Henrique Leis — Restaurant in Loulé

Let’s start with the positives: the food was fantastic, really beyond any expectations. And while this should typically be enough to be happy, terrible service and a random loud noises from road workers kept us distracted.

While it is not totally within the restaurant control, but there was no option to sit inside either.

The quality of service is what left us really disappointed.

First, if you don’t drink alcohol- they don’t know what to offer you. I’m our case they completely ignored us. After asking several times for “could you maybe offer some mocktails”, the answer was that we should ask another colleague. We eventually managed to catch the right person, and our drinks got served by the 2nd main course.

One server struggled with placing plates and communication (we tried English and Portuguese), she just dropped them in front and giggled instead of apologizing. Same happened to another guest.

Another struggled with refilling water but got offended when my partner tried to do it himself. Eventually he felt the need to complain about glasses, that make it difficult to do his job.

On occasion servers were simply rude. There was also funny episode with paying, when my partner didn’t put tip on the bill right away wanting to give it in cash, not that they deserve it, but one of the servers was trying. That alone was enough for them to forget to say goodbye or thanks. When they got the tip, one of the servers came running after us with a “thank you”.

It was really a shame as this kind of Chef does deserve a better team to make...

Henrique Leis is a wonderful classic French restaurant. When you enter, it feels like coming home. A pleasant atmosphere, very well cared for, but not over the top as in some other Michelin Star restaurants. Understated luxury.

The staff is very friendly and helpful, without being slavish.

The 10 tables are arranged in such a way that everyone has their privacy. And for the summer there is a beautiful terrace.

In addition to the lunch menu, there is an extensive dinner menu. The starters are quite expensive, starting at 25 euros. For the main courses you can choose fish (38 -57 euros), meat (38 euros) and vegan (20 euros). Dessert costs around 15 euros.

The 8-course tasting menu costs 96 euros and, if reserved a few days in advance , is also available as a vegan variant.

The wine list is very extensive, with prices ranging from 60 to 6000 euros per bottle. We chose the cheapest, and it was delicious. The other ones can't be much better, haha..

We start with a beautiful basket of bread, a regular version, and a gluten-free version.

Then 4 beautiful amuses, fantastic taste! As a starter we have a colorful, but simple salad. You would expect better at this level.

As main course we chose the mushroom risotto. Highly recommended! Even in Italy we didn't often eat such a delicious, strong risotto.

The dessert not only looked fantastic, it also tasted great!

Definitely a restaurant to go...

Unbelievable! We last went to this charming restaurant 25 years ago, having been introduced to it nearly 30 years ago by friends. We live in London and whilst we have high expectations for good restaurants we also acknowledge that when out of town/country the bar might be set a little lower. Oh my goodness this was not the case for HL, absolutely elegant, meticulous, and scrumptious food is what was presented to us this evening. The wine as well, so attempts to up-sale us to higher priced offerings on the extensive wines on their impressive wine list, but just great recommendations of beautiful local wines. I have to say this is the nicest food I have eaten in Portugal. We were a group of six with two people needing a PB option. We let the HL team know this 24 hours ago and wow they were amazing and provided three PB courses and two interval courses as well. What an amazing knight, fantastic food, setting and service. A real local jewel and some of the nicest most accomplished food I have eaten! Well...