On the last day of our stay in Lisbon, we decided to take a ride on Tram 28 since we read good reviews about the tram in a few travel guidebooks.
Tram 28 is one of the traditional tram lines that still operate in Lisbon. These trams go all around town, traveling to many of Lisbon’s most famous and interesting sites such as the Castelo de São Jorge (the Castle of São Jorge), Mouraria and Bairro Alto. The trip was hilly and noisy, but we were lucky that our tram wasn’t packed and we managed to find two empty seats. If you’re interested to travel by the trams, check out this website for more travel ideas. However, keep an eye out for pickpockets as we read many pickpocket incidents happening on the tram.
After taking a ride on the tram, we decided to have lunch before leaving to the airport. We visited Confeitaria Nacional after reading a review from Lonely Planet.
The confeitaria (a shop that sells sweets or pastries) was founded in 1829 by and it has belonged to the same family for five generations. Upon entering the confeitaria, we were greeted by their cake and cookies display. Unfortunately they were not labelled so it was quite hard to identify them.
The ground floor was packed during lunchtime and we decided to head upstairs instead. The interior of the restaurant was nice and pleasant, even though it was quite crowded.
We ordered two pastéis de nata to start with. Priced at €1.05 each, the Portuguese egg tarts were delicious. The crust of the warm egg tarts was crispy and the fillings were sweet, soft and creamy. We loved them! Further behind on the left was our glass of sumo natural morango (strawberry juice) and sumo natural misto (mixed fruit juice) on the right, priced at €2.45 each. The mixed fruit juice was our favourite, very fruity and refreshing!
We also tried their savoury food. On the left was the rissois camarao (shrimp patty) and the on the right we had the rolo italiano misto (mixed Italian roll). They were priced at €1.10 and €1.70 respectively. The shrimp patty was quite good, it was nicely deep-fried and we can taste the freshness of it. It was worth trying out! On the other hand, the cheese and ham roll was good, but not memorable.
Priced at €2.10, the tarte amendoa (almond pie) was quite satisfactory. It was nice to be shared between two persons, but it could be a bit too sweet if you had too much of it.
Since we still had time to spare and we were still feeling hungry, we decided to head downstairs for more food! Different from the first floor, the ground floor has table service as opposed to the former which was self-service. After looking through the menu, we decided to have a torrada com manteiga (toast with butter) for €1.20. One interesting thing about traveling in Portugal is to discover various Portuguese words that are similar to Malay words. This was because the Malay language has many borrowed words from Portuguese during the colonisation period in Malacca. Manteiga carries the same meaning as mentega, which means butter. We found other words such as toalha (towel), igreja (church), bandeira (flag) and a lot more! Back to food, the buttered toast was quite good! It was thick, warm and well-toasted, a very good light snack!
Since Confeitaria Nacional was famous for their sweets, we decided to give them a try. We had an assortment of sortido amendoa (almond cookies), sortido bolacha (butter cookies), sortido ovo (egg cookies) and Brigadeiro (Brazilian chocolate bonbon). The cookies were all very good! Particularly worth noting is the egg cookie, the yellow sugar coated cookie on the right. It was very sweet and soft, bursting with flavour when we ate it. We highly recommend you to try this out! On the bottom left of the photo, the Brigadeiro was also quite good, a great option for chocolate lovers! The heart shaped cookie is one of their best sellers, that is worth a try too!
We have to admit that the cookies were very addictive. We couldn’t resist another plate! The butter cookies, almond cookies, egg cookies and Brigadeiro were priced at €0.65, €0.90, €0.90 and €1.45 respectively.
As for our drinks, we had a glass of galão com café de máquina (a glass of milk with espresso) for €1.45. Served warm, this drink was rather milky with a light and fragrant sense of espresso. A very nice match with the cookies!
Priced at €1.90, the chá gelado (iced tea) was simple and refreshing summer time drink!
Service was rather average. However, we loved the confeiteria for the sweets! Check out their website for more information about their history and products. Londoners have pubs, Parisians boulangeries and Lisboetas pastelerias (pastry and cake shops)! We loved this city for the food and sights, it was a very memorable trip! Adeus Portugal!
Restaurant Information
Praça da Figueira, 18B
1100-241 Lisboa
Portugal.
Tel: +351 213 243 000
