Most cities are known for something, and for me, forever more, Lisbon will be known as the city of pastry! Is it all about the Pastel de Nata? Not at all, though I sure did enjoy my daily dose of nata :) If you haven’t already, please read Lisbon: The City of Pastry (Part 1). Pastries were everywhere in Lisbon. I’ve never seen so many pastry shops, pastelarias, and so many different kinds of pastries. The question became how to narrow it down to which ones to sample. I asked some born / raised / and still living in Lisbon friends to narrow it down for me. They suggested these four pastries: Tortas de Azeitão and Amêndoa, Mil Folhas, Jesuítas, and Pastéis de Tentúgal.
Every time I went into a bakery, I asked if they had these four so I could see what they looked like and perhaps try one. Before I tell you about each pastry, how I ranked them, and where I tasted them, here’s a bit of history about the egg-based pastry world of Portugal. It is fascinating and sets the scene for the pastry world you’re about to enter.
According to history, as I read on Milly’s Kitchen, “After colonizing Brazil and Madeira in the 16th century, Portugal began importing a steady stream of sugar (formerly a luxury destined only for the wealthy) from their plantations abroad. At this time, there happened to also be a large number of convents in Portugal using egg whites to starch their habits. All those elaborately starched wimples meant a lot of nuns with a lot of extra egg yolks. One of those nuns had the brilliant idea of combining the surplus egg yolks with the newly abundant sugar, and the classic eggy, sweet Portuguese convent pastry was born! Yet, despite the regional differences in pastry in Portugal, there is one common theme throughout every pastry in the country: egg yolk. Egg yolk is the magical ingredient that gave birth to Portugal’s famous pastry industry, with each region expressing their own innovative, unique and historical manner in which they use this one ingredient.”
