O Caçula Cervejaria

The view from the street. The fado is upstairs.

You'll hear about fado while you're in Porto. There are several places in the city where you can pay for a traditional fado performance, and if that's your preference, the options are there. If you'd rather have the experience for free alongside a good beer, show up at O Caçula Cervejaria on a Tuesday afternoon.

O Caçula Cervejaria is part of the O Caçula restaurant group, which also operates A Fábrica da Picaria, a craft brewery a few streets away. The beer at the cervejaria comes from A Fábrica, and it's good across the range: eight taps with the full lineup, a large food menu, and a ground floor bar that works equally well for a quick drink or a long evening.

A Fábrica da Picaria beer, served just around the corner from where it's brewed.

The cachorrinhos deserve their own sentence: they were our favorite in all of Porto. A cachorrinho is a small Portuguese hot dog, typically served on a soft roll with a spiced sauce. We only tried a handful of versions around the city, so I won't call O Caçula's the best in Porto, but it didn't lose to anything else we tried.

On Tuesday afternoon, climb the stairs to the first floor (Americans: read second floor) and you'll find a free fado session in progress. The format is something like an organized open mic: a small group of musicians play traditional Portuguese guitars while a larger group of singers rotates through the stage, each performing a few numbers before making way for the next. I don't speak Portuguese, so I can't tell you what the songs were about. What I can say is that the music is soulful and impossible to tune out. The room was crowded when we arrived a little after 4 PM. The performers, noticing us trying to see past the crowd from the back, helped move a few people around so we could watch properly. That kind of small hospitality stays with you.

The taplist: something for everyone.

O Caçula Cervejaria sits at the southern end of Rua de Cedofeita, with the Igreja do Carmo and its famous azulejo-tiled exterior wall just four minutes away on foot. If you're spending the afternoon in this part of Porto, the nearby Livraria Lello and Carmo Beer Bar are natural additions to the walk. Catraio Craft Beer, Porto's original craft beer pioneer, is on the same street about eight minutes further along.