Lisbon’s Bairro Alto Hotel has long had a reputation not only as a lovely place to stay but also as an excellent place for locals to eat and drink, from the Pasteleria (famed for its pasteis de nata) on the ground floor, to the BAHR restaurant and rooftop terrace above. Now the hotel has a swank new cocktail bar of the same caliber, 18.68.
18.68 pays homage to the history of its street-level space, what was once the oldest volunteer fire station in the country. Like the rest of the hotel, it’s handsome and refined, with high ceilings, stone floors and counters, dark wood walls, leather banquettes and chairs that would make sense in a modern Parisian brasserie. It’s classic but not overly serious, with a few playful touches.
But no one goes to a cocktail bar to admire the interior design. Luckily, the drinks and the food here share that same elegance and mixture of the traditional and the irreverent. Bartender Tiago Santos took inspiration from the name and challenged himself to come up with 18 full-strength, alcohol-free and low-ABV creative cocktails—one has Dewar’s whisky, Port and Madeira wine, hops and buckwheat, while another has Roku gin and matcha ginger beer.
The full beverage menu has 68 options in all, including Portuguese and international liqueurs, natural wines, a range of premium spirits, teas and specialty coffee. The beer is from popular local brewery Dois Corvos, and the wine lists emphasizes natural and low-intervention wines, including a pet-nat rosé.
The snack menu, designed by BAHR chef Bruno Rocha, has inspirations from Portuguese and Japanese finger food, like cured red mullet on toast with fennel and orange, cured meats and cheese, and a handful of sharable plates such as tuna belly with marjoram oil and pork cracklings.
For more information, visit the 18.68 bar website.
18.68
Bairro Alto Hotel
Largo Barão de Quintela 12
Lisbon
Phone: +351 213 408 263
Hours: Wednesday to Saturday – 18:00 to 02:00
