Venham Mais Cinco

On the drive back from 13 hours with a loquacious ESL tour guide through the sunsoaked port wineries of the Douro Valley, the guide drove past what he called the top spot in town for Porto’s signature hot sandwich and suggested we go for lunch the next day. Instead, we hopped out then and there, ready to carpe nocturnem.
To your right as you walk in is where the magic happens: a flat griddle a couple meters long and a meter deep, full of meat. Next to it, a four-​rack open toasting oven for the rolls. To your left as you walk in, a wall hung shoulder-​level with presumably local paintings. The aisle in between, perhaps a meter wide. This aisle is roughly stacked three deep: a hungry throng standing at the kitchen counter on the right, a traffic of waiters and exiting patrons in the middle, and a line of hungry customers standing at attention flush with the left wall. For the moment, that’s us.
After 20 minutes of strengthening our calf muscles and accidentally banging into paintings in an effort to steer clear of the ordered chaos down the middle of the aisle, we are taken to our table. Which turns out to be a few doors down, in an apartment building, up a dark stairwell, in a unit renovated as a not-​so-​private dining room but still possessing such domestic accoutrements as a washing machine and — assuming this wasn’t added by the restaurant — a crucified Jesus statue affixed above the head of one of our number.
Fairly starved, and having obviously abandoned our prior plan of just cooking vegetables after a day of rampant dietary sin, we promptly asked the waitress to bring whatever. So it was with no small measure of schadenfreude that we noticed the other table (well, same table, but other group) was only ordering 15 minutes later. Which schadenfreude evaporated when the waitress then revisited us to announce her decisions and ask for permission to put them in with the kitchen. Doah! A half measure of schadenfreude returned when she did, only minutes later, with the first of the dishes.
Which was a red-​wine soaked, fatty sausage I would have suspected of being a dreaded blood sausage had it not been so soft. An adherent of truth in advertising, she advised us that it was quite unhealthy. We took that admission against interest under advisement and left most of the dish untouched.
Next up, and more successful, was a make-​your-​own-​open-​face-​sandwich exercise with a heavy but mild Serra da Estrela cheese (where was the FDA warning this time, eh?) and appetite-​whetting, finger-​wetting sautéed prawns. Alongside was a pile of French fries whose highest calling was, of course, soaking up the prawn sauce.
Finally — and we’re skipping some courses here — came the legendary prego sandwiches. They were good, to be sure, but like the end of this story, they were a forgettable culmination after so much build up.