Like Sands Through the Hour Glass, So Are the Meals of Our Lives

The next stop on our Spanish roadtrip was the highly anticipated San Sebastian. A quaint seaside town for the food obsessed, San Sebastian, whose population is a mere 120,000, holds 15 coveted Michelin stars. Compare that to somewhere like London, who holds 34 stars, but with about 40 times the population and a gazillion times the visitors. This adorable Spanish town holds more Michelin stars per square foot than anywhere else in the world. We were entering foodie paradise, and we were more than ready to throw down. Over the next four days we will gaze out over the picturesque seaside, take several culinary tours throughout San Sebastian's Parte Vieja, and dine at one of the top restaurants in the world (8th best, to be exact). 

I could go on and on about how amazingly beautiful and charming San Sebastian is. How the waves of the azure colored Bay of La Concha lazily lap the white sandy beaches that give way in all directions to a town dotted with glorious churches, incredible architecture, and a picturesque old port. I could, or I could share these pictures and get on with the good stuff.

Our time is San Sebastian can be broken into two meals. Actually, two events. The word "meal" just doesn't do justice to eating in San Sebastian. My homemade chicken soup is a meal - this deserves to be elevated far above that. This is the world's gastronomic capital we're talking about.

So, two events. One is taken in Michelin-star opulence, prepared by a rock-star chef who tours the dining room at the end of the night, shaking hands and signing menus. The other is taken in something resembling a dive bar, prepared by some old guys stuffed into the back of tiny kitchens. One is a 12-course degustation designed by Juan Mari Arzak, the owner and executive chef of one of the top 10 restaurants in the world. The other is a four-course booze-up created at our leisure while walking from bar to pub in San Sebastian's Parte Vieja. One costs a month's rent. The other costs a twelve pack of beer.

Arzak, the restaurant, is ridiculous and ridiculously good. As far as fine dining and molecular gastronomy go, Juan Mari Arzak has been a real game changer. Regarded as the founding father of Modern Basque cuisine, Arzak has held it’s 3 Michelin star status since 1989. The reigns at Arzak have since been handed over from Juan Mari to his more than capable daughter Elena, but they both continue to roam the dining room to check in on their patrons. Every single diner, every single night of service. I had stalked this father/daughter team since learning about them from various magazine articles and several different shows on the Travel Channel and Food Network, so when Elena visited our table at the beginning of our meal, and again at the end to check in on us, this food nerd was absolutely starstruck. Concerns over the freshman 15 I had gained thus far on our honeymoon were quieted, a momentous entry on my perpetual bucket list was crossed off, and I sat back ready to be stuffed and awed. Back to the ridiculousness...

The ridiculousness comes mostly with the price tag and that awkward, shameful moment when the bill arrives and you start to realize what else you could have spent that money on (a week's accommodation; supermarket bought lunches for the next couple of months; food for 500 starving children in Africa). There's ridiculousness on the plate as well: dry ice carrying the scent of Iberico ham; an oyster that turns out to be mushroom soup; balls of things that shouldn't physically be able to be made into balls; a plate of simple syrup that takes on the appearance of a red piece of coral; edible gold leaf draped across a fillet of fish that's probably worth more than the edible gold leaf.

The twelve courses are made up of five "'amusements", including a corn flavored veloute with black pudding and figs and some sort of tomato dish that was served enveloped in Iberico ham scented smoke. I told you. Ridiculous. Next up are three starters, served in two's for sharing. My favorite was the cromlech with onion, coffee, and tea. The Stonehenge-like parcels had a crispy, light like air tapioca and squid ink shell. The filling was some sort of foie gras and onion-flavored mousse. We struggled to understand our Spanish waitress’ explanation of how to eat the thing initially, but finally got the gist of it when she mimed flipping it over and eating it as you would an ice cream cone.

Cromlech with onion, coffee, and tea

'Low-tide' monkfish

The starters are followed by the fish course, a playful dish called 'low-tide' monkfish for me. It came served beached alongside green clams made of mussels, white crispy seashells made of sugar, blue curacao-jellied stars, and red tempura'ed seaweed. On top, and scattered around were little spheres of roasted red pepper-flavored ‘caviar’.

Soup and chocolate between vineyards

The last of the savory dishes included a lamb course for me and a beef dish for CC. They were both spectacular but we had food up to our eyeballs at this point, and those sneaking fears about the layer of padding I had added to my newlywed self had started to come back. And then they started the dessert course and I stopped caring again. Three desserts later, including the stand out 'Soup and Chocolate Between Vineyards', which was a play on a grapevine, where the grapes were perfect spheres of chocolate with the texture of an actual grape, and a scoop of basil ice cream (that acted as the 'stem'), all of it swimming in a soup of sweet and sour strawberry. And lastly, a tray of mini desserts shaped like tools from a workshop. Mango legos, dark chocolate bolts, fizzy cola washers, and hazelnut screws. Over-extended tummies aside, when a meal ends like that, what can you do but smile?

Next, and in stark contrast, is the other food event we experienced in San Sebastian. Every other meal during our stay was spent wandering from course to course in pub to pub in the Parte Vieja. Here, there are alleyways and crossroads overflowing with bars that are overflowing with pintxos. See it and weep, people:

The ritual is easy, the ritual is awesome. Truckloads of people hit the cobblestone streets at nightfall and spill out of doorways sipping wine and eating bar snacks. When they've enjoyed their first course, they move on and dive into more deliciousness further down the street. Enter, imbibe, ingest, depart, and repeat. We find what we feel is a good place to start. Diners and drinkers have spilled out onto the dimly lit street, laughing and yelling and sipping wine. There's only one thing to do: head down, arms tucked in, aim for the bar. Here you get to pick your poison, pile it onto a plate, and pay by the honor system when you're done. This system shouldn't work amongst all the chaos, but it does. And it does deliciously. Everything that is served is fresh, none of it processed. Course two is around the corner, the third course four doors down. More yelling, more crowds, more laughing, our hands dripping with olive oil, our bellies full of beer.  I insist we keep going despite the growing look of fear on Christian's face as he discovers his bride's extreme love of food and the lengths at which she'll go to experience it. I'll push myself as an athlete does, only I push to sickness. I am a true Olympian.

Arzak was amazing, we agree, a once-in-a-lifetime experience. There's food there we didn't know was food. Classic Basque dishes are paired with cutting-edge molecular gastronomy. There's a calm, comfortable environment and impeccable service from smiling wait staff. It's first class. But the traditional pintxos pub crawl? Being pushed around by locals indulging a passion for food, for friends, for life. Waiting for the barman to finish slicing up a huge leg of Iberico ham before raising a txakoli bottle high in the air and dribbling it into a glass. Salivating at the smells of frying meat. Helping ourselves to the huge plates of tapas strewn across the bar. Jostling. Laughing with my adorable new husband over the amount of food I can consume. Drinking. Eating. Eating. Eating. This is living. And I'll take it any day.

For more pic's of our time in San Sebastian, go on over to flickr.