Restaurant Elevador in Lisbon: nice but bland

For this second dinner in Lisbon I looked for something more traditional and local than the excellent Down Under of the day before.

To be honest I was too lazy to look around and didn’t want to walk too much so, referring to its positive reviews and acceptable prices I thought that the Elevador, the restaurant of a Hotel, the Santa Justa, located in a small pedestrian street in the lively south of the city center would be a suitable choice.

#TypeSubject
1FlightParis Orly-Lisbon, TAP, Business Class
2HotelMoxy Lisbon City Center
3RestaurantDown Under by Justin Jennings, Lisbon
4RestaurantElevador, Lisbon
5HotelSheraton Cascais & Resort
6HotelPenha Longa Resort, Sintra
7LoungeTAP Premium Lounge – Lisbon
8FlightLisbon- Porto, TAP, Business Class
9FlightPorto-Paris Orly, TAP, Business Class (Operated by Portugalia)

The concept

Nothing special here, it’s a modern Portuguese / Mediterranean cuisine restaurant of the most classic kind.

The setting

It is a hotel restaurant so it is quite neutral. If one expects to find something typical on the plate, the setting is very conventional.

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The Menu

It is a half-local, half-international cuisine with a bit of research but just the right touch.

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And the dessert menu.

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As for me, I’ll take the shrimps and the cod. The dessert will be a chocolate fondant.

The meal

The welcome is very pleasant and I am installed…at a small table in a corner while the room is almost empty and will still be empty when I leave more than an hour later.

The staff (once again very friendly) brings me the menu and takes my order.

A few minutes later they bring me some bread, sauce and appetizers.

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If you’ve been paying attention, this is what is called a “cover” on the menu and is in no way a delicacy of the property. Often in Portugal the cover is a supplement that is often mandatory. A bit like resort feesin hotels.

It is very good and if it had not been imposed on me I would have taken it. But as it is imposed to me it is immediately less pleasant.

In the meantime I was not offered to order a drink and it’s a pity, an aperitif would have been welcome to accompany this.

Next comes the shrimps with chili, butter and basil sauce.

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It is served in a pan, it is beautiful and very appetizing.

However, I’m still trying to figure out where the chili is and it also lacks salt. I eventually came across a chili pepper but even when I crunched it nothing happened.

It is really disappointing because the dish was promising, the visual appealed and the result is finally quite flat.

Let’s move on to the cod, Portuguese sauce, sliced fries.

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And here are the fries.

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Once again the presentation is very beautiful. And again it’s bland. If we remove the salty side that the fish brings, the dish is totally flat.

On the other hand, the chips will be a real treat! Maybe the only thing that really has taste so far.

Maybe the dessert will save the meal…I order a chocolate fondant, hazelnut praline and salted caramel sauce.

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Once again the dish is very visually appealing. And it will keep its promises, or at least not disappoint. Good. Not exceptional but good.

I will then have a coffee and it will be a struggle to get the attention of a waiter to finally get the bill.

In the end you will have understood a dinner which will not leave an imperishable memory. It wasn’t bad, far from it, but it was overall bland and all the more disappointing since the dishes were visually very nice

The service

Very pleasant, friendly, fast…except for the bill which was difficult to get.

The atmosphere

No atmosphere, no soul.

Bottom line

A rather ordinary meal. Absolutely not bad, don’t get me wrong, but tasteless and flat. It’s a shame because there are efforts on the recipes and the presentation of the dishes but there is definitely something missing.

Bertrand Duperrin
Bertrand Duperrinhttp://www.duperrin.com
Compulsive traveler, present in the French #avgeek community since the late 2000s and passionate about (long) travel since his youth, Bertrand Duperrin co-founded Travel Guys with Olivier Delestre in March 2015.
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