I think the first time I became aware of San Sebastián (also known as Donostia) was an article in the Observer’s Food magazine, a couple of years ago. It was described as ‘foodie heaven’ with the most michelin starred restaurants per capita anywhere in the world, so it’s been an ambition my mine to visit for a while. I only managed a day trip this time, but it was long enough to get  a taster of the quality of the food here.

The place itself kind of reminded me of Monte Carlo, but without the proliferation of flashy cars. There are a lot of very well dressed people sauntering around this sunny Basque town, with far too many little yappy dogs (or rats, as I prefer to call them). It is quite a pretty city, with a very pleasant looking beach, a statue of Jesus on the hill overlooking the beach a la Rio de Janeiro and an attractive bay.

Before we had arrived, I had the vague plan of grabbing a few pintxos (Basque name for tapas) and then trying to get an evening meal in a michelin starred restaurant. Having done absolutely no research on the restaurants in San Sebastian, the michelin starred ones were not easy to identify, so we settled for a long afternoon of drinking and eating pintxos instead. This was a very pleasant alternative and the more local way of eating and we certainly didn’t get the feeling of having missed out.

Every bar has their pinxtos lined up on the bar, which was fantastic for a couple that has little Spanish between us. Pointing and selecting was the order of the day, which I think we perfected without too much difficulty! The selection can be a little bewildering, but most pintxos looked and tasted the part, delicious bite sized morsels leaving you wanting more. They range from the more expected Spanish Tortilla, or variants thereof, to towers of seafood or pickles, on the ubiquitous slice of baguette.

The number of michelin starred restaurants obviously has an impact further on down the chain (or maybe it worked the other way around?), as the quality and variety of the pintxos are very high indeed. Not every bar has great pintxos, though, and the usual rules of ‘if it’s empty, don’t go in’ and ‘if there are locals in there, it’s good’ generally apply. There were a couple of not so good places, but on the whole, the bars were excellent, Bar Tanger and Bar Quintos being our favourites, although I couldn’t tell you where exactly they were.

Many pintxos and beers later, we were back on the bus to Bilbao, feeling rather satisfied and having very much enjoyed what I hope is the first of several trips to Donostia.