Kappo, Cascais, Lisbon, Portugal
I was on a work trip to Cascais, a small tourism town by the ocean close to Lisbon. The restaurant is in a relatively quiet area in the central Cascais. I was curious, when booking the seat, what an omakase looks like in Cascais. Though it turned out to be just an “omakase style”, it was a fun and relaxing experience in general and the chef really tried his best to follow the Japanese styling. The menu is very simple: sashimi and sushi, plus the rest, namely some starters and desserts.
Menu
All the starters apart from Chawanmushi (steamed egg, and picture not given) came together as a small set. The set was well presented, including Nori (seaweed roll), Kani (crab), Usuzukuri (a small sashimi, I think here it was tuna), Furofuki (Daikon, I believed the menu has a typo here) and Uni (sea urchin). The seafood parts were all light seasoning and emphasised the freshness of the ingredients. I got a handful of caviar on top of the seaweed roll, sure, making it look posh and expensive. Sea urchin was creamy as expected, and, besides, the chef presented it in a thick soup base. Daikon was probably my favourite, firstly, because I personally like the taste of daikon anyway. Second, it was the only dish that was fresh bitterness, rather than fresh seafood sweet; and yes, I like a bit of bitterness at this level of dining.
Hassun - Nori, Kani, usuzukuri, furufuki and uni
Then I got the sashimi, containing mackerel, squid and maguro (tuna). The waiter mentioned that they provide a high-end soy sauce imported from Japan and kindly explained whether I should dip into soy sauce or/and use wasabi for each type of fish. Frankly, I could not remember the suggestion and just used the soy sauce without wasabi for all. The maguro (tuna) was really rich and fresh and squid was interestingly sweet. I would say a good combination from light to strong flavours.
Sashimi - Mackerel, Squid and Maguro
The sushi was made and served, as expected, directly by a chef, in the order from light and white fish to strong and rich-flavour fish. All sushi were nicely done, so I enjoyed a lot. However, I felt the chef was a bit rushed, hence I actually called for a pause halfway through. Maybe the chef should control the pace better by leaving some gap time between sushi.
Kappo is a nice restaurant in this mostly tourism town. It benefits from being the only Japanese restaurant in the area, and a high-end one, therefore, I think it is a successful restaurant. Indeed, it was busy the evening I visited. However, the menu was pretty much a set menu with potentially some changes on the sashimi and sushi based on the availability of fishes.
🐼 Score: 4/5
