After our day of exploration in Lisbon, our next stop was Porto, to rendezvous with my brother and sister-in-law to start our hike. Taking the very excellent Alfa Pendular high-speed train, after a comfortable journey we soon found ourselves arriving at Porto Campanha station. From there to our hotel down by the Douro Waterfront is a relatively short walk, so we decided to use this as an opportunity to do one of Offbeat Eats Health Check re-visits to a favorite spot from our 2018 trip, Casa Guedes.
Back in 2018, we had several visits to Casa Guedes, a small café adjacent to Jardim de São Lázaro, where the highlight was the ability to drop in and get a tasty and affordable Sande de Pernil. Made from roasted pork knuckle (a.k.a. “hock”, or what the Germans call Schweinshaxe), basted in a house-specialty spice mix, the roasts are brought up to a serving tray at the front where a chef (on most of my visits, Senhor Correia, one of the owners) carves the meat off of the bone and assembles sandwiches, dipping both the bread and the carved meat into the juices running off of the roast. It’s a great and affordable treat.
Casa Guedes itself has changed little since 2018 (except for the expected price increases, a constant in our travels in Portugal, the intervening years have had a lot of inflation), although on our visit, due to demolition of a nearby building, it was in a bit of a construction zone. But despite the occasional rumbling of demolition, the waitstaff was very pleasant and worked around the occasional interruption.
The bigger news was that since our last visit Casa Guedes expanded from the single restaurant (now “Casa Guedes Tradicional”) to have a handful of other locations, include a rooftop location just down the street (“Casa Guedes Rooftop”). While the rooftop was somewhat tempting, the presence of an easily-accessible two-top where we could easily manage our luggage had us revisiting the original location.
After a nearly unchanged (aside from now supporting Apple Pay) ordering experience at the indoor counter, we settled into our outside seat by the garden, enjoying a Porto Tonico. One of the “standard” drinks of the Porto region, this is a mix of port wine and tonic water, which makes for a surprisingly pleasant and almost sangria-like beverage that was a nice way to relax after our voyage.
A few minutes later, the waiter emerged from the kitchen with our sandes de pernil. A favorite from our previous visit, we ordered two variants: I ordered a straight up Sande de Pernil (right), and Carol ordered a Sande Pernil com Qeuijo (left), with soft cheese. Like it’s somewhat-related sandwiches the bifana (sliced pork loin in a white wine and garlic sauce) and the sande de leitão (carved suckling pig), the sande de pernil focuses on crispy pork knuckle for its pork splendor. The version here at Casa Guedes is a masterpiece: perfectly tender pig, carefully shredded, with the occasional bit of crispy skin. After slicing, both the meat and the bun are lightly dipped in the juices (much like the classic Hot Italian Beef of Chicago fame), making for a moist and delicious sandwich.
Alongside our sandes de pernil, we also got an order of frites. One thing that amazes me during my travels is how the subtly different potato varieties in each country make for slightly different frites; throughout the Iberian peninsula the frites are usually quite bold and yellow, with a slightly less starchy note than typical US fries. The version at Casa Guedes was quite flavorful and crispy, they do as solid job on their frites as their sandwiches.
Really, I was happy to see that Casa Guedes was doing quite well, and in fact has been expanding. The sandwiches are still top-notch, and the overall experience one of the better sidewalk cafés of Porto. I’d like to go back and try their new rooftop bar at some point when I don’t have luggage in tow.
