Traditional food of Portugal: 11 dishes to know

Portuguese food is built on olive oil, garlic, bread, pork and the sea, above all bacalhau, dried salted cod said to have a recipe for every day of the year. Cooking is slow and simple rather than spicy. The most emblematic dishes are bacalhau à Brás, the kale and potato soup caldo verde, the boiled feast cozido à portuguesa and the custard tart pastel de nata.

Updated 2026-10-125 min read

What Portuguese food is built on

Olive oil is the base of Portuguese cooking, used both to cook and to dress finished dishes, with garlic and onion close behind. Bread, potatoes and rice fill out the plate, pork is the most important meat, and a long Atlantic coastline puts fresh sardines, octopus, clams and shellfish on menus everywhere.

The defining ingredient, though, is one that is never eaten fresh: bacalhau, cod that has been salted and dried, then soaked for a day or more before cooking. Portuguese fishermen were salting cod off Newfoundland by the late 1500s, and by the 1700s it was a staple across the country. Portugal is said to have 365 ways to cook it, and some sources count over a thousand recipes. It is the traditional Christmas Eve dinner in many families.

Spices arrived through Portugal's trading empire, but the food at home stays mild: cinnamon in desserts, paprika and red pepper paste in pork marinades, and piri-piri chili kept mostly for grilled chicken. For the one dish Portugal is most associated with, see our article on the national dish of Portugal.

Bacalhau and fish

• Bacalhau à Brás — Shreds of salt cod cooked with onions and matchstick fried potatoes, then bound with eggs pulled off the heat while still soft. It was probably created in the second half of the 19th century in Lisbon's Bairro Alto. It is finished with black olives and chopped parsley.
• Sardinhas assadas — Fresh sardines grilled whole over charcoal, a summer tradition along the whole coast and inland. They are the street food of the Santo António festivities in Lisbon around 13 June. They are usually served simply, with potatoes and salad.
• Arroz de marisco — Rice cooked with shellfish, squid, fish and white wine, the seafood rice of Portugal's coastal restaurants. It is often compared to paella but is a distinct Portuguese dish. It is usually brought to the table in the pot it was cooked in.

Soups, stews and pork

• Caldo verde — A soup from the Minho in the north: potatoes, onion and garlic cooked and puréed, then finished with couve galega, a Portuguese cabbage, cut into very thin threads. It is served with a slice of chouriço and cornbread (broa) at weddings, birthdays and popular festivals, often late at night. It was voted one of the Seven Wonders of Portuguese Gastronomy in 2011.
• Cozido à portuguesa — A boiled feast of beef, chicken, pork ribs, pig's ears and trotters, smoked sausages such as chouriço, farinheira and morcela, with cabbage, potatoes, carrots, turnips and rice. Everything simmers for around four hours and is served together on one platter. On São Miguel in the Azores, a local version is cooked underground, using the heat and steam of the island's volcanic ground.
• Carne de porco à alentejana — Pork marinated in white wine, paprika, red pepper paste, garlic and bay leaf, fried until golden, then tossed with clams and coriander. It comes with cubed fried potatoes. Despite the name, its origin is debated, since the Alentejo is mostly inland and clams come from the coast.
• Tripas à moda do Porto — Tripe stewed with white beans, sausage and other meats, served with rice. Legend says that in 1415 Porto gave its best meat to the fleet sailing to conquer Ceuta and kept only the offal, which earned its people the nickname *tripeiros*, tripe eaters.

Sandwiches and snacks

• Francesinha — Porto's sandwich: layers of bread, steak, ham, linguiça sausage and other meats, covered with melted cheese and drowned in a hot tomato and beer sauce. Daniel David da Silva created it in 1953 at the restaurant A Regaleira after returning from France and Belgium, adapting the croque monsieur. It is often topped with a fried egg and served with fries.
• Bifana — A thin pork steak simmered with garlic and white wine and served hot in a bread roll, often with mustard or hot sauce. It is a cheap, quick meal sold at cafés and festivals all over Portugal. The town of Vendas Novas is often given as its birthplace; the north tends to make it with saucier sliced pork.

Desserts

• Pastéis de nata — Small tarts of crisp, spiralled puff pastry filled with egg custard and baked very hot until the top blisters. They were created by monks at the Jerónimos Monastery in Belém, Lisbon; after the monastery closed, the recipe went to a nearby sugar refinery that opened Fábrica de Pastéis de Belém in 1837. They are eaten warm, with cinnamon and powdered sugar, often at breakfast with an espresso.
• Arroz doce — Rice pudding cooked with milk, sugar, egg yolks, lemon peel and cinnamon stick. It is spread on a dish and decorated with patterns of ground cinnamon traced with the fingertips. It is a fixture of the Christmas table and of family celebrations.

From Minho to the Azores: regional food

Portugal is small, but its food changes from region to region. The north, the Minho and Porto, is the land of caldo verde, cornbread, tripe and the francesinha. Lisbon has bacalhau à Brás, pastéis de Belém and the June sardine festivals. The Alentejo, the wide inland south, cooks with pork, bread, olive oil and coriander, while the Algarve coast leans on fish and shellfish. The Azores and Madeira islands have their own dishes, from the volcanic cozido of São Miguel to Madeira's bolo do caco, a sweet-potato flatbread baked on a stone slab and served with garlic butter.

Salt cod, olive oil and pork link Portugal to its only land neighbour; compare with our guide to the traditional food of Spain.

Cook Portuguese food at home

Three of these dishes have full recipes in Copper: creamy bacalhau à Brás, caldo verde with its finely shredded greens, and pastéis de nata baked at maximum oven heat. Find them with ingredients and step-by-step methods on our page about the food of Portugal.

For the neighbouring kitchens, see our guide to Western European food.

The recipes

• Bacalhau à brás🇵🇹 Portugal · 1 day and 7 hours
• Caldo verde🇵🇹 Portugal · 45 minutes
• Pastéis de nata🇵🇹 Portugal · 2 hours

Questions people ask

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Sources

1. Portuguese cuisine — Wikipedia
2. Bacalhau — Wikipedia
3. Cozido à portuguesa — Wikipedia
4. Francesinha — Wikipedia
5. Pastel de nata — Wikipedia
6. Caldo verde — Wikipedia

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