Bairro Alto's Hotel Chef receives award
Henrique Sá Pessoa, presently the Chef of  Bairro Alto´s Hotel, was awarded Cook of the Year 2005.

Graduated from the Pennsylvania Institute of Culinary Arts in Pittsburgh, United States in 1997.

He started his career as a qualified chef in London, at the Sheraton Park Lane on Piccadilly, where he stayed until 1999. He was then transferred to the Sheraton on the Park in Sydney, where he worked through the Sydney 2000 Olympics.

In 2002 he returned to his home country Portugal and joined the Lapa Palace Hotel (managed by Orient Express) in Lisbon where he worked at the Italian gourmet Cipriani Restaurant. In the 2003 he landed his first job as a head chef in a small fine dining Restaurant in Cascais. After that experience he joined the elegant and fashionable La Villa Restaurant in Estoril´s praia do Tamariz where he remained has a head chef until 2005. In March 2005 he joined the Bairro Alto Hotel team.

At Bairro Alto Hotel, Henrique hopes to reinforce his position as head chef and implement good reputation and quality for all food areas of the hotel. He defines is cooking as fusion cuisine always using seasonal products and enjoys Asian and Mediterranean cuisines.