A restaurant that has been listed in the top 10 of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants for the last dozen years and holds 2 Michelin stars needs little preamble.
Each year, Chef Andoni Luis Aduriz, affectionately and respectfully known simply as Andoni, and his team create use both ancient and modern techniques to create an entirely new menu of over 20 courses.
Creative, skilled and occasionally playful cooking fuses the finest of the Basque region’s sea and mountain produce with ingredients from across Spain and the globe. This season’s menu witnessed the presence of Japanese sake, kombucha, Finnish viili and an ancient fermented fish sauce known as garum.
Milk crystals & native herbs
Valencian lemon pith & tart cream
Spring mushroom with garlic oil & pink garlic flower
“Drunk noisette of asparagus”
John Dory & nettles
Frozen hake with aioli
(This is supposedly to be eaten like sacramental bread)
“Kiss of a yolk”
(Txganguro - spider crab - with creme fraiche & pepper)
“Roe, egg, roe”
(Red mullet topped with Asturian & egg yolk)
“A pouch of eggs”
(Lobster roe in kombucha)
Cured sirloin topped with pork skin & caper water
(The skin harbours mold similar to chorizo skin)
Toast with butter
(The butter incorporates ‘penicillium roqueforti’ as used in blue cheese)
“Vegetable stew”
(Mung beans, black garlic broth with soy & bear’s garlic / ramsons)
“Garum marinade & grouper”
(Also known as Rome’s ketchup, garum is a condiment made from fermented fish guts or anchovies)
“Tender almonds & lilies”
(Green almonds with pink garlic flowers)
“Vis-à-vis”
(Almond milk with razor clam & sliced garlic, topped with chives)
“Lobster rice…”
(Fermented rice with lobster & Buckwheat with lobster sauce)
“Hake & sea cucumber with asparagus & sake”
(A house “sake” is made by fermenting white asparagus water with Finnish viili / a glass of Sake to compare with the house made sake is also served).
“Sea & tripe terrine”
(Pork tripe with clams)
“Iodised cracklings”
(Galician oyster with crumbled Iberian ham & tomato crumb)
“Onion soup”
(Raw onion is given the impression of having been cooked by the application of pectinase – with the addition of a chicken broth)
“Pine nut cream & roasted brioche”
(Pine nuts with morcilla & pork fat brioche)
“Bone marrow from 2 Montaneras & several years”
(Aged Ibérico pig bone marrow)
“Acorn pil-pil”
(Pork tendon cooked in a pil-pil style sauce)
11-year-old Portspecially made for Mugaritz in 2007
Lamb tartare
“Puffed lamb”
(Puffed bread made with lamb fat)
“Oloroso Boletus”
(Tempura of boletus macerated with oloroso sherry)
Chocolates
“Vespres de Verema”- Mediterranean vineyard infusion from Cellar Credo’s Xarel-lo grape in the High Penedès region
(Vine leaf & stalks, grape skin, seeds, fennel, rosemary & lavender)
