Delirium Café Lisboa

The Delirium glass, a serious pour in a serious vessel.

If you've ever been to the Delirium Village in Brussels, you know what you're getting: a sprawling, chaotic, joyful celebration of Belgian beer that draws visitors from around the world and at times resembles a very happy airport terminal. The little Delirium Café in Lisbon's Chiado neighborhood is a much smaller affair, up a flight of stairs and spread across a few connected areas, but it carries the same spirit, scaled to something more intimate and arguably more charming for it.

Of course, they have all the Delirium varieties (Tremens, Nocturnum, Red) plus a selection of taps that focuses primarily on Belgian beer. This is not a place hedging toward local craft; it's unabashedly Belgian in its loyalties, which is a perfectly reasonable position when your Belgian options are this good.

Before the crowds arrive and if the weather obliges, you might score a seat on one of the tiny balconies overlooking the street below. Watching the city move below you with a Tripel in hand is a genuinely pleasant way to spend an afternoon. It's the kind of small detail that makes a bar memorable long after the beers themselves have blurred together.