11/22/2010 Eleven, Lisboa, Portugal

Eleven is the only michelin star restaurant in lisbon and we managed to get a table. i have to say i was a little nervous about getting in. 1/2 the time the website was down. the rest of the time their online reservation system was down. more than 1/2 of my emails bounced back to me. luckily for us there's the AmEx concierge. this is exactly what they're here for! i called them and asked them to get us a table for 2 and VOILA! we have one.



that night it was really rainy, and too far to walk so we had the hotel call a cab for us, and we just weren't thinking of timing. we ended up getting there really early. like 15 minutes early. ick! the lights weren't on yet outside. thankfully 1 of the serving staff saw us and let us in. we sat in the lobby area they have and watched them get ready for service, i felt bad, like a rude american, but hey, what can you do. if that's how they saw us then so be it. hopefully we overcame that image, if we did have that image, as the night went on.

i noticed the tables were spaced apart, much like ceil bleu in amsterdam. the entire atmosphere of the restaurant was similar. and it does have a nice view of the city. they didn't have the little bench stool for the purse but the service was spectacular.


we decided to have the tasting menu with wine pairings. we started the night with a sparkling red cava which was bottled just for 11.

our bread selection. every so often someone would walk around with this tray and offer more bread. baguette, tomato, rye, olive

Amuse Bouche

in the black spoon was a round was a fish mousse but we weren't able to find out which fish.
the middle is a chicken in filo which was my favorite.
in the white spoon we aren't quite sure what it was.

Amuse Bouche 2

rabbit terrine with pumpkin pudding














Foie Gras terrine with orange jelly and Sao Tome chocolate, apricot brioche

Mussels Cream soup with orange and citronella. before and after.

the soup just didn't do it for me. the breaded muscle was pretty good though. dare i say it - it reminded me of a chicken nugget.

served with:

Today's Catch

Grouper, chestnut puree, parsley foam, vegetable canneloni

served with:

Pumpkin and scallops "risotto" with macademia crust

pumpkin risotto, and the nut crunch on the scallop. now this was a breaded scallop :-).  in fact it was our server for this course we asked about that menu/ translation the day before.

this was tasty

served with:

Sorbet

the sorbet was creme de cassis and they poured their cava over it.

it's pretty and the sorbet was good. the mix of the cava left a bitter taste on my tongue which was too bad.

Lamb carre with vegetables jalousie and puree with farinheira from Ponte de Lima, olives, sauce 

this was good but i preferred my choice

Guinea fowl steamed with Louise Pommery, glazed vegetables   the bird had a heavy, musky is the word that came to mind but i don't know how accurate that is, flavor to it. i'm not sure if it was a truffle or chestnut flavor.

both were served with

Then the cheese cart came rolling up. these are all portuguese cheeses. we had our server dish up a nice variety and were handed

a nice plate of 4.

@6 - soft cow cheese, st. george

@9 - chevre-like, goat cheese

@12 - this was the smelliest, it's a cow/ sheep/ goat mix, soft and slightly crumbly

@3 - canello, this was the softest and a sheep cheese

in the middle is an apricot marmalade and walnuts.

cheese breads and crackers

served with

then came desserts. and with desserts came not only new napkins, but smaller napkins.

this is a raspberry madeline with pistachio, pineapple and a rum-soaked spongecake.

served with

2nd desserts (and who doesn't love that?) 

@4 - chestnut cake (i didn't care too much for this)

@7 - caramel creme brulee 

@11 - passionfruit sorbet

@1 - cheesecake, pumpkin jam and cinnamon ice cream

served with

mignardises

raspberry macaroons, sesame cookies, chocolate rum balls and a marcona almond brittle tuille in the middle

coffee service

i took a picture of this for a reason - check out those little pills with the sugar. no, we didn't order anything under the table to slip into the drink. those little pills are actually sugar!

as we were leaving we were sent home with this:

a nutbread.

over all, if you can deal with potential uncertainty for the reservations i recommend 11. every one of the staff with whom we had any interaction spoke excellent english. the service was fantastic, a new, folded napkin was delivered every time you left the table. however the gentlemen servers did not hustle to the table to hold my chair upon my return. i think they did the 1st time i left but none of the subsequent trips. - but hey, i don't blame them, i'm up every other course with my tiny tank!

this was a great meal. i would like to go back if we're ever in lisbon again, and this time i'd plan a much more leisurely few day's of activites. right around when the main entree showed up both matt and i bonked. we hit the wall. we stopped drinking much of the wine poured, and they were generous pours. but we knew we wouldn't make it through to dessert otherwise.

if you want to add to your star count, here is 1 for lisbon.