Restaurante O Farol — Restaurant in Alcobaça

We visited O Farol for lunch on a sunny, warm February day. The staff were lovely and were very happy to welcome our dog, Larry to sit with us on the outside terrace. They immediately offered Larry a bowl of water and the staff and owners of this family-owned restaurant fussed over him a lot, lol, which he loves. 🤣

The food is traditional Portuguese style, with lots of fresh seafood dishes, served with veggies, plus salads, and even omelets. They do offer several vegetarian dishes, and have a children’s menu, as well. Everything was served hot, presented well, and was absolutely delicious. And I’m picky, lol! 😆

I liked how they brought out the couvert and let you choose what you wanted, instead of just plopping everything on the table, whether you wanted it or not. After lunch, they also brought out a tray with all the desserts and explained each one. They had several lovely homemade puddings, including a dark chocolate covered chocolate mousse that my husband loved.

You absolutely cannot beat the view from this restaurant, as it is on the beach side of the road, not the far side, across the road, where most of the other restaurants are. You can literally walk off the dining terrace down a few steps and onto the beach. The terrace area is lined with glass walls and covered with large umbrellas, so you get stunning views of the whole bay, while sitting in the shade, out of the wind.

Highly...

We had some sapateira and bifanas. For the location and prices I would expect stellar service, however, that was not observed. The waiters couldn't hear us (or pretended not to), and when we finally where able to flag one down, they would take forever for our order. For context, something like a sapateira, would have already been prepared a few hours prior, it should just be bringing it to the table, but that took so long as if they where cooking it. the bifanas where pitiful, it was overly smothered in sauce, making the bread quite oily, and the amount of meat I had, occupied a third of the bread. it cost 5€ and yet I had a sliver of meat, McDonald's mcbifana easily has double that meat. I was embarrassed to take a photo but they should have been embarrassed...

First we ordered stuffed crab..I had to eat it all becsuse my husband said it was old....then we ordered a seafood platter which they had the same thing in it ... which I thought they should've mentioned something...I wasn't about to eat another one all by myself... after starting on the platter we had to call them to bring our wine... the oysters were so awful.🤢🤮..and then to add to this the clams had the most sand I have ever had in my mouth.... the manager thought that by giving us ONE FREE espresso everything would be ok...after a 100...