Body by Menu 2 - Shiny Penguin

I’m a sucker for a Menu 2, and it shows.

The Menus

The most popular option is, of course, Menu 1—the distinctly Portuguese classic: a pastel de nata and a café. Efficient. Iconic. Barely a commitment.

Menu 2 is where things get personal. Sometimes you’re offered a choice in how you want your jitters delivered—coffee or juice. And it comes with a plain sandes, served with the bread at room temperature, ham and cheese cold, no apology, no garnish.

Menu 3 offers both a coffee and an orange juice, plus a toasted sandwich. Warmth enters the picture. So does optimism.

The higher the menu number, the greater the ambition. Menu numbers, I’ve learned, are less about hunger and more about your appetite for the day itself.

And yet—here I am. Menu 2. Again.

Proximity

It’s not exactly indulgence that gets me. It’s proximity.

There are landmines on every corner here—small, beige, and dusted with sugar. Every time I decide I’m going to eat more properly, I find myself calmly, reasonably, rationalizing a bolo de arroz with a galão. Not recklessly. Thoughtfully. As if this were part of a larger nutritional strategy I once read about.

This is where Portugal reveals its quiet genius. Sweets are small. Coffee comes in cups that don’t scream ambition. You’re not encouraged to optimize your body so much as coexist with it. Eat a little. Walk a lot. Sit longer than you planned. Repeat.

Previously, discipline felt loud—rules, plans, resets, programs. Now, it’s softer. You don’t overhaul your life; you negotiate with it. You choose Menu 2 instead of Menu 3. You split a pastry. You walk home instead of driving. You live in the in-between, where pleasure and restraint quietly shake hands.

My body, it turns out, is adjusting just fine.

It’s not being sculpted.
It’s being socialized.

Discernment

I’m not chasing discipline anymore. I’m practicing discernment.
Some days that looks like a salad.
Some days it looks like a galão and a sandwich that never pretended to be warm.

I didn’t get this body from indulgence.
I got it from showing up—again and again—for Menu 2.

Recently Captured

Rotundas

I am continuing to capture photos of Rotundas, this one in Olhão by the marina (see the In Orbit blog posts for the complete collection of rotundas I’ve captured so far).

A Glimpse of Carnaval

Carnaval has started in Portugal, here is a stilt walker in Friday’s Children’s Parade. More coming in an upcoming post, and if you can’t wait, here’s a 2025 rerun: O Carnaval em Algarve.

More Portugal

Read more about daily life, the embarrassing moments, and the process for having a long stay in Portugal. If you are more of a picture person, follow me on Instagram.