Casa Velha — Restaurant in Vila Real de Santo António

We had lunch here by accident when exploring on holiday. Walked past at 12 when it was opening and thought it looked lovely so popped in with my family. We were so glad we did!

We were served by a wonderful waiter who was Portuguese but had lived in England for 18 years and was really helpful. Service was quick. The first time we visited we had the grilled salmon and octopus salad. My 10 year old had hamburgers and chips, very plain but he liked it, and they cooked up some turkey steaks for my 5 year old. The octopus salad was delicious, light and fresh. But wow, the salmon. The best Salmon we have ever had. Crispy, juicy, falling apart delicious. We loved it so much we came back 2 days later. My son this time had the grilled prawns and monkfish with me which were delicious, lamb chops for the other son and of course salmon again.

A wonderful restaurant, reasonable prices, gorgeous Vinho Verde to wash it down. Set in a beautiful little village near 2 beaches (get the free road train to Fabrica beach). The best meal by far for taste and price that we had in our 12 days in the area.

We hope to go...

Ugly dark restaurant with zero atmosphere. No regard for the environment, all the condiments even the butter is brought out in tiny plastic sachets and they’ll charge for very tiny thing you never ordered, butter, bread, olives, cheese you name it. We had to send it all back to the great confusion of the waiters who seemed to lose their entire command of English as soon as they were confronted by tourists who weren’t complete eejits. There was no kids menu so beware to parents, you’ll spend €14 on the cheapest Aldi patty you ever saw that came minus a burger bun despite being advertised as a burger. The kids faces were priceless though. The salad was dumped straight out of a bag, the fish was ok but for anyone who has access to coastal produce you know it’s simply sourced and even more simply cooked. There’s absolutely nothing about this place that warrants more than two stars. No ambience, rubbish service (they even refused to let us split the bill), insanely overpriced. Do yourself a favour and find somewhere, pretty much anywhere else to eat. This was definitely the lowest point of...

I wrote a 5* review this time last year, and wanted to write another to show that it is still as good!

Knowing how busy it gets we booked a table for 12pm (opening time). There was a queue at the gates, and they were full within 5-10 minutes so I would recommend booking to guarantee a table. There was a queue whilst we were eating, but I noticed that they delivered drinks to the queue!

Last year the salmon was the best we ever had, we still have not had better so we had it again and it was just as delicious! This time our 11 year old had it too and although he's not much of a fish eater he loved it. Soft, crispy skin, and so much salmon for 15 euros. Our 6 year old had the skewer of prawns which was great, came with a lovely salad which included strawberry, orange and kiwi.

We had a few puds, the best was the homemade orange roll.

We have booked again...