Tapa Bucho — Restaurant in Lisbon

To start, the atmosphere in the place is great. The lighting and feel inside was really warm and inviting. Unfortunately, the tables and chairs were terribly uncomfortable. They must have salvaged the stands from the 80's Sears radial arm saws for the table legs because they weren't meant to be tables. The metal digs painfully into your legs if you're taller than about 5'8". Or maybe it's a strategy to keep people from lingering?

The food was totally mediocre. Nearly everything we ordered was completely average, inoffensive but thoroughly boring. If you averaged the menu of every bistro or tapas place in the world, this is what you'd get. If you're looking for safe, this is your place. The lone standout was the portabello mushrooms which were absolutely phenomenal (I don't care if you're not a mushroom eater, I promise you I'll love them). The steak was cooked nicely on the inside but had very little sear on the outside. The potatoes tasted like reheated frozen potatoes. The chicken katsu tasted like the dinosaur chicken nuggets from the 90s (again, that may not be a bad thing). The ceviche was probably the second best but, again, totally unremarkable in terms of flavor. The tuna tacos were okay but surprisingly small (some Costcos would probably give samples that size) with very greasy shells. The bread (appetizer) was some of the driest crumb bread I've tasted. It was a bit odd, in fact, that it was still soft yet so dry.

The cocktails were reasonably priced and similar to the food in their mediocrity. Not bad, not good, they just "were".

Service was very, very fast for the food yet slow for the drinks. Our food arrived before many of our drinks did! The servers were pleasant and friendly.

We must be in the minority in our opinion because the place was slammed full. It's totally not worth fighting the crowds to get in here. Again, it wasn't bad, it just wasn't good. 3 out of 5, not sorry we went but...

This looks and feels to all intents like a small meeting place for a family as much as a restaurant. And the atmosphere is perfect – you get to relax over the amazing food while chatting to others. This was a relaxed lunch with a friend and we were both ready to share the tapas experience.

There were a great number of dishes to choose from, and my friend and I have varied tastes, so we asked for some help from the waiter. He knew his stuff inside out and made some recommendations we were both very happy with. It was great to have service with a smile and someone who was there to help as well as serve.

The Mixed board of 3 cheeses and 3 sausages was put together with skill and care. Dishes like this can go very wrong, but the chef obviously knows his local cuisine. I always go for Calamari when eating tapas and this was an absolute delight. Cooked to perfection. My friend had a real craving for meat, so chose the Ox tail, which just melted in the mouth. In addition, we had the Corvina ceviche with sweet potato puree, lime, casava chips and cilantro which tasted as good as it looked. Just to keep up the seafood end of the bargain (after all, we were in Lisbon) we had the Prawns with garlic sauce and these were amazing.

It was quite a shock that we were still ready for dessert after this, and shared the Creme Catalan with ice cream and the Walnut and chocolate cake with mascarpone and lime cream between us. They were heavenly! My friend and I have spoken about...

Okei where I am gonna start. I had a reservation for 2 people at the terrace, unfortunately we got there late and we lost the table. Something that should have been clear during the reservation is: the tapa buco signed in the google maps is not the one opened! it is 2 blocks down so we lost quite a bit of time to figure out that when we were late. But I still give 5 stars because this was also our mistake mainly on the delay. I give good rating for the food, the ox`tail is the best tapa you can get there. The service is good and I have to give even more appreciation to the new girl working that with so much happines was serving us and helping us with the choices. Very good job hiring her. Also the guy managing the area tried to make us more comfortable and when we asked if we could move outside when a table was free he accepted and after 5/10 mins we moved outside and get fresh air. A little improvement i would give is: 'If you think that the terrace table will get free in 15/20 mins I would propose to the customer to sit for drinks and then let them know when the table is free so they do not stop the meal to change place. A part the little problems at the beginning, very good place to get some high quality tapas. I will return for sure...