Squid

Jan 8th
Morgane and I took the Lisboa Metro (fast, cheap, and easy) to Praca Marques de Pombal this evening. After we got off the train we took a stroll down Avenue de Liberdade—the Champs Elysees of Lisboa—until we found a spot for dinner. Prior to this evening Morgane and I were under the impression that no one worked in Lisboa. We were constantly passing people loitering in the street smoking cigarettes and talking among themselves. Our trip to the Praca Marques de Pombal finally enabled us to see the heart of the Lisboa business world.
We had dinner at La Café. It was an impressively pretentious place but the magic of Portugal lies in its price. It had a water list (exactly like a wine list but for water), a “complimentary” piece of chocolate covered foie gras to begin the meal, and a very interesting waiter/chef combination (waiter=cross between Benicio del Toro and Goofy, or perhaps a Portuguese incarnation of Spud from Trainspotting. The chef was a foot shorter than the waiter and a foot wider. He spent 5 minutes trying to convey his thoughts, in French, on food and life).
My food experiment continued—the chocolate covered foie gras was surprisingly good. It was hard to detect the foie gras beyond the wall of chocolate. For dinner I had stuffed squid. It too was fairly good though I have to admit it was somewhat akin to eating spaghetti. The squid had a chewy texture and was stuffed with a sort of ground pork (meatballs).