This is going to be a long one – I was sick for a day and then internet has been really bad in Bilbao, so it’s been a few days since my last post…

 

With another day left in San Sebastian, we wanted to make the most of it. We visited the food market that August, our pintxo expert from the night before, told us about. He had mentioned that you can tell which vendors were the best by the crowds of grandmas standing in line for them. Apparently, while at work or busy with life otherwise, the locals send their grandmas to the market for them for fresh ingredients for that night’s dinner. August was right, we spotted them immediately!!

Unfortunately, I spent our last day under the weather and we actually had to cancel a major lunch reservation, but we went with the flow and spent more time walking around the city. It was pouring rain so we decided to go to the San Telmo Museum to learn more about Basque history and culture. And then we wanted to put our new knowledge of pintxos to good use, so we pintxo-hopped on our own for dinner. And I’m pretty proud of the way we walked right up to each bar and ordered like pros!

 

The next day we were back in the car and headed to Bilbao, with a lunch stop in the coastal town of Getaria. We parked at the port and walked up into the town for a delicious lunch of fresh grilled sea bass. Simple but great, and just what we needed after the richness of the Basque food we’d been eating.

In continuous rain, Tori was the ultimate pro in getting us to Bilbao. Just before you enter the city you go through a long tunnel and all of a sudden you come out the other side and the Guggenheim is staring you in the face. It’s pretty incredible!

 

Our hotel is literally across the street from the museum so each time we come or go we get a new glimpse from this angle or that…we have re-embraced our high-school-photography-class history together and taken every photo op that we possibly can!!

 

We visited the museum, or El Goog as some refer to it, and learned a lot about the actual structure as well as the collection.

Now let’s talk about the food…

Our first dinner in Bilbao was at Zortziko – modern Basque food in a funky, yet formal, lavendar and peach 1920s-style dining room. Their tagline says “El placer de descubrir,” meaning the pleasure of discovery…so as you can imagine we had some interesting takes on the traditional. We arrived to find a line of chestnuts laid out on the table and I knew immediately that I would like this place.

We were first brought a little amuse bouche of potato and bacon cream, which we devoured as if it were gelato. Next I had “wild mushrooms served in its habitat” – the grilled mixed wild mushrooms from the night before were so good that I had to go for mushrooms again. The habitat consisted of some crumbled biscuits mixed with truffles (the dirt/earth), an egg (it’s Spain, so of course an egg) and some mushroom jus…it was fantastic! Next up were scallops with liquified potato and truffle. I don’t have a picture to share but it was almost like having mac and cheese with my scallops :). And for dessert, Tori was getting the molten chocolate cake, so I went the opposite direction and decided to try The Forest – mushroom ice cream, truffle sand, chestnuts and red fruits. The ice cream was kind of blueish and I felt like I was eating something out of a fairy tale, but it was really subtle and really good. Lastly they brought some extra little treats for us while we digested.

 

Lunches have been more casual – mostly pintxo hopping. We went to Plaza Nueva to test out a few different places there, and had some really different pintxos from anything we tried in San Sebastian.

We had a really good sweet pork dish, some Basque cheese grilled and served with an apple marmalade, as well as a pintxo of hummus with a slice of smoked cod on top…surprisingly light and delicious compared to everything else we’ve tried. And most importantly, we had some sidra (cider) to wash it all down.

          For our 2nd dinner in Bilbao, we headed to Serantes 3, a prestigious seafood restaurant with 3 locations in the city. We had a really lovely waiter who was pushing the empty glass bottles from our water on us to take home…and we still aren’t sure why?!?! He even brought us a plastic bag to put them in so we could carry them home. Very strange, but clearly well intentioned. Anyway, for dinner we started with pulpo (octopus), Galician style – with paprika and potatoes. And then we split clams in a garlic salsa verde, and a sirloin steak. It was all really classic and simple food. We ended the night with some chocolate cake and a local digestif.

Our last dinner in Basque country together, and since it was a national holiday (Feast of the Immaculate Conception) many restaurants were closed so we went upstairs to the terrace restaurant at our hotel, famous Spanish chef, Martin Berasategui’s restaurant, Doma. We ordered the tasting menu and had a really good, very quiet (only 2 tables were full), very brightly-lit meal. The Rioja was one of the best we’ve had while we were in this region, and the food was solid.

First up were 2 small appetizers – a marinated salmon with cucumber sorbet and pistachio milk, followed by Pumpkin and Orange cream. I don’t eat salmon normally, but I decided I couldn’t pass this bite up…and I’m glad I didn’t.

Next we had an assortment of winter vegetables (with a little bit of Jamon Iberico of course).

And then a squid dish that mimicked pasta – Squid false risotto, sea tagliatelli and dried pepper powder. Small pieces of squid made up the “risotto” and thing shavings of squid took the place of the tagliatelli noodle. One of the best on the menu!

Steamed Hake fish with broccoli cous cous and tomato air, and Venison with figs and chestnuts were the 2 entree dishes. The fish was fresh and tasted great, but the venison was by far one of my favorites of the night (clearly it was so good that I couldn’t be bothered to take a picture before eating).

Dessert was a Foie Gras nougat terrine with a red-wine granita, black sesame and apple. Really light and refreshing, actually!

For an after-dinner drink Tori had one last humongous Gin & Tonic before leaving Europe, where they take their G&Ts very seriously (so seriously that they have kits that they sell for different flavorings, etc.)

All in all it was a really good last meal. Tori and I have the first half of the day together tomorrow and then she heads home, as I begin the last leg of my trip…I’m crossing the border into France and will spend a couple nights in the coastal town of Biarritz, and then a couple nights in Bordeaux, before finishing up the trip in Paris.

Tori, thanks for coming to visit…it was a blast, filled with lots of Michael Jackson tunes (and Taylor Swift of course)!

Quick shout out: welcome to new readers Norah Scarlett and Harley Faye 🙂