We’re in Os Papagaios, the restaurant Joaquim Saragga oversees in Lisbon’s Arroios neighborhood, where we’ve asked him to show us how to make one of Lisbon’s more iconic dishes: ervilhas guisadas, peas braised with Portuguese sausages, typically crowned with poached eggs.

Come spring, Portugal revels in green-hued produce: fava beans, asparagus, artichoke, spinach and other leaves. Peas feature in this bounty, but the ubiquity of frozen peas means that the dish makes frequent appearances on tasca and restaurant menus during all times of year.

“I know it’s very common around Lisbon,” says Joaquim, when we ask where the dish hails from. To confirm this, he flips open a copy of Traditional Portuguese Cooking, Maria de Lourdes Modesto’s Bible to Portuguese gastronomy. Although he’s reluctant to call himself a chef – he prefers the term “tavern keeper” – the dishes Joaquim serves at Os Papagaios have roots in traditional Portuguese cooking but also feature subtle tweaks that come from modern cooking and culinary science.

He scans the ingredients in the book, and says, “If you look at it, these are very poor ingredients. Peas, anyone can grow in his backyard; eggs, people get from hens; chouriço, traditionally [people] would make at home.”

We ask him how his take on the dish differs from the standard, and he tells us, “Normally, with this dish, you don’t see the sauce. I like it kind of like a soup.”

This soup-like texture in Joaquim’s version comes from the addition of a vegetable broth, as well as splashes of white wine to “perfume” the dish, in his words. He also adds an additional punch of aroma via a piso – Portugal’s take on pesto – of cilantro. And unlike the tasca version, he shows restraint in cooking the star ingredient.

“I like the peas with a little crunch,” he tells us.

The result: a base that combines onions, garlic and tomatoes; smokey, salty, savory meats; a generous addition of fresh herbs; peas; and those silky eggs. This dish seems to combine everything that’s wonderful about Portuguese cooking in one pot. And if you’ve opted for fresh peas, everything that’s wonderful about spring, too.

Recipe: Ervilhas Guisadas, Portuguese-Style Braised Peas

Joaquim Saragga’s take on this dish includes a piso, Portugal’s equivalent to pesto, which can be made a few days in advance and kept in the fridge.

It also includes a light – “elegant,” in his words – vegetable broth. This can be made with the scraps left over from preparing the dish – onion skins, pea pods, tomato caps, cilantro stems, etc.

Joaquim suggests serving the dish with hunks of bread for dipping – both in that broth and in the egg yolks.

For the piso

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 large sprig cilantro (20g), chopped

1 clove garlic (5g), peeled and sliced

1 tablespoon olive oil


For the peas

1 tablespoon olive oil

100g cured pork belly (bacon), sliced

4 tablespoons white wine

100g chouriço, spicy Portuguese sausage, sliced (Spanish chorizo or other fully cooked pork sausage can be substituted)

3 cloves of garlic (15g total), peeled and crushed

1 medium onion (150g), peeled, halved and sliced

2 large ripe tomato (250g), diced

1kg peas (peak-of-season fresh peas are worth seeking out, but the dish doesn’t suffer too much from the use of frozen peas)

1 bay leaf

600ml vegetable stock

1 teaspoon salt

4 eggs


For serving

1 large mint leaves (20g), leaves separated and torn

1 small sprig cilantro (20g), leaves only torn

1 teaspoon minced garlic

Bread

Chili oil (optional)


Prepare the piso: With a mortar and pestle, pound and grind the salt, garlic and cilantro to a rough paste. Add the olive oil, grind until it has a smooth consistency. Set aside.

Prepare the dish:
In a large saucepan or casserole, add the olive oil over medium heat. Add the pork belly, sauté until some of the fat is extracted and the pork is slightly caramelized, around 2 minutes.
Deglaze with 2 tablespoons of white wine. Add the chouriço, garlic and onion, sauté until the onion is tender, around 5 minutes.
Add the piso and tomato, sauté until the tomato is tender, around 5 minutes.
Deglaze with 2 tablespoons of white wine. Add the peas, bay leaf, 600ml of the vegetable stock (or enough to reach just below the level of the peas) and the salt, increase the heat and bring to a rapid simmer.
Reduce heat to a simmer, put the lid on and simmer for five minutes, or until the peas are just tender. Crack the eggs into the mixture, shifting the whites gently to encourage even cooking, return the lid and simmer until the eggs are just set, around 5 minutes.
To serve, garnish the dish with the mint, cilantro and garlic, and serve with bread and chili oil, if desired.

Austin BushAustin Bush

Published on June 25, 2024

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