Aloma

Many articles have recommended this place for a Portuguese tart. I was not disappointed. They were sold out when I first found this location, but they told me to come back in ~10 minutes for a fresh batch. Boy, was it worth it. the tart was flaky, and the filling was hot and creamy.
The staff are so friendly! I must have had «tourist» written on my forehead, as the staff asked where I was from, and how long I would be visiting there in Portugal. The server even drew a little cartoon saying «Welcome to Portugal!». I just landed that day, so it really was a perfect start to my vacation.

Great place, good people and good pasteis de nata. In the redisigned mercado da ribeira.

How could these possibly be award winning egg tarts? The pastry was thick, not flaky and so hard that it was tough work cutting an egg tart into 2 with metal cutlery. Clearly the pastries were not fresh and had been on display all day long. Although the server placed the egg tarts under a grill before serving and told us that they were very hot, we found that they were not even mildly warm. Such a disappointment and waste of calories consumption. I was hoping that the egg tarts at Aloma would be so tasty that I could purchase some to fly home with and save me trekking back to Manteigaria but it was not to be. We only got to the airport with a few minutes to spare before gate closure after having to make another trip uphill to the far superior Manteigaria egg tart specialist!

Ok the pastel de nata are actually pretty good — apparently the won a price or something, which given the rest of their pastries is quite surprising: they are crap. We tried a lot of different pastries and none of them was any good. Service? Are you kidding me? Do yourself a favor and try somewhere else, there are plenty of other cafes next to it and they can’t possibly be worse. Won’t go there again even if I am starving.

Nice place to take a break, near a garden with parking nearby.
Don’t expect any smiles, at least I didn’t get any… :(

I had their coffee and pastel de natas special. It was highly disappointing, the crust wasn’t even flaky and the custard wasn’t hot. The coffee was okay. Atleast it wasn’t overpriced.

Boa pastelaria!