Lisbon@Ibo restaurant

Sitting on the dock of the bay...

Had a very good dinner with impeccable service at Ibo restaurante in Lisbon's Cais do Sodré last night. Although it opened three years ago it was the first time we had been, having only recently heard about it. The cooking is a blend of Portugal and Mozambique. We could have been outside but opted to sit upstairs, which both gives you a better view over the Tagus and keeps you away from the groups of smokers who regular leave their tables inside to have a quick fag outside.

Side of the restaurant with its view over the Tagus

View from upstairs dining room (above and below)

Three master (Principe Perfeito) approaches and passes

Nightime views from Ibo

including the diving Christ

Viewed through a glass of 2008 Meandro do Vale Meão

Douro white: 2009 Casa Amarela

Douro white: 2010 CARM

Highlights of the meal for me were the succulent breaded prawns with a variety of sauces and then the Mozambiquan crab curry. We started with a glass of white from the Douro – the 2010 Casa Amarela and the 2010 CARM Reserva. Both were good with the Casa Amarela a little richer and fuller than the CARM. Then we enjoyed a bottle of the excellent value and reliable Meandro, the second wine of Quinta do Vale Meão.

Ibo

Armazém A – Compartimento 2,

Cais do Sodré

1200-450 Lisboa

Tel: 21.342.36.11

geral@ibo-restaurante.pt

2007 Meandro@O Magano, Campo d'Ourique, Lisbon

Discovered a new (new to us) Alentejo restaurant – O Magano in Campo d'Ourique, Lisbon. Had a very good and copious meal – lots of starters including presunto, octopus salad, chick pea salad, broad bean salad and stuffed mushrooms. These come as standard and you choose your main course. I had a very good rabbit in a rich gravy accompanied by a migas. Could just about have fed two people and certainly far too much for one person. No space for a dessert, so we just had a very good cup of coffee to finish.

On the way in I noticed a bottle of 2001 Quinta do Vale Meão (one of the Douro Boys) in the wine cabinet. Unfortunately the 2001 was 85€ on the wine list. Actually not an unreasonable price seeing as this wine retails at around 60€ but still more than we wanted to pay. Luckily they had the 2007 Meandro, the second wine of Quinta do Vale Meão. This was excellent – soft with mouthfilling fruit with well integrated tannins. This wine was in the Douro Boys tasting on 30th October when I thought it needed more time to soften. Just shows the influence of food.

O Magano is just across the road from Garrafeira de Campo d'Ourique a very good wine shop. Worth booking as it gets from busy from about 9pm, especially at the weekends. When we left a little after 10pm there was a queue for tables.

O Magano
52 Rua Tomas da Anunciação, Lisboa
Tel: 21 395 45 22

EWBC: visit to the Douro with the Douro Boys – more added

Francisco (Vito) Olazabal

I have added more text to the account of the first day of our visit to the Douro, although this is still work in progress.

His daughter, Luisa

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2 November 2010

Barrels and vats@Quinta do Vale Meão

Very long day yesterday. Left Lisbon around 8.30 and arrived in Quinta do Vale Meão, near Pocinho in the Upper Douro, around 2.30pm – programmed to arrive around 1pm. Timings probably calculated using a Ferrari smashing the speed limit and it didn't help that our tour guide missed the turning to Vale Meão within 55 seconds of getting on our bus.

Carrie Jorgenson (Cortes de Cima) – always connected@service station in middle of Portugal

We had two very good visits to Quinta do Vale Meão and Quinta do Crasto. Vale Meão is owned and run by Francisco (Vito) Olazabal. I first met Vito when he was in charge of Ferreira, best known for their Ports and Barca Velha. Sometime in the mid-1990s I stayed overnight at their Quinta do Portal near Pinhõa. Over dinner we drank Barca Velha – unfortunately I can't remember the vintage or possibly vintages that we enjoyed. Anyway it was good to meet Vito again.

Vale Meão used to be one of the sources for Barca Velha. The estate used to have 30 owners – many of whom took little interest in it and rarely visited. In the 1960s Vito started buying parcels from his fellow family members until he finally acquired all the parcels some 30 years later in the mid-1990s. In 1998 he quit as director of Ferreira, part of the Sogrape Group, in 1998. "Not a very wise thing to do as I was just two years off collecting my pension," he remarked. "But I don't regret it at all. It was my son, Xito, an oenologist who urged me to do it."

Qunita do Vale Meão: Francisco (Vito) Olazabal (right) and his son Francisco (Xito) and daughter Luisa

Xito is the winemaker and his sister, Luisa, has recently joined Vale Meão to look after the marketing and PR. The property has three wines: the estate red Vale Meão, a second wine called Meandro and a Port. They are the sole amongst the Douro Boys not to make a white.

I think the Olazabals are right to keep their range simple. I enjoyed all their red wines – both at the Douro boys tasting in Lisbon and during our visit to the property. The concentrated, black fruited and supple 2004 Vale Meão and the very fine 2000 Vale Meão with its beautiful balance of ripe fruit and freshness in the finish. The 2000 was the product of a difficult flowering, so a very small crop. The result is one of the finest Douro reds we tasted on the trip.

We tasted the wines over a very enjoyable lunch starting with a delicious spinach soup – a reminder how central soup is to good Portuguese home cooking. Then we had leave to get the train down the Douro from Pocinho to Ferrao. Unfortunately we had only a few minutes of light, so missed much of the spectacular scenery on the way to Ferrao.

(Visit to Quinta do Crasto will be covered in a separate post.)

Always connected: Andrew Barrow, glasses and spittoon

Douglas Blyde (intoxicating prose)@Crasto

Detail from above photo

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