Tasquinha Cruzeiro — Restaurant in Faro

If we could give this restaurant a rating higher than 5 stars, we certainly would.

This quaint little restaurant was our best find in Faro. Don't get me wrong, Faro is a beautiful place with lots to see and do but this restaurant captured us the first night and we ate there every night whilst in Faro ... that's just how great the food was.

Tasquinha Cruzeiro "Yellow House" sits back from a main street in a small square, quiet, cute and unobtrusive. It would be easy to miss or overlook and that would be a huge mistake.

Maria, the owner, and her staff serve authentic Portuguese fare at very reasonable prices. While we couldn't try everything on the menu in three nights we can certainly recommend the veal in port, the garlic prawns, the vegetable soup (gazpacho) ... each of them is a prize winning dish.

Maria and her staff make you feel like part of the family. Everyone works to make your experience special and worth remembering. Each of them comes to make sure you are enjoying the atmosphere and the meal ... even the kitchen staff come out to see that you're happy. We ate on the early side so didn't need a reservation but if you're planning to eat later, you ought to make a reservation.

This is a very special restaurant that we highly recommend. Don't miss your opportunity to enjoy authentic Portuguese cuisine, a quaint atmosphere and staff that make you feel like family...

Food quality was so bad that we left halfway through our meal and went down the street to an actual restaurant.

The chicken we ordered was all chicken breast and was as dry as eating bark. The anchovies were too acidic and they were so skimpy with the bread. The pork and clams, was way too salty and you could not even taste the clams. Way too many potatoes, not enough substance. They don’t have any rice, they don’t have Coke Zero. Every other restaurant we went to in Faro had both during our 5 days here.

The service was equally appalling. The server didn’t even know the menu, what was available what wasn’t (I.e. we showed her pictures of various items on the menu, but she didn’t know which one it was and had to go ask her colleague every time).

Avoid this restaurant, go to Ricky’s if you want a great...

BOTTOM LINE: not recommended but not completely awful.

We ordered bread and patè sardines. The patè was good but the bread was stale.

Then we ordered vegetable soup and it came half warm and half cold, as if they didn't microwave it well.

We ordered clams and sea bream - they were both VERY GOOD.

The wine was good but it had something floating in it.

After having liked the clams we decided to order some mussels which were simply not fresh and tasted bad. We left them on the table and after having told the waitress they were bad we were not compensated in any way.

Overall the service was good, and the waiting staff was warm and friendly.

By the way they do NOT accept...