Local food, traditional dishes and regional specialties in Cascais, selected for quality and authenticity.
Soupy seafood rice loaded with prawns, clams and crab in a rich tomato-and-coriander broth — the great sharing dish of the Cascais coast, at its most famous in the restaurants above Guincho beach.
Whole fish from the day's auction — sea bass, bream, sole — grilled over charcoal and dressed with little more than olive oil, salt and lemon. Cascais was a fishing port first, and this is the proof.
Spider crab stuffed in its own shell — the meat picked, seasoned with mustard, beer and herbs, and served cold with toast. The grand opener of a Cascais seafood dinner.
Goose barnacles prised from the wave-battered rocks of this coast — boiled briefly in seawater and eaten with the fingers. Strange to look at, intensely of the ocean, and a delicacy the Portuguese take seriously.
The town's own sweet: little butter biscuits rolled in sugar that crumble like the sand they are named after, baked in Cascais since the 19th century.
Two of Portugal's rarest wines bookend Cascais: salty, ungrafted reds from the sand vineyards of Colares and the revived fortified Carcavelos — tiny appellations a short drive from town.
