Speak to anybody that’s been to San Sebastián and it’s likely that before they get to the pristine beaches, the bustling Old Town or the backdrop of luscious green mountains, they’ll tell you at length about the food they ate. And I’m going to honour that tradition here by documenting some of the best places we’ve eaten and drank in our two trips to the Basque city. After all, Kate and I chose to the visit the northern Spanish coast for our honeymoon, largely based on its gastronomic reputation, while its other aforementioned charms led us to fall in love with the place and return just one year later for our anniversary.
Pintxo bars
Despite boasting the highest concentration of Michelin stars in Europe, the heart and soul of San Sebastián’s food culture lies in its pintxo bars.
For the unfamiliar, pintxos are the equivalent of tapas in the Basque region. They’re small plates, served hot or cold, designed to be snacked upon over a period of time. Like tapas, you’d need to pick a few plates over the course of an evening to make up a full meal, or you can enjoy one or two as a bar snack.
However, there are some key differences to the Basque Country’s pintxo bars when compared to the tapas experience you’ll find elsewhere in Spain:
- Generally, pintxo bars employ bar service as opposed to waited tables – and often the most popular will be rammed with customers, eating on every available surface, stood up, even spilling out on to the streets holding plates and forks.
- Cold pintxos are typically served from the bar and often take the form of delicious morsels on pieces of bread, impaled on a cocktail stick.
- Those in the know will want to sample the hot pintxos. These are generally cooked to order on request, emerging from the kitchen when ready.
- Rather than sitting and lingering over dishes in one place, its recommended that you go bar to bar sampling just one or two of their specialities, washed down with a very small measure of house lager, wine (txakoli, the locally grown white, or perhaps a red from the Rioja region), or Basque cider, before swiftly moving on to the next.
Finally, the key thing to know about pintxos, along with all food in San Sebastián, is that the bar owners take immense pride in them, whether they’re presented in the style of high-end restaurants or much more rustically. They’re a way of showcasing the very best produce the region has to offer, from succulent hake and tuna, to world-renowned steak and pork, to seasonal vegetables and rich olive oil.
The best pintxo bars in Old Town San Sebastián (that we visited)
La Cuchara de San Telmo
San Telmo is one of the most famous bars in the city, which may largely be due to its appearance on two of Anthony Bourdain’s foodie travel docs. But the late chef knew good food when he tasted it and decades on from his first visit, people still head there in their droves. This can make for one of the Old Town’s most hectic experiences. Table service was enforced on our first visit, whereas post-pandemic it was much more of a test of wills to wait for elbow room in the narrow bar space. However, our patience got its just rewards. Once inside, you can expect glorious pieces of hake and tuna, suckling pig with crispy crackling and apple sauce, as well as super-soft beef cheeks.
Mendaur
Eating at Mendaur is an experience unlike any other. First off, it looks a bit like a sports bar, with bright lighting and a TV screen in the corner of the room. Secondly, the bar owner seems to revel in his distinct brand of knowing surliness, which can be disarming at first, but proves amusing once you tune into his sense of humour and catch his wry smiles. Finally, there’s the dishes they serve, which are some of the most beautifully presented and innovative in all of San Sebastián’s Old Town. Across our two visits, our favourite dishes included the squid, accompanied by three sauces artfully swished across a glass plate, and the crispy taco loaded with tasty shredded pork. We loved Mendaur so much on our honeymoon visit, it was the first place we booked for our anniversary evening.
SSUA
A newer bar for the Old Town, this place opened not long before we first visited. The dishes here vary in size from small pintxos to larger sharing plates, but one constant across the menu is the quality of the ingredients and distinctive flavour combinations. Our favourite dishes here were the hake pil-pil, tuna with caramelised onions, and pork steak with apricot and potato puree. The inexpensive house red here was particularly delicious too. Both times we’ve visited it’s been less busy than some other bars, possibly as it’s still building a reputation, but for now that provides welcome relief from some of the more hectic dining experiences in the Old Town.
Txakolina
Txakolina has a bit of a homely vibe. There’s a big range of pintxos on the counter that are heated to order, but also a small selection of house specialities that are cooked fresh to order. Kate’s favourite wine of our 2022 trip was to be found here, a rich rioja reserva, aged for a minimum of 3 years. They also do one of the best tuna pintxos we’ve sampled.
148 Gastroleku
Positioned on the corner of the Constitución Plaza, we first came here on a private pintxo tour we booked as part of our honeymoon. It was one of the standout bars of the evening and much to our delight, we bumped into our tour guide Clara when we revisited the place one year on! Our favourite dish at 148 was the duck breast with apple chips and teriyaki glaze, cooked perfectly pink.
Casa Urola
I’ll admit, we only stopped here very quickly for one pintxo. But what a pintxo – the lobster spoon! Essentially the poshest mouthful of seafood cocktail you’re ever likely to eat, it consists of a ceramic spoon piled high with dressed lobster, a garlicky mayo, tomato, lettuce and trout roe.
Haizea
This is a super-local spot that is known for its rustic fish dishes. These include their signature ‘cod brick’, a sort of fish pie wrapped in filo pastry and tied up with a leek bow, and what we heard described as ‘the best scallop in the city’, served on a skewer with two king prawns.
More food and drink experiences in San Sebastián
As much as it’s tempting to make for the Old Town every night you spend in San Sebastián, there are some other great places to visit across the city for a bite to eat, a glass of wine, or a world-beating beer. Many of these are to be found in Gros, a part of town that attracts a young crowd of surfers and students looking for an alternative to traditional Basque cuisine without hint of a dip in quality.
Basqueland Izakaia
Basqueland brewery’s outpost in the city centre is the bar we spent the most time in across our two trips. Basqueland’s beer ranks up there with some of the very best I’ve ever tasted by any brewery in the world. From their signature pale Zumo, to fruity sours, crisp lagers and outlandish imperial pastry stouts, these guys do the lot and they do it well. There’s always a buzzy atmosphere about the place too, with a mix of tourists, beer enthusiasts and locals gathered every evening until late. It helps that the staff are among the most friendly I’ve met in any bar in Europe, recognising us across our trip and chatting about beer, life in the city and the places they hail from. All in all, it feels like a home from home.
Bar Desy
Bar Desy continues the theme of great service by passionate people. A tiny traditional Basque bar that has developed a craft beer focus, the first time we visited, we were surprised to find the fridge was filled with cans from Manchester breweries. This sparked my first of multiple conversations with the bar’s owner Gorka. He told me all about his love of UK beers and discussed how they compare to the Basque country’s own offerings. He’s also passionate about the food they serve, which is simple, rustic Spanish fayre and super-satisfying. Think tasty boquerones piled on bread, rich tortilla and a baked vanilla cheesecake which (whisper it) I found to be better than the original creation of La Vina in the Old Town.
Urgulleko Polboriña
Best visited at sunset, this place is located 2/3 of the way up Monte Urgull, one of the three peaks that can be viewed from La Concha beach, which towers over the Old Town. The atmosphere here is fantastic in the early evening, with couples, groups of friends and their dogs all taking in the view over the bay.
Chiringuito de la Isla Santa Clara
Ok, so this one is here for one reason only, but which makes it potentially my favourite bar of all. If I was to recommend one experience in San Sebastián, it would be to rent a kayak for couple of hours from Ondaretta beach, paddling out to Santa Clara Island, and then ordering an ice cold Estrella to sit on the wall with. Salty from swimming the last stretch as you moor up and taking in the view across the shimmering bay, the feeling just cannot be beaten.
Casa Julian (Tolosa)
I know this piece is ostensibly a guide to the city of San Sebastián, but if you’ve got more than a few days in town, then I cannot recommend a trip to Tolosa enough. The small town, half an hour out of the city by light rail, is home to Casa Julian, which some (including Forbes Magazine) have called one of the best steak restaurants in the world, a temple dedicated to the txuleton. This is a Basque speciality, a huge slab of rib beef from old dairy cows, cooked to perfection in an idiosyncratic way upon a unique sloped grill.
Casa Julian is a modest place, a far cry from the sort of high-end steakhouses you tend to find in other European cities. It serves just one main – the steak served with roasted red peppers. When it appears on our table, it is truly majestic thing to behold – a colossal piece of charred meat, left with the bone running along one edge and sliced to offer a glimpse at the ruby red meat within. And there isn’t the faintest disappointment in the eating: the texture buttery smooth, and the fullest flavour. It was truly unlike any steak I’ve had in its combination of taste and tenderness.
If, like Kate and I, your holidays are driven largely by the culinary delights on offer, then there’s perhaps no better destination in Europe for a week away than San Sebastián. Particularly if you’re also keen on hiking along luscious coastline, swimming or kayaking in the blue sea or lounging on the beach with a radler. Essentially, it’s heaven in a city break for foodies.
SOUNDS TASTY 