Matcha Kitchen Lisboa · for the bar team
What we sell, why it costs what it costs, and what to say. Learn the sense of it, not the words — a memorised sentence is audible. Anything not answered here goes to Yulia and comes back as an answer, never as a guess.
A kitchen is where you experiment. We don't lock the menu — drinks and food change, we try things and rework them. So there is nearly always something new to offer, and that is not marketing, it is literally how we work.
The second meaning: we want it to feel like walking into someone's kitchen rather than a service counter. Warm, light music, curtains.
"Kitchen because we're always making something new and the menu keeps moving, like in a real kitchen. And because we wanted it to feel like you came round to someone's place, not into a coffee shop. Look at the chairs — they all have a story."
Playing: half-jazz, soul, light funk, light hip-hop with vocals. Calm in the morning, a little more energy towards evening. Never: techno, chart pop, rock, heavy hip-hop, and nothing that sounds like a spa. Alina makes the playlists. Nobody swaps them, not even in an empty room.
Warm and slightly wild at once — an artist friend's kitchen. Cosy like a visit, and there is a wig on the chair. Hold that image and you will find your own words for any guest.
"Isn't it just green tea?" Not quite. Normal tea you brew and throw the leaves away — you drink the infusion. Matcha is the leaf itself, stone-ground to powder, and you drink all of it. On top of that, the bush is kept in shade for the last three to four weeks before picking, so the plant makes more chlorophyll and amino acids: brighter colour, softer and sweeter taste than ordinary green tea.
"Why is it expensive?" It is picked by hand, only the young top leaves, off a bush that produced less because it spent a month in shade. Then it is ground on stone mills that manage about forty grams an hour. And then there is how much we put in: 3.5 grams a serving where most places use two. Hand-made biscuits. Real Belgian chocolate. Real fruit purée instead of flavoured syrup. There is nowhere here to save money quietly.
"I tried matcha, it was bitter." Good matcha is slightly sweet with bitterness in the background, not the other way round. When it is properly bitter there are three usual reasons: culinary grade instead of ceremonial, water too hot, or it has simply sat too long — matcha fades, loses the bright colour and turns bitter. We buy in small amounts so it never gets old. Try ours; if you don't like it we'll remake it.
"Where is it from?" From a farm near Kyoto. And it wasn't found in a catalogue — Alina, who owns this place, is a matcha obsessive: she went to Japan, stood on that farm and agreed it with the growers herself. We are now tasting matcha from several high-grade farms to build our own selection, the way a wine list gets built.
3.5 grams is a lot of matcha, so roughly 100–120 mg of caffeine: about two espressos, not one. It behaves differently — matcha contains L-theanine, which flattens the spike, so instead of a rush and a crash you get three or four steady hours. People who get jittery from coffee are usually fine on matcha. But when someone asks about pregnancy, or children, or how many a day: give them the number and let them decide. We don't give medical advice.
| Thing | What you say |
|---|---|
| Collagen | Marine collagen in peptide form — already broken down, so the body can use it, unlike plain gelatine. People take it for skin, hair, nails and joints. It is fish: an allergen, and we say so before being asked. Not suitable for vegetarians or vegans. |
| Spirulina | An algae. It gives that colour, which nothing else does, and it brings antioxidants. Keep it to that. |
| Lion's Mane drops | A mushroom, taken for focus and mental clarity. |
| Protein | We have a drink with protein and peanut. Say "with added protein" — it tops up a day's intake, it does not replace it. |
| Milk | Everything can be made on coconut, oat or lactose-free. |
| Sugar | We don't add it by default — we ask. And it isn't sugar as such, it's our own syrup. The fruit is real purée, ninety percent fruit, which is also why it doesn't keep long. |
| Coffee | Yes, specialty. We are about matcha, but nobody should be forced to drink something they don't want. |
European rules only allow approved health claims in anything commercial — the menu, the screens, packaging, Instagram. Spoken answers to a direct question are a much softer zone, but the principle is the same and it is simple.
Describe the ingredient, don't promise a result. "We add marine collagen in peptide form, people take it for skin and joints" is fine. "Collagen will strengthen your nails" is a promise, and that is a health claim. And always close with the honest line: it's a supplement, not medicine.
Nothing about health effects ever goes in writing — not on the menu, not on the screens, not in a caption — unless it has been checked first.
The drinks on our three screens are shot close up. That is the standard: what leaves the station should not look different from what is on the wall. A guest sees the photo, orders, receives it — and if it matches, the phone comes out. If it doesn't, they say nothing and simply don't shoot it.
Layers, colour, foam height, a clean cup on the outside, the straw sitting right. Nobody photographs a cup with fingerprints on it, however good the drink is.
The line is simple: the guest changes their drink, the barista doesn't. The first makes us flexible; the second would destroy the standard.
The difference between good and bad is not persistence, it is precision. "Anything else?" is a question that is easiest to answer with no. A specific recommendation from someone who knows the product reads as care.
Once. If they say no, the subject is closed — a second attempt undoes the whole visit. Not during a queue. Food to almost everyone, take-home matcha only to people who already showed they liked it — they photographed the drink, said something nice, asked about the matcha, or came back.
Minimum: greeting, waiting time, name on handover. Silence here is the service.
One sentence beyond the minimum — a recommendation or a word about the drink. Then follow their lead.
Everything works here: the story of the matcha, the place, the owners, take-home matcha, the review, a photo. Five to ten guests a shift are like this, and everything else grows out of them.
Reviews come from people who were asked at the right moment, and there is only one right moment: they have just shown you they are happy. Small talk first, make sure they liked the drink, then — "if you enjoyed it, it really helps us, we only just opened; would you leave a couple of words on Google?" There is a QR on the counter so nobody has to search.
Google bans reviews obtained in exchange for anything. Incentivised reviews get removed in batches and the profile can be restricted — we would lose not only those reviews but the rating everything was built for. For a place with no history that is fatal. A guest who already wrote one can be given a biscuit, but only if it was never promised and never mentioned beforehand. Instagram is different — rewarding a tag there is completely fine.
| A guest films the place | Welcome. Show them our page, ask for a tag. |
| We offer to photograph a guest | Only with permission, and the photo goes to them. |
| We want to post a guest | A separate permission. Filming and publishing are two different consents. Best case, they post it themselves and tag us. Children only with a parent's consent. |
If you don't know, don't invent and don't brush it off. Say you'll check, check, and write the question in the team chat. In a month there will be twenty of them and they become the next version of this document. A place where guests' questions go nowhere only learns from reviews — which is to say, too late.