Tasca do Chico

Let us be clear about what this is: Tasca do Chico is a fado bar that serves food, not a restaurant with music. If you come expecting dinner you will be disappointed. If you come expecting fado vadio — the loose, amateur tradition where anyone who can sing gets a turn — you will get one of the most affecting nights out in Lisbon for the price of a few beers.

The room is small, dark and covered in football scarves and photographs. When someone starts to sing, the lights go down and the room goes completely silent, including the people who were mid-conversation and mid-drink. The standard varies wildly, which is the whole point of vadio: you might get a nervous local having a go, and then a professional who happened to drop in and takes the roof off. The good ones are genuinely stunning.

Eat before you come, then order presunto, cheese, olives and bread to have something on the table. It is fine — good ham, decent bread — and it is not why you are here. Drink beer or house wine and do not overthink it.

Honest notes: it is crowded and standing-room-only most nights, and you may spend the evening pressed against a wall. Arrive early for a seat or accept you will be standing. Silence during the singing is enforced by the room and rightly so — if you want to chat, step outside. It is on the tourist circuit now, but the singing has stayed real, which is more than can be said for the dinner-and-fado houses charging five times as much.