It's called Bossa, and it’s also “novo” (new), although here we’re talking about gastronomy and not music. It opened at Cascais Marina on June and because it is open from early till late, it presents itself as the restaurant for all meals, from breakfast to dinner.
It also has a covered and comfortable terrace, seats for 70 people and a menu that takes you on a journey from Brazil to the world. Let’s start with brunch. Here you can taste yogurts, French toast, açaí, and egg cooked in a number of ways, with a highlight being the Fiorentino eggs (€8.90) served on a bed of spinach, which is typical of Brazilian home cooking. The mascarpone and red berry pancakes (€8.90) are another specialty. Bossa also serves the classic Brazilian “morning coffee”, which includes “pão na chapa” (toasted bread), tapioca, and Minas cheese.
If you have lunch or dinner at the restaurant, you might want to try the tapioca cubes with pepper jelly (€8.90) before indulging in dishes like shrimp moqueca accompanied by Brazilian farofa (a side made with toasted cassava flour) (€39 for two people), or grilled steak with chimichurri sauce (€24.90), a traditional dish from Argentina that is served here with chips and farofa. The menu also includes a range of pasta dishes and salads.
For drinks, the suggestion of the house is the Bossa Summer cocktail (€10), which combines Campari with orange juice, although they are also testing the less bitter Bossa Sour, a recipe made using Aperol Spritz, gin and a lemon and egg white foam. End your meal in the best way with a panna cotta with passion fruit sauce (€6.90).
Bossa is the new project by Viviane Leote, a 47-year-old Brazilian entrepreneur who has lived in Cascais since 2001. She is responsible for restaurants like Confraria, Nikkei, the Charcutaria and the new Vela Latina. For her, this new space was a kind of return to her roots, both in terms of Brazilian cuisine and the fact that during her early days in Portugal she was a manager of a restaurant in Cascais Marina.
The invitation came from Benjamin Katz, who has been a partner of Cascais Marina since 2013. “Everyone knows it was a dead marina,” Viviane told Time Out. “But he revived it and invited me to take a space – because before, there were only dining spaces, so he transformed part of the marina into an area that is fashion-oriented. And he wanted it to have a restaurant.”
Viviane admits she was hesitant because at the time she considered it to be “an abandoned marina”; however, she was finally convinced of the location’s potential and picked up the gauntlet. “Since it’s a restaurant that supports the shops, I thought it should be open when the shops are open. So it had to be a restaurant that was open in the morning and the afternoon. It needed to be open all the time... And it was precisely for that reason I thought of a more Brazilian concept,” she says, alluding to the famous Brazilian “morning coffees”.
“I didn’t want it to be just another typical Brazilian restaurant where you only eat feijoada or moqueca... I wanted a restaurant that has something to offer throughout the day, and for that reason the menu is inspired by dishes from around the world, because Brazilian cuisine also encompasses the entire world. And there’s always a Brazilian twist to our dishes.”
The entrepreneur wanted to infuse a bit of herself into the menu, so on Sundays from lunch until 6pm it serves “Feijoada da Vi”, which is based on her own recipe, and which she usually prepares at home when entertaining friends. “Bossa is an extension of my home: it has many plants, a lot of blue, sofas and cushions... I brought comfort and some of the dishes that I also make.”
Not far from Cascais Marina is Confraria, and Viviane shares some a big news: she’s already preparing for the next opening in the building across the street, Casa do Largo, which has been occupied by a number of different restaurants down the years. The renovations are well under way, with the space expected to be ready around February and March next year. “It’s a very old space that is well-known in Cascais, and it is now ours,” she says without sharing any revelations about the cuisine it will offer. “But it’s by far my best project. It’s the one that is giving me the most joy. I think it’s my favourite of all the restaurants, one in which every detail is being thought out and worked on very carefully. It is because of this that the project is taking so much time. It will certainly be my life’s project.”
Marina de Cascais, loja 27 (Cascais) Wed-Sat 9am to 12am, Sun 9am to 6pm