I’m refraining from torturing the internet with lamprey photos for another day. (Aren’t you glad?) Instead, these are photos of a more popular Portuguese food: bacalhau.
When Paulo walked into his parents’ house for lunch (as we often do on Sundays), he looked at the platter and said, “Pataniscas!”
To which his mother swiftly replied: “ISCAS!”
The Portuguese do say that there are hundreds of ways to prepare bacalhau — this is just two of them. How it was explained to me, the difference is that iscas are pieces of coated and fried bacalhau versus pataniscas, which are made of shredded bacalhau mixed with the rest of the ingredients (flour, onion, egg, parsley, etc.) then fried.
I’ll be the first to admit, I’m a big fan of pataniscas and iscas (at least my mother-in-law’s) are not far off. If you come to Portugal and want to try bacalhau for the first time, this is one of the ways I’d recommend trying first, along with bacalhau com natas or bacalhau à brás.
March 5, 2017
Album: Portugal [Winter 2016/2017]
For more posts/photos of Portuguese food and drink:
https://gailatlarge.com/blog/tag/portuguese-kitchen
https://www.pinterest.com/gailatlarge/portuguese-food-drink/
https://www.instagram.com/gailatlarge/
