cataplana

thumb|right|200px|Open cataplana thumb|right|200px|Closed cataplana thumb|right|200px|Clams in a cataplana A cataplana is an item of cookware used to prepare Portuguese seafood dishes, popular in the country's Algarve region. The cataplana is also the name of a typical dish of Algarve region as well as a Portuguese item of cookware used to make the dish and a method of cooking using it. The cooking vessel can be used for cooking a wide variety of ingredients, but prawns, clams and pork cataplanas are the most popular menus of the cataplana dish.

According to The Oxford Companion to Food, the most famous dish made in a cataplana is amêijoas na cataplana (clams in cataplana). The cataplana is traditionally made of copper and shaped like two clamshells hinged at one end and able to be sealed using a clamp on each side of the assembly, enabling the vessel to function as a crude pressure cooker. Cataplanas can also be made of aluminium.