After a day out in Lisbon, the last thing I feel like doing is cooking a meal.  The restaurants in the village all offer a ‘takeaway’ service, i.e. you choose a dish from their menu and they will pack it up to takeaway but for the time it takes, you might as well eat there.  I could order in advance, but I’m not that organised……  Takeaway lunches are easy – piripiri chicken, chips and salad from the little restaurant next to the petrol station.

So, we went to Martim Moniz – Lisbon’s Chinatown area – where there are several Chinese food shops, plus one Indian I know of, Popat Store,  which is very quirky selling the most old fashioned of English condiments amongst the spices, chillis and oriental vegetables.

My favourite is Supermercado Hua Ta Li, on the north side of Praca Martim Moniz.  It is full of all the fresh vegetables used in Chinese cooking at prices and quality that beat any supermarket, plus freezers full of Chinese delicacies and aromatics, including frozen lime leaves, galangal and coconut.  Of course it is also full of all the jars of Chinese spices, dried Chinese spices, an Aladdins cave of interesting ingredients.  Best of all they have cooked Chinese food – I admit that most of these are too ‘Chinese’ for my European palate (chicken feet etc.) but they sell crispy duck plus pork and vegetable dumplings.  Add these to Peking pancakes from the freezer and cucumber/spring onions from the fridge and I have a delicious Chinese takeaway!

Mustn’t forget Supermercado Chen, on Rua Palma – probably the most famous of Lisbon’s Chinese food shops – full of more delicacies.  What you can’t find at Hua Ta Li will be here.