Michelin Guide reveals the best restaurants in Portugal

Portugal stops appearing alongside Spain and starts to have a Michelin guide dedicated only to its restaurants. The event to announce the winners took place this Tuesday (27) in the city of Albufeira, in the Algarve.

The event is a historic milestone for Portuguese gastronomy after more than a hundred years of sharing the guide with Spain. The first Iberian Michelin Guide dates back to 1910, but it would have to wait until 1926 for the first distinction for a Portuguese restaurant to appear and another ten years to reach the second star. And now, exactly 114 years later, he now has a guide to call “his own”.

Held at NAU Salgados Palace & Congress Center, the award ceremony was attended by personalities from the world of gastronomy, tourism and culture. “This date is to celebrate Portugal's gastronomy, but also to value its ingredients, cooks and restaurants”, said Maria Paz Robina, general director of Michelin in Portugal and Spain.

Antônio Costa Silva, Portugal's minister of economy and fisheries, gave a brief speech where he stated that “Portugal's tourism is increasingly evolving. Our revenues have increased by 19% since last year and tourism is a lever to boost local industries. 25 billion euros were generated in 2023 and we will try much more from this event.”

Despite being a small country, Portugal plays an important role in global gastronomy and has increasingly become a destination sought after by lovers of good food and good wines, proof of this is that the country has 31 restaurants with a Michelin star (what the guide considers as “high-level cuisine, worth stopping by”) and eight restaurants with two Michelin stars (“excellent cuisine, worth the detour”).

Last year's guide includes Eneko, Vistas and Largo do Paço (they all had one star), with the first being closed, the chef of the second leaving the project and the third being in the process of being remodeled since 2023. Portugal continues without any restaurant with the maximum rating, that is, three stars.

Check out the complete list of the Michelin Guide in Portugal for 2024 below:

*in bold are those who entered this year

• Two stars:

Antiqvvm (Porto, chef Vítor Matos)

Alma (Lisbon, chef Henrique Sá Pessoa)

Belcanto (Lisbon, chef José Avillez)

Casa de Chá da Boa Nova (Leça da Palmeira, chef Rui Paula)

Il Gallo d'Oro (Funchal, chef Benoît Sinthon)

Ocean (Alporchinhos, chef Hans Neuner)

The Yeatman (Vila Nova de Gaia, chef Ricardo Costa)

Vila Joya (Albufeira, chef Dieter Koschina)

• A star:

Two Monkeys (Lisbon, chefs Vítor Matos and Francisco Quintas)

Desarma (Funchal, chef Octávio Freitas)

Ó Balcão (Santarém, chef Rodrigo Castelo)

Sála de João Sá (Lisbon, chef João Pedro Sá)

100 Maneiras (Lisbon, chef Ljubomir Stanisic)

The Kitchen (Guimarães, chef António Loureiro)

Al Sud (Lagos, chef Louis Anjos)

A Ver Tavira (Tavira, chef Luís Brito)

Bon Bon (Carvoeiro, chef José Lopes)

CURA (Lisbon, chef Pedro Pena Bastos)

Eleven (Lisbon, chef Joachim Koerper)

Encanto (Lisbon, chef José Avillez)

Epur (Lisbon, chef Vincent Farges)

Esporão (Reguengos de Monsaraz, chef Carlos Teixeira)

Euskalduna Studio (Porto, chef Vasco Coelho Santos)

Feitoria (Lisbon, chef André Cruz)

Fifty Seconds by Martín Berasategui (Lisbon, chef Rui Silvestre)

Fortaleza do Guincho (Cascais, chef Gil Fernandes)

G Pousada (Bragança, chef Óscar Gonçalves)

Gusto by Heinz Beck (Almancil, chef Libório Buonocore)

Kabuki Lisboa (Lisbon, chef Sebastião Coutinho)

Kanazawa (Lisbon, chef Paulo Morais)

LAB by Sergi Arola (Sintra, chefs Sergi Arola and Vladimir Veiga)

Le Monument (Porto, chef Julien Montbabut)

Loco (Lisbon, chef Alexandre Silva)

Mesa de Lemos (Viseu, chef Diogo Rocha)

Midori (Sintra, chef Pedro Almeida)

Pedro Lemos (Porto, chef Pedro Lemos)

Vila Foz (Porto, chef Arnaldo Azevedo)

Vista (Portimão, chef João Oliveira)

William (Funchal, chef Luís Pestana)

Portugal also has more two green star restaurants (which distinguishes sustainable gastronomy): Malhadinha Nova (João Sousa, Albernoa) and Ó Balcão (Rodrigo Castelo, Santarém).

The young chef award was awarded to Rita Magro (Blind, Porto); the sala award (which distinguishes the house's service) was given to Pedro Marques (The Yeatman, two stars, Gaia), while the winning sommelier was Leonel Nunes (Il Gallo d'Oro, two stars, Funchal).

In category Bib Gourmand (relative to a good quality/price ratio, in the range of 45 euros), in addition to the 21 establishments that were already in the guide, eight new restaurants were announced: Flora (João Guedes Ferreira, Viseu); Inato Bistrô (Tiago Costa and Miguel Rodrigues, Braga); Norma (Hugo Alves, Guimarães), O Pastus (Annakaren Fuentes, Paço de Arcos); Olaias (Mónica Gomes, Figueira da Foz); Oma (Luís Moreira, Baião); Patio 44 (Simão Soares and Afonso Ramos, Porto) and Poda (João Narigueta, Montemor-o-Novo).

A global reference

Created at the beginning of the 20th century to help travelers on their journeys, the Michelin Guide is today considered a global reference in restaurant qualification.

To award stars to restaurants, inspectors, who work anonymously, value the quality of the products, the mastery of cooking points and textures, the balance and harmony of flavors, the personality of the cuisine and regularity.