Figured its time to start a new Basque thread since the previous are getting a little stale (but useful). It may or may not have anything to do with my upcoming trip in October. Got lots of unfinished business after a family trip 7 years ago. The plan is 3 night stays in Bilbao, San Sebastian, Bidart (France).
Already secured ressies at Martin Berasategui, and Les Frères Ibarboure (where we are staying). Dont think I’ll do any more 3 star Michelin, but less than $200 pp one or two star is a possibility.
Plan is to visit Biarritz (Chéri Bibi?), Bayonne, and Saint-Jean-de-Luz. Took note of some of the reccos by @Maribel here.
Also planning one night in Rioja. Staying in Palacio de Samaniego. Plan to see Laguardia and Logroño and some wineries. Palacio de Samaniego has a seemingly nice restaurant but I can be easily persuaded to eat elsewhere.
Also considering a small group food tour in San Sebastian.
TIA
I’m not sure if todopinxtos is still around but if not @Maribel might have some insight or a guide about which pinxtos shops are best in San Sebastián.
I don’t think a guided tour would be worth it just find the dishes that a shop is known for and that’s about it.
I would try to make a reservation for la cuchara San telmo if possible or wait before opening. The food there was our favorite out of the old city pinxtos.
For Rioja, if you have a car or other transport, and time for a longish lunch, consider Venta de Moncavillo. It definitely falls in the under $200 pp 1-2 star category but it’s our favorite higher end place in the region. The dining room faces their extensive and beautiful garden where most dishes in the veg forward meal will be sourced from. That time of year there will be wild forages mushrooms and game from Rioja on the menu.
If you are driving to Basque country from Rioja, consider stopping at Arrea!, just across the border from Navarra near Pamplona. They focus on various preservation and slow cooking techniques of wild game, vegetables and spider crab. You select a few base ingredients and they present various parts of the animal or veg/crab cooked or prepared in a range of methods. The 110 euro tasting included three core products (we chose boar, roe deer and wood pigeon), each having 7 separate preaparations after a set of starter bites (around 15). You can also order the sets of seven preparations and other dishes a la carte.
Thanks for this. Last time we did exactly what you suggested in San Sebastian and that worked out well. While in Bilbao we took a private tour. We enjoy taking at least one tour on every trip for the experience, and ease. When the places are too busy it can be overwhelming and stressful. I’ll also consider taking a tour somewhere else, maybe even a half day driving tour if they exist.
This is great. The places look amazing. The plan is to drive from San Sebastian to Rioja in the morning, visit a winery, one of the towns, repeat the next day before driving to Bilbao. Arrea will require a change of plan, but its very tempting. Actually, thinking now, a detour on the way to Bilbao may work.
For your drive from Donostia to Rioja Alavesa (Samaniego), Arrea! would be the best change of plan, the best detour, especially for its game dishes in October, rather than Venta de Moncalvillo, which we loved and is one of the 2 very best in the Rioja region (along with Echaurren)…but V de M would be a detour south of Logroño. We’re headed to the former in July. I highly recommend both, but Arrea! actually makes more logistical sense to me to your itinerary.
As to private pintxos tours, my good friend Gabriella Ranelli of many years owns Tenedor Tours, which I would normally recommend, but her pintxos guide, Katherine is on maternity leave.
Gabriella was the local fixer for Bourdain’s Parts Unknown Basque Country, and she and her husband Aitor were featured in the program. Wall Street Journal names her one of Europe’s best culinary guides and she is Arzak’s PR person and like his second daughter. She is the most knowledgeable person you could possibly ever find regarding all things related to Basque cuisine, having been in the business for over 30 years.
Instead if Gabriella’s guides are booked, consider Culinary Backstreets, which just began food tours in both Donostia and Bilbao. They will avoid the most crowded places in the Old Quarter (which has become a madhouse) and take you to those you may not find on your own.
Or if you want another very local and very Basque food tour in Bilbao, contact Bilbao native Mikel Gómez de Urquijo at www.toursbybasques.com and tell him I sent you. He’s been our loyal guide to fine Vizcaya dining for over 20 years. And he does txakolí tours as well, as he has done for us, and he has accompanied us to many lovely countryside asadores and gourmet spots in Bilbao.
Or, if you go on your own in SS, stop at the following and brave the crowds (don’t use todopintoxos which is very outdated). Gabriella takes us to the following—we visit at least 3-4 times a year.
Old Quarter:
***Casa Urola, your first and most important stop for Pablo Loureiro’s seasonal creations
Ganbara, if you can get in when it opens
Tambo, if you can’t get into Ganbara, it is owned by the same family; same fab pintxos
Txepetxa, the anchovy temple
Antonio Bar, the new one on Boulevard with more space
Ssua Arde, in the former space of A Fuego Negro (whose chef/owner closed and created Arrea!)
La Cuchara de San Telmo will be packed so go very early or very late; ditto to Borda Berri
Ditto to Bar Néstor for snagging that uber famous slice of tortilla; it’s become nearly impossible
Have the tortilla instead at Antonio Bar
Gros:
Head straight to Bodega Donostiarra for their “Indurain” or their “Completo”. The annex across the street is their newest space.
Then continue to Bergara Bar, where the “miniature haute cuisine” pintxos phenomenon got started
Center:
Bar Vallés, where the Gilda was invented, and where Marti Buckley recently escorted Eva Longoria
Narru (1 Repsol sun) at the bar for their fabulous chistorra or dining on their exquisite txuleta or any wild fish. Iñigo Peña is one of the city’s top chefs.
La Espiga, a locals’ favorite and no tourists to speak of
You have chosen two wonderful hotels. My full approval!
The 2 best lodging choices in the Rioja D.O. (unquestionably) are Palacio de Samaniego and Santa Maria in Briones.
If you choose not to dine at the Palacio, I highly recommend an exclusive wine tour at Viñedos de Páganos (Sierra de Cantabria) in Páganos followed by lunch at El Puntido, choosing the menu with wine pairing. (tiger john, put this on your list–it’s where Emma of Mannix left to help them start their gourmet restaurant). It’s just a very short hop away from Samaniego and will be memorable. No large tour groups. https://www.sierracantabria.com/las-bodegas/vinedos-de-paganos/
For Laguardia the best lunch spot is still Amelibia.
If you need further info, my far, far too long Rioja guide (a victim of my Rioja travels since '91), has more info on wine touring, sightseeing, dining.
I’m happy as well that you chose MB for your 3-star Michelin experience. I’ve been fortunate (for business) to have dined at all of the Michelin starred SS-area temples except for Paulo Airaudo’s Amelia in the Villa Favorita, and MB was my first and the one I would most happily return to, as it has a lovely countryside setting in Lasarte. Fine choice!
Since you’ll be driving from SS to Samaniego, you won’t have the chance to dine at Bédua outside of Zumaia (featured in the movie “7 Apellidos Vascos” or in English “Spanish Affair”) but put it in CAPS for your list for next time—one of the Basque country’s finest asadores and not well known outside of Spain.
For Biarritz, do try to dine at Cheri Bibi.
If you have time for Bayonne/Baiona, please try to dine at La Table de Sébastian Gravé, our best meal in this lovely, highly atmospheric and very, very French Basque river town.
Email sent to Gabriela
We did a private tour with Mikel in Bilbao. He’s already expecting me
We may have a chance to eat in Bédua when we revisit Getaria and perhaps see Zumaia again. Especially since Asador Araneta where we had a great meal last time closed. Plan is to try as many mushrooms and egg dishes I can find.
Will look at the rest. Thanks again.
Hopefully you make it to Bedua! I still think fondly of their besugo and txuleta, if i were to do it again I might order two different fishes. One of the standout meals during our 3 week trip to basque country/madrid/paris. Call ahead to reserve!
@Ziggy
I hope you do get to Bédua! And be sure to order their tortilla as well! We’ll be there at the end of July while staying at the txakolí winery in Getaria, the Ametzoi experience.
Please give mikel our regards. We hope to see him soon in the Urdaibai.
We’ve just bought our flight to Spain for late September, and our plan is to visit San Sebastián, Bilbao, and Rioja, so I will piggyback on Ziggy’s thread. Any thoughts, suggestions, recommendations on especially charming hotels in any of those spots would be greatly appreciated. Looking for locations that are walkable to sites and restaurants in the first two places, and something charming in a cute town with good wineries nearby in the third. Thanks very much in advance. I’m actually taking the husband along this time!
@LulusMom1,
As to recommendations of charming hotels, it would be best to know your budget, as September is still high season in San Sebastián/Donostia and hotel rates will be sky high.
All hotels in SS and Bilbao will be walkable to major sites, as these are extremely walkable cities and the inner cores small.
For charm in SS, without the very. very hefty price tag of a La Concha beach facing property, I would consider the Room Mate Gorka on a pretty square, the Zenit Convento (in a former convent with noted restaurant), the excellent Arbaso facing the Catedral del Buen Pastor (with its 2-sun Repsol designated Narru restaurant) and the less pricey Villa Katalina nearby. But beware the price tag of SS lodging from June-September.
For something charming in an extremely cute fishing village, we head to Getaria, the txakolí producing town and birthplace of both Juan Sebastián Elkano and fashion designer Cristóbal Balenciaga. Getaria is as charming as a town can get on the Basque coast. It also houses the wonderful Balenciaga costume museum and is chock-a-block with fantastic charcoal grilled seafood eateries----the world famous Elkano, but also the Txoko, Iribar, Mayflower, Balearri on the beach, and Kai Kaipe (cousin to Elkano).
The most gorgeous (and expensive and elite) place to stay here is the Iturregi but for moderate budgets, we’ve also stayed happily at the San Prudenzio on the hill, surrounded by txakolí vineyards, at the Ametzoi Experience, a working txakolí winery and in town at the lovely Saiaz.
For Bilbao, the “grande dame” hotel with a perfect central location is the Carlton. The Artist Grand Hotel of Art (formerly the Grand Domine) and the Miró face the Guggenheim. The newish Tayko is found in the Casco Viejo, the Old Quarter. But again, any hotel in central Bilbao will be wonderfully walkable.
For the Rioja, if you want to stay within the medieval walls of Laguardia in the Rioja Alavesa, the area in the Basque Country of the Rioja wine producing region, I would suggest the Castillo de Collado or the much more expensive (harvest season pricing), Hospedería de los Parajes (to me, overpriced).
Or if you don’t mind staying at a winery hotel surrounded by beautiful vineyard views and easy in-and-out for wine touring, you have the Eguren Ugarte, which looks like something out of a Flintstones movie.
Very high end and small, as I mentioned to Ziggy, the lovely Santa Maria in Briones and the Palacio de Samaniego in Samaniego, the two best hotels in the D.O. The first medieval town sits in the Rioja Alta and is handy to the Dinastía Vivanco wine museum and Miguel Merino winery, and the other sits in the small medieval Basque village of Samaniego, handy to many fine wineries (Remírez Ganuza, Ostatu, Luis Cañas, Amaren, Sierra de Cantabria, Bodegas de la Marquesa and the contemporary Baigorri).
The Carlton in Bilbao, while well located, is in dire need of a refresh, IMO. We much prefer The Artist. It’s more modern than charming, but its nice, well located, fresh, and the best rooms have views of the Guggenheim puppy. The rooftop bar has great views, too.
We stayed at a really charming place outside of San Sebastián, in Hondarribia. Villa Magalean. We loved Hondarribia, much less inundated with tourists but plenty of good restaurants and bars. It was an easy, short bus ride from there into San Sebastián, and also simple to get to daytrip to the french Basque region from there.
I haven’t stayed at the Carlton for several years, so it’s important to know that it’s now in need of an update. We’ve stayed at both the very traditional Carlton and the contemporary The Artist in a deluxe room directing facing the Guggen.
I completely agree about the lovely Villa Magalean in Hondarribia, another of the Basque Coast’s most charming fishing villages. I didn’t mention it, because I thought that Getaria would be a better fit between Donostia and Bilbao. But for those interested in exploring the beautiful 3 flower villages of the Pays Basque, plus Biarritz and Bayonne/Baiona, plus the delightful train ride to La Rhune, Hondarribia makes for a very nice base. We based there for an entire 2 weeks with friends at an agroturismo…
We make a yearly pilgrimage to Hondarribia for a seafood lunch at the Hermandad de Pescadores, which makes the most wonderful fish soup and perfectly grilled fish straight from the piers.
We also love for its award winning pintxos the Gran Sol on Calle San Pedro in the Marina district, the cute Danontzat in the medieval quarter with its delightful and uber friendly chef (where we meet Gabriella), the Alameda with its Michelin star and one of the Basque Country’s very best grilled meat temples, the Asador Laia Erretegia up in the hills. Plus several more such as Abarka and the restaurant Sutan of the txakolí winery, Hiruzta, another great grilled meat house with a female chef at the grill who has also won the award for best Basque Country parrillero (grill meister) and very fine txakolí wines.
It’s a great eating town.
We really liked Gaintza in Getaria. A modern (enough) Boutique hotel inside their own winery. Walking distance to the village and their excellent restaurants, Balenciaga museum, and even a nice cemetery where he’s buried. Only 20 mins from San Sebastian.
FWIW in Bilbao we chose Hotel Miró, near the Guggenheim
We’ve also toured at Gaintza, courtesy of Mikel, and have thought of staying there but this year it will be the Ameztoi Experience for our txakolí fix. But it only has 4 sea facing rooms and gets booked up very quickly for the season.
Gaintza is another great choice, I agree, for the unique experience of staying in a working txakolí winery, plus having it walkable to town.
Maribel, we really liked Danontzat. Had a fun and good diner there. And also Gran Sol. We had been looking forward to Hermandad de Pescadores, but had a very underwhelming meal there. The fish soup was great, but the rest of the meal not so much, and the service was beyond bad. But we did sense that something seemed “off” there that particular night, so maybe our experience was not typical.
I love the uber friendly chef of Danontzat, and it’s Gabriella’s favorite informal place to dine there.
I go with my Pamplona friends each July to the Hermandad. We’re usually a group of 8 or so (the organizer of our annual trip is my BFF who is a very high end travel concierge), she makes the reservations well in advance, knows the wait staff well, knows what to order, so we always have a great and very long lunch with excellent service (I’ve never gone for dinner, as I think it’s a much better lunch spot). I think you just might have hit it on an “off” night.
If you are looking for an fantastic, non-Michelin meal in Bilbao, I highly recommend La Viña de Henao, not all that far from the Guggenheim. I rarely see it mentioned on tourist forums-- we were definitely the only tourists there the day we had lunch-- but for us, it was one of the best food/dining experiences we had on our Basque trip last fall. It’s a tiny place (reservations a must), run by a young couple-- she’s the chef. Excellent food, warm ambience, all around a total winner for us.
