Custard Heaven in Lisbon

When you get to Lisbon, they said, you must have the pastel de nata, a sort of custard tart. And you must, you must, they said, have the ones from Casa Pastis de Belem, the original bakery that has been producing them since 1837.

There are always enormous line-ups outside the bakery cafe, to such an extent that there is a side kiosk that sells just the tarts to go. There is normally a long line-up there too, but we were lucky to find it was clear to get in and out in under a minute. We emerged with two tarts, accompanied with little sachets of cinnamon and icing sugar, which seemed like unnecessary indulgence but who are we to argue against tradition.

Now, we take our responsibilities to test recommendations seriously, and so we have enjoyed many pastels de nata, of varying quality. We can concur that those from the neighbourhood of Belem are among the very best we had. 

They were right after all.