It was my son’s birthday a few days ago and we went out to buy him a present and then to eat something. I bought a pair of boots (40% discount for holiday in Cardiff), and then we went to the restaurant, Viva Brazil. Sometimes ago he told me about this restaurant with a very good Brazilian food.
menu
They have 2 menus: one with 4 types of meat and unlimited salads and dishes; the other one with everything unlimited. He chose the unlimited one, I chose that with 4 types of meat, because I am not allowed to eat too much meat, (200 gram/week), the truth is that, before knowing about my health problems, I ate a great quantity of meat :), now I am trying to limit it because of the pain I had in past. But that night I ate meat for 1 month :), we had on the table a disc with 2 sides: red and green. The green side signals (to be seen by the waiters) means that you would like more meat, the red side is used when you simply wish to take a break or you have finished. We went to the salad and cold meats bar and we took a little quantity of everything that seemed special and interesting. In fact I tried many things, my son doesn’t like tasting new things, but, during our dinner, he tasted what I had in my plate. He ate fried potatoes, with Brazilian spices, very good, but a little spicy for me. We turned the disc with the green side and immediately a waiter came with the first cut of meat, they had 16 selected cuts of meat, stuffed pork, pork with Parmesan, flank steak, beef, chicken legs, chicken hearts, chicken and bacon, lamb, linguica – Brazilian sausages. The meat was slowly roasted over the charcoal barbecue. Everything was delicious. They cut the meat in slim slices; after the third type of meat we were full, my son ate more than me, the waiters were coming continuously, sometimes with the same type of meat or with roasted bread with garlic or caramelized cinnamon pineapple.
salads and side dishes
The most delicious for me was polenta 🙂 cut in cubes and fried as the meat at the barbecue not in oil. Another type of food- potatoes balls with cheese, bacon and garlic- very good. But polenta was special; Brazilian black beams with pork – very good; pickled onion and chili. There were also all kind of risotto, vegetables, but I couldn’t taste all of them, the salads looked good, but nothing special so I didn’t taste.
drinks
We drank cocktails, Caipirinha for me, with mango and passion fruit, traditional Brazilian cocktail. They had a lot of cocktails, but that was their recommendation and I tasted and I liked it very much. My son drank Margarita, then a Brazilian beer, Brahma ( not bitter, I liked it) and the waiters too, they were handsome, Spanish, Portuguese, South Americans. Both girls and boys, all of them speak English, Spanish or Portuguese. The bartender was working continuously, making the cocktails very quickly; I was fascinated of what he was doing and his rhythm of working. Our table was near the bar.
Conclusion: it was a great evening, everything was delicious, fresh, the meat melts in your mouth, special atmosphere, not very expensive comparing with what we ate and drank, we paid 50 GBP including tips. It is not cheap, but in UK the restaurants have big prices. I don’t think it was a great price comparing with the quantity of food offered by the restaurant. We have decided to repeat this experience and I recommend this restaurant. You can find it in other cities, so if you meet Viva Restaurant try it, it deserves. This is my opinion of course 🙂