Hi, everyone. Welcome to Pot Luck Food Talks. Eric,
before we start, please, you have to tell me,
where did you get this hat? My hat? It looks
amazing. That is a very natural question. Yes.
I've been wondering this entire time. The entire
time Alexander's been setting up the mics, I've
been looking at you in wonder. asking myself,
where can I get a hat like that? Well, I got
it on my recent trip to Japan. And so the second
day I arrived at Japan, we went to Shimokitazawa.
Have you been there? No. So it is like neighborhood,
like a super nice neighborhood you should go.
And there are a lot of like vintage stores. Also,
the neighborhood is pretty nice in itself. So
we went there for a walk and to visit my friend
Barry, who lives there. He cooked lunch for us,
like an amazing, I would define very like a semi
-professional home cook. You know, he has like
a sous vide device. He has like this super pro
Japanese cast iron pot rice cooker. Oh, nice.
It was like a tuna wrapped in kombu and sake,
you know, like super nice. If it was lunch, I
would define it as a Japanese breakfast with
boiled rice and poached eggs. and the sashimi
and all this sort of stuff. Anyways, after lunch,
we went walking around in the neighborhood, and
he brought us to this vintage store where I saw
this cap. And I saw it, and it was like, oh,
this looks pretty cool, you know? So I scanned
the letter, the kanji that has, and Google Translate
translated as soup. So it said soup, and I was
like, man, soup. It's amazing, yeah. For good
or bad, when I'm traveling, I avoid consumerism
like overly, you know, especially in Japan. I
mean, I had to buy an extra luggage, which is
what a lot of people have to do when they go
to Japan for the first time. In my case, it's
because I broke the small one. So I had to buy
a new one. So I bought like a huge one. And even
though I had overweight, you know, because it's
so, I mean, buying, for example, ceramics in
Kyoto, that shit is like crack cocaine, man.
You never have enough of it. Tokyo was my departure
point and I would also leave Japan from Tokyo.
So I traveled around and went back to Tokyo when
I was for the second time in Tokyo. So I had
just like two days left. I was like, the cap,
the soup cap. I have to go back to that vintage
store. So I went back there. I was determined
to buy it, you know, because... it was not cheap
also not expensive like 40 euros you know like
and i was like okay let's let's get it it doesn't
matter so i go back i scan it again with google
translate and it says hot water and i'm like
no i'm not saying ah this is not as cool as soup
but i love it anyway you know Because, you know,
kanjis are not letters as we understand them.
They're not like pieces of sounds that you build
together. They're like concepts, right? So hot
water and soup is kind of like... Same concept,
yeah. Exactly. So I was like, okay, let's take
it. So I go to the counter and the two ladies
there, they were like, you know, like Japanese
laughs. And I was like, okay, well, what does
it say? And they said, ah! I don't know. So I
take my Google Translate so I could record them
and translate. And I look at it and it said,
public bath. And I was like, ah, you know, same
concept, hot water, you know. It was this, I'll
take it. Referring to a public bath as a soup
is really cursed. It's a really cursed idea.
Yeah, and that's the story of it. Then I saw
that there are some YouTube channels where they
show people that have ridiculous stuff written
in kanjis. And they don't know tattoos or t -shirts
or stuff like that. Yeah, that's all about it.
That's nice. I'd rock a hat saying I owe one
of those. Soup or public bath. I'd be fine with
that, honestly. So here we are. What's happening?
Well, I wanted to prove you that... um everything
you eat in san sebastian is at least good yeah
i mean i think that's wrong like okay like it's
not it depends how you define good right i'm
sure there's places where it's easier to eat
something that's really inedible but there are
like a fair few places that i've been to to get
like a and it's like like it's edible but it's
not great you know like it's really not great
no no i didn't say great i said at least good
you know yeah please okay meaning good that's
not bad you know like or a little bit more than
not bad you know i mean i suppose for example
barcelona i've always said that barcelona can
be the city where you have like the best restaurants
maybe in the world or in spain madrid san sebastian
barcelona But the difference is that in Barcelona,
you also find the worst places in the world.
You know, like, you can get, like, crappy tourist
traps with unedible junk for a lot of money and
easy, like, super easy. Walk into a random place
in El Raval, sorry, not El Raval, in Las Ramblas,
and you'll find that, you know? Walk to a random
place in San Sebastian, in City Center, Old Town,
or Gross, and you'll have at least good... Or
it could be super good, excellent, and mind -blowing.
So you could find that, you know? Okay, fair
enough. Alexander was telling me yesterday about
this thing that I think you guys spoke about,
that apparently Basque people think that this
whole hype about Basque food is like a sort of
political thing that's not actually that good.
I mean, of course, that's not like a general
view. But I've known people, I've talked to people,
like friends that are... In some cases, not even
from San Sebastian, from villages around. And
because they know that I work at Basque Culinary
Center and I have this whole background with
food and everything, they asked me, like, this
whole thing about San Sebastian being a food
capital, is that true? Like, is Arzak really
someone worldwide? And I'm like, yes, he is.
Yeah, he's like a legend, like a living legend,
you know? It's not like some hype that was built
around him for locals. That's what they're asking
me, you know? And I say, oh, yeah, yeah. Like,
I went to Chefsaff in Düsseldorf, this chef conference
in Düsseldorf in Germany. Elena was speaking,
and they showed a picture of the old man, of
von Maria Sack. And there was like a two -minute
standing ovation, you know, for just showing
a picture of the man in Germany. So that really
proves that he is a legend. But going back to
this topic, for example, there's this new building
from Basque Culinary Center that is being built,
and there's a lot of opposition from the neighbors.
But that's also something very common if you
go back in the history of this city. Grumpiness
and opposition. Yeah. For example, I don't know
if you know, but the whole beach of Gross, Suriola
Beach, that's an artificial beach. Like if you
see pictures from the mid -90s, there was like
a wall in the middle of the beach and there was
no beach as we understand it today. There was
no Cursal. There was no... Many of these things
were built just in the late 90s. And now you
have that beautiful beach where everybody was
around and everybody enjoys it. There was a lot
of opposition to that building. A lot of people
didn't want it to be built, thought it was a
mistake and so on. So with this new building,
they're saying like, oh, this is like, how much
to gastronomy? We've had enough of it. Where
are our dogs going to pee now? You know, like,
I'm serious. That's crazy. Or so they had to
cut like two trees to make the building. And
it was like, what's going to happen with our
biodiversity? Of course. There's so little biodiversity
in the Basque Country. And I mean, of course,
I respect everybody, especially people, especially
locals that grew up here and they have their
own vision. I know very few people outside of
Basque Culinary Center that are enthusiastic
about it now that it's still a project. In any
case, what I want to prove is that there's this
whole thing about it has been enough with this
food thing, you know, like I've seen. At the
same time, people are not seeing the value of
it because they take it for granted. Good food
is taken for granted around here because of that
reason. Because it's good, because you've always
known. If you grow up here, you've known good
food as a standard. So something a little less
than good is crap. It's unedible crap. So the
standards are very high here around food. Yet
at the same time, I think there's a generational
shift problem. Young Basque, it's not as it was
in the 90s or the 2000s where there was a large
amount of young people becoming hospitality and
astronomy professionals. Now that's not the case
anymore. So what happens? That slot has been
taken by foreigners, mostly Latin Americans.
So you get to see here most or a lot. of traditional
Basque restaurants are run by Latin Americans
who preserve the tradition, of course. They're
cooking in the traditional style. But yeah, it's
a quite common thing. But also, interestingly
enough, in many places, well, not in many places,
you will see a lot of traffic of Japanese travelers.
And that's brilliant. They even have their own
city guide in Japanese. And they walk into places
with their guide, for example, to Casa Urola
with the scallop, just showing the picture of
the scallop. I bet they love that at Casa Urola,
yeah. Yeah, because I didn't know this. There
is like a... It's not the official name, but
people call it the Food Disneyland. It's a theme
park in Japan where they have replicas of restaurants
from all over the world, and they have a replica
of Casa Urola. No way. Yeah, so they're coming
to the original place. Crazy. That's so Japanese,
you know? Yeah, that's super Japanese. But I
think what's interesting is obviously the Basque
Country is a very rich region in Spain. It's
very rich in resources, etc. Apart from the fact
that it's a shame that people don't see the value
in food because it's a huge tourism draw. It
brings a lot of money to the country also. People
can hate on tourists as much as they want, but
it brings a lot of capital and keeps the standard
of life up. But what's interesting is now being
here in the Basque Country and wanting to look
at real high -level Basque cooking and what that
means. It's sort of like what makes the cuisine
so interesting to people and so fascinating.
Because I know when I first came to the Basque
Country, I didn't really know what to expect.
I came here for Mugaritz, to work specifically
at Mugaritz. And being here in the Basque Country
for that year... really changed my trajectory
as a chef i was like heading one way and then
i came here and i went to asadores and sidrerias
and stuff like that and it really changed where
i was heading for me like two things that made
me fell in love with the city back then when
i also went to mucaris i was 19 years old And
it was both cider houses and pincho bars. You
know, like this pincho bar crawling. I was like,
this is fucking Disneyland. You know, this is
food Disneyland. And a cider house is also such
an amazing experience. It's a magical thing.
I mean, you have like way more knowledge about
the Basque country. Now you've lived here a couple
of times and you've come for visits and everything.
So what is for you Basque cooking about? Like
what are the key features of it? For me, it's
like super, super focused on the produce, on
the product with like minimal kind of like intervention.
It's like very puristic and often with the element
is very seasonal and often with the element of
charcoal and fire. grill like very subtly and
it has this like very it gives it this like almost
primal sort of like mystical feel to it like
take like so this example you have like guisantes
lagrima they're like teardrop peas it's a super
seasonal super high quality product cooked over
charcoal gives it like this like little they're
now in season by the way yeah we're going to
get those probably on sunday i i hope so man
they're fucking insane like it's um absolutely
incredible because the best countries like we
were talking about yesterday it's like a it's
like garden of eden almost it's like fucking
paradise like the stuff they have here the mixture
of like sea and land is unparalleled and then
this approach of kind of like very minimal cooking
preserving the essence the natural essence you
know it's it's the it's like the holy trinity
of cooking The story of how it developed, as
I understand it, I need to research more and
learn more, but things that I know. If I go back
the earliest I can, I once met a guy. He told
me, oh, my grandfather was a food critic. And
I said, ah, from the new Basque cuisine generation.
And he was like, no, earlier. And I was like,
oh, really? So this guy sent me pictures of one
of the food guides that his grandfather wrote.
And this was so interesting because there were
like, you know, like a food guide where you can
eat this there and that over there from the 60s,
you know. And there were things like, there's
a very good mushroom soup at the drugstore in
Old Town. So there was already a culture of going
around from one place to another and knowing
that there is someone who does something really
good over there. So there was already like a
very, very strong food culture. We already talked
about Nouvelle Cuisine in the Nouvelle Cuisine
episode. Back then, also, you had this culture
in bars, but if you went to a white tablecloth
restaurant, like a proper high -end fine dining
restaurant, it was 100 % French. All of the restaurants
were French here, with French fancy names and
these kind of things. So what happened after...
Franco died in the mid -70s. There was this renaissance
of it was okay to feel Basque again. It was okay
to feel Catalan again. This was a period known
in the arts as the destape, which means taking
the lid out. So in the cinema, Almodovar, all
of these kind of things happened. There was like
this zeitgeist, you know? And in that context,
a group of 14 chefs, even though that Anthony
Bourdain in his episode, he calls them the 12
original apostles. There were 14, not 12, but
it's cooler to call them the 12 apostles. We'll
forgive them. And they wrote a manifesto. A manifesto
that inspired the new Nordic manifesto and many
other things. But this was way too early. This
was like mid -70s and they were determining to...
Basically, the manifestos said, let's not be
French. Let's be Basque and celebrate. Or like
that mushroom soup from the drugstore, let's
transform it into something that we can put into
an amazing high -end restaurant and the proper
setting for it. You know, which was the main
difference between the history that happened
here and what happened in Copenhagen. In Copenhagen,
they had sausages and potatoes. That's what they
had. So they couldn't, it was very difficult
to elevate that. So they just opened the canvas
to a wine canvas and just explore. out of scratch
and create like a new cuisine out of scratch.
In this case, it was creating a new cuisine out
of grandmothers and tradition, right? And that's
amazing because many of these high -end restaurants,
they develop dishes that became standards that
now you see also in pincho bars that people cook
at home and the wheel goes on and on and on.
Like people here, they cook Basque cooking at
home. They go to Basque restaurants for restaurants
and they also have this. gastronomic societies,
these supper clubs where they go there and cook
Basque food, you know? Which is incredible. Yeah.
It's very, very different from, let's say, for
example, America, the United States, for example.
They're becoming a chef means pretty much understanding
external traditions. Like, let's learn how the
French or the Italians or the Spanish or the
Japanese cook. Yeah. While here, people are pretty
much... of course they know they learn about
everything but it's pretty much alive this statement
of think global act local yeah for sure like
it makes absolute sense right you have this it's
really really cool one it's it's such a brave
sort of like movement also you know of kind of
like reconquering and reabsorbing your own culture
that was like for such a long time Forbidden
and pushed away from you, you know, and I mean
if you look at it If you look at that and you
look at it now, you know where past has been
taught in school, you know and stuff like that
It's it's crazy. What a huge push over like what
two three generations they've done, you know,
and how what an effect that had Okay, nice that
you bring that up But it because I'm sure a lot
of our people in the audience don't even know
about what the bus country is You know like so
like first of all Basque language is the oldest
spoken language in Europe. It predates Latin,
you know, like... Which is insane. That means
that, like, logically it has no Latin roots,
but no trackable roots from any other language,
no Indo -European, Germanic, whatever, you name
it, it's not that. So there is no conclusive
theory about where it originated. But it's believed
to have originated somewhere between 5 ,000 and
15 ,000 years ago. So that means Basque people
predate Romans. They have been here for a while.
And that's also probably the reason. So it's
a culture of, I would say, shepherds and sailors,
right? And so that's like the melting pot that
created... the cuisine that exists here. No,
but the interesting thing is, and you can really
see the aftermath. There is also a French part.
So as I said, Basque predate the Romans. So they've
been here in the region and then something called
Spain was created and something called France
was created and the Basque country stayed in
the middle. So that means that there is like
a part of the Basque country, what is known as
Euskal Herria, which is a Basque territory. that
is part of France and if you go there they speak
Basque with French accent and there are very
clear similarities in the architecture and the
type fonts and a lot of things but the food is
very different and I'm pretty sure that the food
became very different after or more different
than it already was after the new Basque cuisine
where they said like Let's use olive oil instead
of butter. Instead of looking how to do a blah,
blah, blah, let's look in other regions of Spain
how to, I don't know, incorporate like a gazpacho
or even like the tomato salad. That is something
that has become a standard in summer. It's like
one of the iconic things that you will find in
San Sebastian. That's something relatively modern.
You know, like it's something that like in the
80s, you would only find tomato cooked into sauces
in the dishes around here. Now, this is something
that was incorporated probably from the south
of Spain or from Spaniards that came here and
opened their restaurants. There's an article
about this, Talk to the Walla at Barnestor, where
he says raw tomatoes, that was something from
the Spaniards. Because that's also something
people here, they don't feel Spanish. They feel
Basque. Yeah. It is a big difference. I mean,
you know, like from people to the outside, it's
easy to kind of like put it all in one thing.
But if you're in Spain, there's a very noticeable
difference between Basque people and Spanish
people. You know, not just in the attitude, but
just in the entire culture, in the physical appearance,
like in everything. It's just a different type
of people. Yeah, absolutely. We're going to go
to a lot of reference places that showcase this
exact cooking. in different styles. We're going
to go to some traditional places that are at
the very, very top of the culinary level here
and to a couple of places that are sort of like
a modern interpretation of that cooking. So it
should be really interesting. Yeah, but I think
it's transversal to all of them, the features
that you mentioned. They're very produce -driven.
There's grill, I think, in all of them. Yeah,
we're going to especially learn about... how
the fish breeding culture developed around here,
because I think you get the best grilled fish
in the world, in the Basque country. And the
way it's done is something that developed, well,
let's ask tomorrow to Mikel. As far as I know,
there are two schools. One is the school of Orio,
which is where we're going. And the other is
a school of Getaria, which is an ex -village.
And the main difference is that in Orio, they
would throw the fish. directly to the grill.
And in Orio, they would put it in the las bazugueras,
in these cages where you put the fish inside
so you can flip it. Oh, I see. Okay. Okay. And
I actually talked to Aitor Arregui from Elcano,
and he told me he did a research to try to discover
when these cages originated, and there was no
conclusion. They couldn't find any reference.
They don't know who or where it started. Yeah,
because I mean, those cages also, they're so
iconic nowadays, you know, like so many elements
of the best cooking have become worldwide culture.
The grilling cages, you know, they're used everywhere
now, even in, you know, Japan. Yesterday, I saw
a video of one of my old head chefs who's opened
a restaurant in L .A. And he was like showing
the grill cages like in his restaurant in L .A.,
you know, to like the cheesecake, the best cheesecake,
you know, that's now a worldwide sensation. It's
so cool how this like it is something about this
cuisine that's just it's like it's almost like
it's like the perfect type of cooking. And then
elements just become extremely popular and get
adapted worldwide. You go to Barcelona and you
will see grilled fish a la Donostiara. Donostia
style. Donostia is the Basque word for San Sebastian.
So right now we're going to Casa Cámara, which
is this place where they have a huge lobster
cage in the middle of the dining room where they
literally get lobsters directly fresh from the
sea to your table. Like a medieval torture device.
Exactly. This restaurant is over 140 years old.
That's crazy. 1884. There's pictures of that
lobster cage from ages ago. Yeah, because it
used to be a place where people would go to buy
lobster before it became a restaurant. Yeah,
it would make sense. Make the restaurant around
the cage where you get the lobster. Then we went
to Muca, which is like a modern Basque grill
place from Juan Vargas, who you work with at
Mugares. At some point he was head chef at Mugares.
When I went for dinner in 2016, he was. Yeah,
he was there for a long time. He was like a remnant
of what I thought was like the strongest team
in Mugarets. He's very Spanish in his approach
with a very deep appreciation for the Basque.
And he's like super minimalist, produce -focused.
It's super interesting. Very interesting. Very
authentically niche. I've been to Muga before
this. The interesting thing about it is that...
They embrace the Basque grill culture, but they're
very, very, very vegetable -driven, which is
very interesting for a grill place. You know,
he worked at Michel Bras. At Juan Vargas? For
a short time. Ah, okay. Well, and Mugare is also
very vegetable -driven. Yes. Or at least it used
to be. Now it became more this techno -emotional
kind of approach. That's today. Tomorrow, we're
going to... Bodegón Xochimari, which is a place
where Basque chefs go when they want to eat grilled
fish. It's a place to go. It's also a historical
place. They developed many of the ways, the grill
styles. That's for lunch. For dinner, we're going
to go to Asador Bedua, which is like three villages
further to the west. Again, very traditional
and very vegetable -driven for a grill place.
Asadoras, you know, means a grill house. That
will be Saturday. Sunday, we're going to visit
Jade Gross in La Rioja. Nice. Again, another
ex -head chef at Mugaritz. She started producing
her own wines. in La Rioja, and I'm pretty excited
about that. I don't know where we're going for
lunch. I know she booked something. And for dinner,
we come back to San Sebastian and we go to Narro.
Again, modern Basque, ex -Mugaritz chefs, lots
of respect for grilling, vegetable -driven. I
don't know where we're going to have the guisantes,
the lagrimas, the baby peas. I think that could
be a good place for it. Probably. Maybe Asador
Bedua could be a good place for it as well. Maybe
Mucha as well. Maybe all of them. Maybe all of
them, yeah. No, let's avoid repeating. Let's
try to do it as diverse as possible. 100%, yeah.
Because there's things to be had in each place.
I mean, you can have steak in all of the places
I mentioned. You can if you want to. We should
have a steak at least once. Yeah. At least once.
At least once. Agree. Yeah. That's it for this
week's episode of Potluck Food Talks. If you
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