already made me go up the same 10 flights of stairs earlier in the day.
Angel: Hmm earlier in the day it was “8 flights” of stairs….suspicious.
Jen: AND I tripped and ripped my jeans and skinned my knees because Angel forced me up those stairs!
Angel: You can skip egg custard tarts then.
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