Photo of the Week: Casa do Valle in Sintra, Portugal

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Photo of the Week: Casa do Valle in Sintra, Portugal

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Gluten or lactose free? Vegetarian or Vegan? Some choices in Sintra!

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Gluten free bread for breakfast Many of our guests are still surprised when they order their breakfast and we ask if they prefer gluten or lactose free products - or if they want tomato to substitute the ham when they say they are vegetarian.  This is not common in Portugal.  Though the Portuguese bread is fantastic and cheeses are really tasty, unfortunately many places in Portugal  fail to recognize that there are increasingly many people with a condition that prevents them from enjoying these things, and thus would like an alternative. We seem to make an exception here, offering both lactose free and gluten free products in our breakfasts. There is a similar situation with vegetarian food - if you want anything other than a salad, know that the Portuguese do have excellent soups, and often even the coffee shops have a soup of the day option. Many places in town offer an omelet or a pasta as a vegetarian option, but not so many where you can safely order your ...
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Oh, the wonderful Pastries and Bread!

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As I have mentioned before, I frequently walk in the mornings with my dog; up and down the hills, into the forest and mountain roads. Recently there has been an extra burden on my walks. It is lent, the 40 days between Carnival and Easter. Tradition says you give up something for those 40 days that is like an addiction. Some people give up coffee, others chocolate or cigarettes. I decided to give up bread and pastries made with white wheat flour. And this is the reason that climbing up the 400 meters to town is now doubly difficult: the bakeries and pastry shops open their doors even before Pandora and I take off from home, so we walk up to town with the irresistible scent of freshly baked goodies lingering over the town center, calling my name - which I am patiently (more and less) ignoring. Sintra is famous for its pastries. The pastries of Piriquita, travesseiros , are famous all over Portugal, and people cue up to buy them to take home by boxes. These long, sugar coded ...
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Abandoned houses

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When you walk around Sintra and Lisbon you cannot but notice and wonder about some beautiful old buildings that look like they are abandoned and/or falling apart. It saddens many to see the potential of these houses going to waste just sitting there with broken or boarded up windows, roof half falling and the garden overgrown. Right across the street from us there is one such building and a few times a week I tell people the story of it. As the high fencing and basketball hoop lets you guess, it was 'Escola Academica' still about 20 years ago when we were building and moved here; a small private school. Once a beautiful building, full of life, the school mistress retired, the school lost its license, and for awhile after the death of the old school mistress, a family lived there with no rights to rental. When they were successfully evicted, we thought the house would be soon sold and were looking forward to new neighbors - with no luck until today. Many people wanted to...
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