The Mugaritz Experience

We're not stopping with just one dining experience.  No way.  This trip was designed to be epic.  The schedule for the following day: Continuing my mom's birthday with dinner at Mugaritz.

The morning of this meal, we actually called the restaurant to request moving our dining time to lunch.  We had toured San Sebastian as extensively as we intended, so we were ready to drive out to the countryside and eat another highly anticipated meal.  Fortunately, they easily accommodated our request.

If you're driving, lunch is actually a better option because of the dark roads at night.  Plus, you can enjoy the outdoor setting that surrounds the restaurant while letting the wear off the alcohol before getting behind the wheel.

Mugaritz is a true dining experience in every way.  Chef Andoni Luis Aduriz has more than earned its spot in the world's top lists.  The food showcases nature's ingredients and its seasonality with every bite full of emotion, ingenuity, and execution.  The service is phenomenal, too - Spaniards have such charm.  There's absolutely no stiffness.  You enjoy fine dining, and yet you feel like a VIP at home.  The Mugaritz experience is all about the journey that brings the food towards exceptional and perfection.

Mugaritz Tasting Menu
20+ course tasting menu.  You have a choice whether you want to keep the menu closed and have a surprise for every course, or you want to read the courses and anticipate its arrival based on the title and description.

The Arzak Experience

If you make the effort to visit San Sebastian, one of the culinary meccas in the world, you have to make the effort to eat in at least one of their Michelin rated restaurants (San Sebastian holds 14 Michelin stars with a population of just 183,000).  And if you're passionate about food, you have to try to score reservations at the world's top restaurants.

And that is exactly how I formed this trip.  Every city we visited had a food destination.  Spain has specialty foods originating from certain cities or towns.  This country birthed some of the greatest chefs in the world.

Enter, Juan Mari Arzak.  What better way to start our trip than with a dining experience from the godfather of all contemporary Spanish chefs, and, perhaps, of most western chefs today.  And what better way to celebrate my mom's birthday.  Seriously, there is no better way.

Arzak is located just outside of the central parts of San Sebastian.  You enter welcomed by a formal wait staff in traditional garments.  The restaurant is classic, simple, modern, and refined.  The staff and service have that unique Spanish hospitality that graciously makes you feel at home.

We ordered the tasting menu instead of a la carte selections because we assumed this may be our only chance eating here, our once in a lifetime experience.  After eating course after course with some "whoa - that's amazing!" bites, I have a feeling this wasn't our last time.  I could go back and eat the cromlech course and lamb course all over again.  Plus, the a la carte menu had offerings now offered in the tasting menu.  And of course, the menu constantly changes according to season and availability.

The icing to the meal and the whole dining experience was meeting Elena Arzak, Juan Mari's daughter.  She walks around the restaurant unassuming and readily welcomes guests who are eager to meet her, like at our table.  What an amazing night.

Our Tasting Menu
Printed out at the end of our meal.  Complete with our course selections, special requests, and wines for the evening.

San Sebastian - Is this heaven?

If you love food.. love to eat, love to cook.. you have to go to San Sebastian, a true culinary mecca.  All that hype you read and watch about this place, it's all true.  In fact, it's beyond true.

San Sebastian, or Donostia in Basque, is a coastal city in northern Spain just about 20km south of the French border.  With endlesss blue waters along clean beaches, mixed with lush greenery covering this culture-rich city, this is truly one of the finest destinations Spain has to offer.

Centro and Parte Vieja are the heart of the city filled with shops, cafes, mercados, and endless back to back pintxos bars and restaurants.  The mercados, or markets, are indoors and incredibly clean.  All these fresh fishes and meats make you dream of having an apartment to cook everything offered there.  The pintxos bars just don't stop, and it's amazing.  There's a mix of traditional and modern, with specialty dishes in each of them.  Pace is the trick.  Take it easy on the eating and drinking in each spot, so you can seriously have the whole afternoon and/or evening of nibbling and sipping everything your heart desires.  I think San Sebastian could be heaven.

Non-stop eating, and drinking, starts now.

San Sebastian coastline