In my previous post, I started to chronicle some of my food adventures in San Sebastian, Spain - the star gastronomic city of the proud Basque country; a bit low on the radar for anything else other than food, this is certainly a to-visit destination for foodies coming to Europe.

There are numerous ways of experiencing Basque cuisine: in restaurants serving up classic Basque food (often with special week-end offers), in other food venues like sagardotegi (Basque cider houses) from which one can enjoy both a nice txuleta (steak) and natural cider or, if price is not an issue, by going to modern gastronomic venues by this and that chef.

Easily the most popular and the most affordable way of enjoying delectable Basque treats, however, is by going for pintxos, the elevated Basque form of the popular tapas culture that evolved from southern Spain. Indeed, it is with pintxos that the Basques have dominated Spanish cuisine and which has earned their fame across the rest of Spain for stylized presentations (not necessarily with "sticks" or pintxos, in Spanish) that elevate their food.

Being that it was my second time in the city, there was no way I was gonna let the opportunity to go for some nice pintxos pass (indeed, I ended up sampling quite a bit). Indeed, I got to be more selective with my choice of places now by surveying the favorites (scouting online reviews, in advance, as well). And need I say that it was a tasty and colorful journey.

Considered the gastronomic capital of Spain and located at the Atlantic coast of the proud Basque country (Euskal Herria), San Sebastian is a city that is proud of its cuisine. Taking inspiration from both French and Spanish sides of the Basque, the local environs and, most importantly, the season, Basque food is famous for highlighting the best ingredients from the area and of the season and manipulating it into real masterpieces, often impressive to look at and even better to taste.

Being that it was my second time to visit the city (having been there for a few days a couple of years ago), I had an idea about what I was plunging into - an amazing pintxos culture in La Parte Vieja (Old Town), a wide selection of seafood (some of which are not found easily in the Mediterranean) and the Spanish penchant for wine and enjoyment but little did I know that I would be in for much more. Having refined my choices on where to go (both from experience and from the internet), I was in for a weeks' worth of treats!

In this post, I'll chronicle mostly my adventures with Basque cuisine, in the more general sense, and particularly with my encounters of Basque dishes in restaurants - I'll reserve my review and selection of pintxos (an even more elaborate aspect of Basque cuisine) on another post. 

This filler is gonna be really short. :)

Last night, I went out with some colleagues from this workshop I'm attending in San Sebastian to sample the nightlife of the city (which like most university cities also boasts of Erasmus parties). In one of the places we went to, I came across this nice drink - Satanas (Satan, in Spanish) which was really devilishly good. We took the shot without asking what it was first and found it surprisingly nice and I got a second shot because one of the guys didn't want his. 

This the first of many filler articles to come. Filler articles are short posts that I could quickly scribble and compose to keep a steady stream of information sharing when I'm busy writing blog posts as well as other things. As my hands are full in writing blog posts now (there are at least 3 under work), I decided to give the filler thing a go.

First, a short update on what I've been up to -- currently recovering from the short 2-day trip to Budapest that I did last weekend (more on that on a coming blog post) while also prepping for another trip for this coming weekend, an official one, this time to Spain... in the Basque country (up in the northern Atlantic coast, near the French border). Since I'm somewhat excited to do this trip (even if I've been there before, a couple of years ago), I'm writing a filler to share something which I'm looking forward to -- food-related, of course!

The Basque country (in particular, San Sebastian, one of its two main cities) is an important gastronomic center not just in Spain but also in Europe (boasting of being the city with the most Michelin-starred restaurants per capita in Europe) - a fact that manifests in their participation in developments on modern cooking (nueva cocina or cuisine nouvelle) that can be sampled in their fine-dining posh restaurantes as well as in more accessible food options such as pintxos - the Basque equivalent of the Spanish tapas.