Restaurante O Coral — Restaurant in Tavira

Coral was my bucket list for quite some time. I've been coming to Cabanas de Tavira for the last 2 years but never got lucky enough to get a table. This time i took their own advice "don't worry, just come near 20:00 and you won't wait long" and so it was! Simple as that! 😁 Now, i'm really glad i did...this is probably the best restaurant i've been in Cabanas!! Excellent choices on the menu, very well imagined and prepared, the space is small but cosy, eating with a sea view is priceless, staff is so so nice! The food is truly amazing, the Tuna carpaccio is out of this world, the Choco Risotto will have you cry for more and more! Delicious alfarroba Cake desert you cannot miss!! Had the chance to personally congratulate the chef, and she was incredibly nice and friendly, something which is not easy to find around other restaurants with a "famous" brand around Cabanas unfortunately. I will definitely come back next year and can't wait to try out the...

Fairly new in Cabanas, but definitely worth a visit. It serves relatively small, reasonably-priced plates, but everything was delicious. The Octopus with sweet potatoes was superb in particular, with juicy, tender pieces of octopus and wafer thin sweet potato crisps, as were (that Algarve standard) the baby clams, which were served with tiny pieces of garlic toast to soak up the juices. My wife said the anchovy bruschetta was delightful too. Everything is done with care here: the puddings are traditional and clearly locally made (I had the fig, carob and almond tart for dessert) and there's a decent wine list too. If you have a bigger apperite, the rice dishes looked delicious and substantial - two of the tables around us had the black rice and prawn rice, and they looked very happy with what they had ordered. Pleasant owner and...

We arrived at 7pm opening time and were the first party seated. 4 adults and 2 children.

We did not order starters, but we did order the "Couvert", common in Portugal, a little bread and some olives, and the main courses.

At 8:15, whereas all the other tables around us had their food, we still did not have our main courses.

I went to the owner to question the delay with our food in particular, and he told me the reason was we had ordered the Couvert. So the dealy was our fault apparently.

Well I have lived in Portugal for some time and I have never had that experience!

Having said all that, after my complaint the food arrived quickly.

On the positive side, the wait staff are excellent and very friendly indeed.

The food was nice and the location is perfect.

Moral of the story, don't order the...