Bilha Nova — Restaurant in Porto

I came to this place after a recommendation of a friend. She praised it a lot..but I was pretty disappointed. Service was nice and friendly but the food below average. I had Polvo a Lagareiro and the one served here certainly lacked garlic and olive oil, for me essential ingredients of this dish. The potatoes were okay, beans slightly overcooked. I had many Polvos in Porto already, this one certainly one of the worst. My friend had the steak and it didn't convince me either. The meat wasn't particularly tender. The dessert (Tiramisu) was not too sweet but also just average and nothing I would order again.

Most annoying however was, when we realized that the prices on the menu die NOT include taxes, and another 13/23% had been added to the bill. When we mentioned it to the waitress she was certainly very embarrassed, it seemed we were not the first clients complaining about this. It's the first time EVER I have seen this practice in Portugal and I will certainly check with DECO if this is common practice. I figured only later there was a little note on the bottom of the menu, only in Portuguese (the rest of the menu is bi-lingual)

Looking at the price again AFTER taxes, food was definitely not worth the money. I give two stars only because the service was nice and it's pretty inside.

We left the restaurant with uncomfortable feelings. I would not recommend this to any of my friends, guests, family and I don't understand why it has such a...

In our one week visit to Porto I have to say this place by far was the worst experience of the trip. Right off the bat we were told very arrogantly "well this is a restaurant okay, so if you wanna drink something you have to eat too", when we said we just wanted some wine. I get it, I've been in restaurants where food consumption is mandatory but the waiter's attitude was terrible. After this, we were served some entries we didn't order. I noticed this is a common practice here so we didn't touch it. The guy said they had no drinks menu, so we didn't get to choose the wine we wanted to drink, we were just asked if red or white. When it was time to pay, of course the entries were there being charged. I had to clarify that I would not pay for something I didn't order nor touched. The reply was also quite arrogant. The shrimps we ordered were pretty tasty but sadly this doesn't do much for the experience of visiting this place. I've worked in the service industry for 10 years and not even in my worst days have I treated a costumer like the two guys...

Gorgeous space and romantic ambiance make this a lovely place to dine. Staff are friendly and enthusiastic, with one even singing to himself while working, a testament to how much he enjoys his profession. Based on other reviews, I was very excited about the food, but… The shrimp/prawns were nicely textured, but had not absorbed any of the flavor of the sauce. To get that flavor, I had to scoop up spoonfuls of sauce to eat with each crustacean. The main course, the cod on potatoes, was beautiful, wonderfully moist, and paired with a bed of nicely textured vegetables. But it was too salty to enjoy. I ate as much as I could, drank water to try diluting the salt, but had to leave about half of the cod on the plate due to its excessive salinity. While the potatoes were perfect, the vegetables were also too salty. Perhaps I visited on an off-day. Each item was cooked just right with wonderful texture, but the flavors were tragically out of balance. Despite the wonderfully ambiance, I left quite...