Pão de Canela

Praça das Flores is a small, quiet square between Príncipe Real and São Bento, with a public children’s playground in the middle. Pão de Canela has been on the square for more than 20 years, and its terrace is, in Time Out’s words, practically stuck to the playground. Children can go back and forth between the swings and the table, and you can see them from your seat. For a toddler who will not sit through a meal, that is the whole point.

The café’s own website describes it as the place for “a snack with the children playing in the park”, and it is open every day from 09:00 to 23:30, so it works for breakfast before a morning in the square, lunch, or an early dinner on a summer evening.

The restaurant menu has two dishes marked for children up to age 11, each €10 when checked in September 2026:

• Smile Burger: a burger on the plate (no bun) with a fried egg, ketchup and chips, marked gluten-free
• Linguini Pomodoro: linguine in tomato sauce, marked vegan

From the café side there is plenty for small appetites. A ham and/or cheese toastie (tosta mista) was €4.80, a plain bread roll with butter from €1.20, and a croissant with Nutella €3.30. There are scones, banana bread, a gluten-free coconut and walnut cake, chocolate salami, muffins and pastéis de nata. Fresh orange juice was €4, hot chocolate €4, and a bowl of fruit €3.50.

Desserts from the restaurant include ice cream with salted caramel (€6), a brownie with ice cream (€7), chocolate mousse and pineapple with lime zest (€3.50). The adult menu leans Portuguese, with fish, octopus, a bitoque steak with fried egg and chips, burgers and salads, and marks vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free dishes.

The website says there is brunch à la carte every day, from eggs and brioche to granola. There is also a set brunch served at the table at €19 a person for a minimum of four people. It includes croissants and bread, cheese, ham and butter, jam, honey and Nutella, scrambled eggs and bacon, banana bread, yoghurt with granola, a fruit bowl, one hot drink each and a jug of fresh juice. Book it ahead.

The playground belongs to the square, not the café. It is open to everyone and nobody from the café supervises it, so one adult needs to keep watch. When the café reopened after renovation in 2022, Time Out reported that its indoor children’s corner, the Espaço Canelinha, was not in use, and the current website does not mention it. Plan on all the play being outside, and on a wet day this is a normal café.

The terrace is the place to be when the weather is fine, and it fills up at weekends. The café also hosts private events, including children’s birthday parties, arranged through the website.

Rato station on the yellow metro line is the nearest. The streets around the square slope and are cobbled, like much of central Lisbon, so a sturdy buggy helps.

Nearby, the Museu Geológico has dinosaur bones and fossils in wooden cases in an old convent in Bairro Alto, and the Mãe d’Água reservoir of the Águas Livres Aqueduct is at Amoreiras, a walk beyond Rato.

Is there a playground at Pão de Canela?

There is a public playground on Praça das Flores right next to the café’s terrace. It is not part of the café and is not supervised.

Does Pão de Canela have a kids’ menu?

It has two children’s dishes for ages up to 11: a burger with egg and chips, and linguine with tomato sauce, both €10 when checked.

What time does Pão de Canela open?

Every day from 09:00 to 23:30, according to the website in September 2026.

Do you need to book?

Not for coffee. Book for the set brunch, which needs at least four people, and for weekend lunch on the terrace.