Hello friends! Today we are all about the seafood rice! This is a traditional dish from Portugal and I had the pleasure of trying it out at Restaurante Uma Marisqueira! The restaurant is pretty hidden in downtown Lisbon and they are typically busy unless you visit outside of dinner hours. We arrived at Restaurante Uma Marisqueira at 8pm and were lucky enough to snag ourselves a table.
Restaurante Uma Marisqueira interior
The interior of the restaurant was very classic Lisbon with beautiful tiles along the walls and wine everywhere. Something we noticed about the tables here is that they put a piece of thin paper under your plates so they can easily clean the tables up after by simply discarding the whole sheet.
At most if not all restaurants in Portugal, they offer you a plate of bread with a variety of spreads and cheese to put on it. If you consume the items, they will charge you for it but if you’re not up for bread as an appetizer before dinner, you can ask them to take it away so you don’t get tempted. We usually did without the bread because we rather save our stomachs for the delicious food to come.
Seafood rice
Being such a popular restaurant you would think that Restaurante Uma offers a variety of dishes to choose from but nope, they only serve ONE dish, seafood rice. You’re not able to order anything else to eat at the restaurant and they will not make anything else for you. I mean why would they, they already thrive on their specialty. The amount of seafood rice they serve you depends on how many people you have in your party. Since we had 4 people, we got a giant pot but others who came with 2 people had a smaller one.
The seafood rice had a tomato base and it reminded us of a really soupy risotto. The rice was mostly at the bottom and after a while it slowly soaked up all the seafood tomato soup which made it all the more flavorful. The pot came with more seafood than we thought! There were lots of prawns, clams, crayfish, mussels and even a whole crab in it. It was absolutely delicious and as someone who loves soup and seafood, this was the perfect meal for me.
Quick bites:
- Small restaurant, nice ambiance
- Friendly wait staff
- Big portions at about $16/person
Read more about my Portugal food visits! Bonjardim, Pasteis de Belem, Flora and Fauna, Cafe Gelo, and Tasca Saloia.