I have been so excited about writing this post since Saturday, and have been meaning to do it all week- this is my first restaurant review – and what a review to start with!

 I have two words for you – Casa Portuguesa!

Now before we go any further, I must apologise that I took no pictures for you guys – the main reason is that we (unashamedly) finished off every morsel of food before the thought of capturing the moment even entered my mind! However here is a link to their home page for those of you who need some visual stimulation http://www.casaportuguesa.com.mx/ ;)

So, back to Casa Portuguesa – as the name suggests it’s a Portuguese restaurant, and one that I walk past almost every day since we moved into this apartment. It’s a place I have wanted to try for a while, becuase it seems really alive and buzzing (especially at lunch time), and there seems to be such a fantastic ambiance surrounding it. So last Saturday, ‘C’ a friend of ours and myself decided to go out for dinner. We had no real plans in place, but decided just to walk around the neighbourhood and see what caught our fancy.

After a few rounds we ended up in Casa Portuguesa. It really was such a lovely surprise from start to finish. Our waiter was a very knowledgeable and accommodating man, who definitely knew his menu – which I love!

For starters he recommended the Pulpo a la Portuguesa which is octopus marinated in olive oil, cilantro (coriander), garlic, lemon and white wine sauce. It was brilliant! The octopus was cooked perfectly and had just the right amount of ‘chew’ to it. We also had the Camarones Piri-Piri which was grilled prawns with piri-piri sauce (A portuguese chili sauce). I was slightly worried that it would be too spicy for our friend, who’s  not big on spicy food, but the marinade was excellent. You could really taste that lovely char grilled flavour of the prawn and the piri-piri suace really complimented the dish.

At this point we were all really excited! Good seafood in Mexico City has been really hard to come by (which is not surprising, considering we are basically living in a basin 2240m above sea level!). So for us – this place was a gold mine…we would come back just for the starters alone!

For the main course we all had something different – but naturally being the gluttons that we are, we had to try each other’s food – and I can definitely say we were all impressed!

Our friend had Lomo de robalito al grill which, if I’m not mistaken is grilled cod. It was grilled to perfection. The outside of the cod was crispy and the inside was that perfect texture that cod should be (which I can never seem to get when I cook fish!). It was served simply with a no-fuss garlic butter sauce and green vegetables – this is a dish that I will definitely be ordering when I go back (and I WILL go back!).

‘C’ ordered Conejo Lisboa – which was rabbit. To be honest I don’t remember how it was cooked (I was really focused on my dish), but it was served with a brown sauce and rice, and that too was also very very good. I get the impression that a lot of people are scared of eating rabbit – but honestly it is a really lovely meat and you should take the opportunity to try it the next time you get the chance.

Finally, I had the  Arroz de Mariscos -which is basically seafood rice. That may sound a tad boring to some, but I assure you it was anything but. The rice was teeming with seafood and what a variety there was: white fish, squid, tiger prawns, clams and mussels – and there was absolutely no scrimping either! All cooked together in a tomato based sauce coming together in pallela of sorts.  In all honesty ‘C’ was not that keen on my dish, the rice was most likely cooked in fish stock – so it was slightly too fishy for him – however I loved it. Then again of course I did- it was rice based dish! As this blog continues you will see I have an absolute, unequivocal obsession with rice – I don’t know why I do, but it is there. My obsession is so acute that I very seldom let myself eat rice these days….just because once I start there is no stopping…but this is a whole other topic that I am sure to cover one day in the future.

Due to my afore mentioned rice addiction…I more or less licked my plate clean (and I can assure you it was a huge mound of rice) I think even our trusty waiter had a double take in amazement….needless to say I was so uncomfortably full that the thought of desert was absolutely not appealing. However the boys decided they could still squeeze some pudding down. Generally I’m not a desert person so am definitely not in a position to comment in this area – but the impression I got from the boys was that the desert was good – but not the ‘high light” of the meal.

All in all, it really was a fantastic evening. Casa Portuguesa is without a doubt a restaurant that I would recommend to anyone and everyone that I meet! C and I loved it so much we couldn’t stop talking about it the entire weekend. The staff were lovely, they had live portugese music which really added to the ambiance but most importantly the food was superb!

So if you don’t know where to go this weekend – you know what my thoughts are! Casa Portuguesa!