world's top 50 restaurants

[Ken Gargett]

every year, chefs around the world get very excited about the release of the 50 best. 

wondering if members have been to many of these. shamefully, i've not yet been to attica, the only aussie this time (bit harsh but not sure the judges get down here that often?). i've been to can roca about four times and they'd be four of the best restaurant experiences i've ever had - i think it is brilliant, both the old site and the new place down the hill. the italian place must be pretty exciting to top it. 

also mugaritz, which was amazing, arpege - fabulous but that was in its early days, before it was famous (i think it only had one star back then. first time at can roca, it was only two stars). the other one i went to was tickets in barcelona. very rarely go to top places by myself but i'd really wanted to get there. but long booked out. a mate who knows the brothers suggested i just turn up on opening and tell them the australian ambassador recommended i went. i only realised later that they thought i was the australian ambassador. but what a place. the dessert room is willy wonka meets disneyland and everything explodes. had a great visit. 

any thoughts on others? 

 

World’s 50 Best

1 Osteria Francescana, Modena, Italy
2 El Celler de Can Roca, Girona, Spain
3 Mirazur, Menton, France
4 Eleven Madison Park, New York, US
5 Gaggan, Bangkok, Thailand
6 Central, Lima, Peru
7 Maido, Lima, Peru
8 Arpège, Paris, France
9 Mugaritz, SAN Sebastián, Spain
10 Asador Etxebarri, Axpe, Spain
11 Quintonil, México City, México
12 Blue Hill at Stone Barns, Pocantico Hills, USA
13 Pujol, México City, México
14 Steirereck, Vienna, Austria
15 White Rabbit, Moscow, Russia
16 Piazza Duomo, Alba, Italy
17 Den, Tokyo, Japan
18 Disfrutar, Barcelona, Spain
19 Geranium, Copenhagen, Denmark
20 Attica, Melbourne, Australia
21 Alain Ducasse au Plaza Athénée, Paris, France
22 Narisawa, Tokyo, Japan
23 Le Calandre, Rubano, Italy
24 Ultraviolet by Paul Pairet, Shanghai, China
25 Cosme, New York, USA
26 Le Bernardin, New York, US
27 Boragó, Santiago, Chile
28 Odette, Singapore
29 Alléno Paris au Oavillon Ledoyen, Paris, France
30 DOM, São Paulo, Brazil
31 Arzak, SAN Sebastián, Spain
32 Tickets, Barcelona, Spain
33 The Clove Club, London, UK
34 Alinea, Chicago, US
35 Maaemo, Oslo, Norway
36 Reale, Castel di Sangro, Italy
37 Restaurant Tim Raue, Berlin, Germany
38 Lyle’s, London, UK
39 Astrid Y Gastón, Lima, Peru
40 Septime, Paris, France
41 Nihinryori Ryugin, Tokyo, Japan
42 The Ledbury, London, UK
43 Azurmendi, Bilbao, Spain
44 Mikla, Istanbul, Turkey
45, Dinner by Heston Blumenthal, London, UK
46 Saison, San Francisco, US
47 Schloss Schauenstein, Furstenau, Switzerland
48 Hiša Franko, Kobarid, Slovenia
49 Nahm, Bangkok, Thailand
50 The Test Kitchen, Cape Town, South Africa

Read more at http://www.decanter.com/wine-news/worlds-best-restaurant-awards-395577/#xAqqj1Ov2YzyZIhu.99

[Bill Hayes]

My missus has been to Attica. She said it was exceptional. I plan to go with her one day in the not so distant future seeing as it's literally just down the road from where we live. I have been to Dinner by Heston in Melbourne which isn't the UK one listed. It is pretty good but not as good as when Heston's Fat Duck was in Melbourne. That's still the best I've had for both taste and creativity and also experience. Was just discussing last night with the missus about going back to Dinner by Heston this weekend to sit at the bar and have the cocktail flight they have on offer at the moment.

[SigmundChurchill]

Last summer, Eleven Madison Park (#4 on the list) was closed in NYC for renovations, but they took the opportunity to move to the beach for the summer.  The restaurant opened a mile or two from my beach house, so I couldnt pass up the opportunity to try it.

 

My thoughts:

1. Every bite was a slice of heaven.  

2. There weren’t many bites.  

3. Every bite was an extremely expensive bite.

 

They must have done well there though, because in spite of the renovations being complete, and in spite of being open in NYC this summer, they decided to reopen the restaurant at the beach for the summer in addition to the city location.

 

I also ate at Le Bernardin, but it was so long ago I dont remember much about my meal.

[Ken Gargett]

1 minute ago, SigmundChurchill said:

Last summer, Eleven Madison Park (#4 on the list) was closed in NYC for renovations, but they took the opportunity to move to the beach for the summer.  The restaurant opened a mile or two from my beach house, so I couldnt pass up the opportunity to try it.

 

My thoughts:

1. Every bite was a slice of heaven.  

2. There weren’t many bites.  

3. And every bite was an extremely expensive bite.

 

They must have done well there though, because in spite of the renovations being complete, and in spite of being open in NYC this summer, they decided to reopen the restaurant at the beach for the summer.

in one sense, it should not, but the cost inevitably plays a role. 

first 3 star i ever went to was troigros when it was at its peak. a good mate had worked there and he and i were doing aussie food/wine presentations and got time off to get there. unbelievable. we also stayed there and the breakfast the next morning - michel troigros joined us which was fun - was beyond description. groaning tables of everything sweet and savoury you could imagine. it cost us a bucket but we felt it was a steal. shortly after, we got to les crayeres in champagne. very good but a similar cost and we felt that while it was good, lord it was expensive. 

every time i have walked out of can roca, no matter what the cost, have always thought it a bargain. went to louis xv not so long ago. again, terrific but so expensive. 

[SigmundChurchill]

3 minutes ago, Ken Gargett said:

in one sense, it should not, but the cost inevitably plays a role. 

first 3 star i ever went to was troigros when it was at its peak. a good mate had worked there and he and i were doing aussie food/wine presentations and got time off to get there. unbelievable. we also stayed there and the breakfast the next morning - michel troigros joined us which was fun - was beyond description. groaning tables of everything sweet and savoury you could imagine. it cost us a bucket but we felt it was a steal. shortly after, we got to les crayeres in champagne. very good but a similar cost and we felt that while it was good, lord it was expensive. 

every time i have walked out of can roca, no matter what the cost, have always thought it a bargain. went to louis xv not so long ago. again, terrific but so expensive. 

Agreed.  Cost is relative.  How much is tasting something unique and magnificent, worth?  Chefs of this caliber are artists, and it was definitely worth the opportunity to sample his art, even if it is just the one time.

[Ken Gargett]

Just now, SigmundChurchill said:

Agreed.  Cost is relative.  How much is tasting something unique and magnificent, worth?  Chefs of this caliber are artists, and it was definitely worth the opportunity to sample his art, even if it is just the one time.

yes, a couple of times the bill has hurt but looking back, always glad i experienced it. mind you, it is nicer when you walk out and think how good was that and the bill doesn't make one cringe and rush off for a second mortgage. 

tickets was another where i could not believe how cheap it was for what you got. brilliant. it was about the same as a good lunch in a top brizzy restaurant. 

[El Hoze]

Two thoughts, I have been to many on here:

-Mugaritz: ate there w the Mrs in Nov last year. I/we paid for the laughter, as the meal was a complete and total joke. The emperors new clothes.  Luckily we could laugh and almost bonded over what a horrible/ridiculous meal it was as we ate so many other good things that week. It may have been the most laughable meal of my life given how serious they take themselves. 

-Cosme/Pujol (same owner): I go to Cosme probably 3/4 times a month...maybe more when I am in NY more regularly. Never been a fan of Pujol but the first time I went to Cosme I thought “I am shocked this isn’t on every foodie list” and soon it was. The food there is insanely good. 

[El Presidente]

I need to spend some time in Peru!  There are three on the list 

[Ken Gargett]

1 hour ago, El Hoze said:

Two thoughts, I have been to many on here:

-Mugaritz: ate there w the Mrs in Nov last year. I/we paid for the laughter, as the meal was a complete and total joke. The emperors new clothes.  Luckily we could laugh and almost bonded over what a horrible/ridiculous meal it was as we ate so many other good things that week. It may have been the most laughable meal of my life given how serious they take themselves. 

-Cosme/Pujol (same owner): I go to Cosme probably 3/4 times a month...maybe more when I am in NY more regularly. Never been a fan of Pujol but the first time I went to Cosme I thought “I am shocked this isn’t on every foodie list” and soon it was. The food there is insanely good. 

interesting thoughts on mugaritz. was about 8 years ago i think that i went. it was an organised thing when in spain to visit wineries. when i say organised, not on the itinerary but a few of us desperately wanted to go so we got a booking that arvo (the wineries had some serious pull). a mate, who is seriously cynical about such places, had been and could not stop raving. must say i love it. different but most of the stuff they tried worked. they had the very best somm, young bloke from burgundy, i have ever met. terrific guy. we had a long chat about matching cigars (i think i have done a piece on him for kenfessions) and i saw a piece by a terrific writer, matt kramer, who is a good mate, on him. we had never discussed him. just coincidence. he is at a nearby seafood place now. rob might be interested to know that at one stage i asked him about matching cigars and red wine. he was genuinely surprised that anyone would even think of it. 

i do remember a white tea i had there. sublime. the best tea i have ever had in my life. 

it would be a shame to think it has dipped in quality or become a parody of itself. 

[Fuzz]

2 hours ago, Bill Hayes said:

My missus has been to Attica. She said it was exceptional. I plan to go with her one day in the not so distant future seeing as it's literally just down the road from where we live. I have been to Dinner by Heston in Melbourne which isn't the UK one listed. It is pretty good but not as good as when Heston's Fat Duck was in Melbourne. That's still the best I've had for both taste and creativity and also experience. Was just discussing last night with the missus about going back to Dinner by Heston this weekend to sit at the bar and have the cocktail flight they have on offer at the moment.

I went to Attica last year. The meal was interesting, but nothing spectacular, especially for the price. I found the food to be weird for the sake of being weird. I mean, I don't mind mussels, but I don't need to see the face of the mussel farmer painted onto the shell, when I am eating (especially when the portrait is eerily disturbing).

And no wonder young people can't afford houses, when smashed avocado on an extremely thin wafer, is now considered fine dining.

Only 2 really good things happened at Attica. First one was, one of the waitresses broke my wine glass when she was putting down a plate, soaking my trouser leg in white wine. Now you may say, "Hey, that's not good". Well, here comes the second good thing. To make up for it, whereas every other table had one glass of wine per degustation course, our glasses kept getting topped up until the next course came (we must have had 2-3 glasses per course). To say that we left quite drunk is an understatement.

I remember seeing a pic of Ben Shewry, picking weeds in a back alley. When I saw that I thought to myself, "Yep, I just paid $400 to eat something I usually spray with Roundup".

[Ken Gargett]

1 hour ago, Fuzz said:

 

I remember seeing a pic of Ben Shewry, picking weeds in a back alley. When I saw that I thought to myself, "Yep, I just paid $400 to eat something I usually spray with Roundup".

well he is a kiwi! 

[El Hoze]

6 hours ago, Ken Gargett said:

interesting thoughts on mugaritz. was about 8 years ago i think that i went. it was an organised thing when in spain to visit wineries. when i say organised, not on the itinerary but a few of us desperately wanted to go so we got a booking that arvo (the wineries had some serious pull). a mate, who is seriously cynical about such places, had been and could not stop raving. must say i love it. different but most of the stuff they tried worked. they had the very best somm, young bloke from burgundy, i have ever met. terrific guy. we had a long chat about matching cigars (i think i have done a piece on him for kenfessions) and i saw a piece by a terrific writer, matt kramer, who is a good mate, on him. we had never discussed him. just coincidence. he is at a nearby seafood place now. rob might be interested to know that at one stage i asked him about matching cigars and red wine. he was genuinely surprised that anyone would even think of it. 

i do remember a white tea i had there. sublime. the best tea i have ever had in my life. 

it would be a shame to think it has dipped in quality or become a parody of itself. 

I have wondered ever since whether the menu that night was just a miss, or whether the place has indeed become a parody of itself. Usually at a place like that you’ll have a few misses but will have at least a couple “wow”s and I kept waiting for even half-wow. We did have a wine pairing that was very interesting. Still more or less glad we went as we got a great story out of it. 

Out of curiosity at which seafood restaurant did your somm end up at? 

 

[Ken Gargett]

10 minutes ago, El Hoze said:

I have wondered ever since whether the menu that night was just a miss, or whether the place has indeed become a parody of itself. Usually at a place like that you’ll have a few misses but will have at least a couple “wow”s and I kept waiting for even half-wow. We did have a wine pairing that was very interesting. Still more or less glad we went as we got a great story out of it. 

Out of curiosity at which seafood restaurant did your somm end up at? 

 

i'll dig out the article. might take me a day or so to find it. 

[SigmundChurchill]

6 hours ago, Fuzz said:

I went to Attica last year. The meal was interesting, but nothing spectacular, especially for the price. I found the food to be weird for the sake of being weird. I mean, I don't mind mussels, but I don't need to see the face of the mussel farmer painted onto the shell, when I am eating (especially when the portrait is eerily disturbing).

And no wonder young people can't afford houses, when smashed avocado on an extremely thin wafer, is now considered fine dining.

 

Only 2 really good things happened at Attica. First one was, one of the waitresses broke my wine glass when she was putting down a plate, soaking my trouser leg in white wine. Now you may say, "Hey, that's not good". Well, here comes the second good thing. To make up for it, whereas every other table had one glass of wine per degustation course, our glasses kept getting topped up until the next course came (we must have had 2-3 glasses per course). To say that we left quite drunk is an understatement.

I remember seeing a pic of Ben Shewry, picking weeds in a back alley. When I saw that I thought to myself, "Yep, I just paid $400 to eat something I usually spray with Roundup".

 

I thought that was Al Pacino painted on the muscle shell.

 

...well...the restaurant IS called Attica.

[Cubadust]

From this years list I've been to Tickets and Disfrutar in Barcelona, from what I can see. And even though both are good, even great I have a hard time picture them as top 50 restaurants. Disfrutar, maybe. The heritage of elBulli have you set for life I believe. Both Adrià and Oriol Castro are amazing chefs though, no doubt about that. The only problem I have with both top 50 and Michelin is that they tend to go a little too much on name and location. Half of the places in Barcelona for example wouldn't get a star if you placed the same restaurant here in Sweden, or atleast a star less. But it is what it is.

[Frozen North]

I'll take a Costco hotdog please?

[LGC]

I'll take a Costco hotdog please?

You can’t beat a foot long from Costco!!! That’s where my wife goes when she gets a hankering...

[gnosmas]

this list is the worst kind of elitism, though admittedly largely inconsequential unless you're trying to get a table at one of these places or using it as a guide while traveling.  that the world's foremost authorities on gastronomy are a tire company and a bubbly water pilferer is pretty telling.  sort of useful as a gateway into the world of haute cuisine but at best misguided when accepted as doctrine.  but like the oscars, it's a fun ceremony for the industry to pat itself on the back.  

that said, i really love fine dining and have been to a handful on the list.  the wife and i did our honeymoon in portugal and spain last  year.  azurmendi was the first ranked restaurant we hit.  gorgeous space and has the distinction of being the most sustainable restaurant in the world.  everything was pleasant enough but nothing that was perspective-altering.  3 michelin stars is a bit of a stretch.  i had long dreamt of dining at asador etxebarri since i first saw it on no reservations (rip bourdain) some 15 years ago.  it was everything i wanted it to be, though not every bite was extraordinary.  one course was actually downright bad.  but the cumulative effect of years of waiting and anticipation, and eating at a restaurant where the chef is actually doing all the cooking, at such a primal level, was an unforgettable experience.  the gambas de palamos as prepared by victor arguinzoniz is one of the best things i've ever had.  a perfect ingredient prepared perfectly. 

once we got to barcelona, we had dinner at enigma (albert adria's newest venture), lunch at el celler de can roca, dinner at tickets, then lunch at disfrutar followed by dinner at estimar over the course of 3 nights and 2 days.  enigma was stunning and was a bit concerned that it may have set the bar too high.  el celler de can roca dashed those concerns.  it's the meal i think about the most from our trip.  maybe my favorite dining room of any restaurant i've ever been in.  save for a couple bites amongst the onslaught of canapes, the food is emblematic of everything one hopes for when going to one of these blowout dining experiences.  inventive and engaging, but always delicious first, and a loving, singular reflection of the terroir.  "no one else is having this experience outside of this place."  what pushed it into the realm of the transcendental was the wine pairing.  i've never had a pairing where the synergy between the food and wine was so perfectly dialed in.  it's pure magic, or at least it must be, because i've never experienced anything quite like it before or since.  and because i'm a glutton with a bit of a sweet tooth, i asked if the desserts from the smaller tasting menu could be included in our tasting, and they obliged.  jordi's desserts are otherworldly.  unfortunately the cigar dessert wasn't available that day.  had a pretty bad time at tickets (clearly resting on their laurels) and disfrutar was a bit of a one-trick pony with an unpleasantly disjointed menu.  if anyone is heading to barcelona anytime soon, i HIGHLY recommend estimar.  it's a small seafood restaurant from a longtime adria disciple that is an absolute gem.  they display the day's offerings on ice in front of the kitchen.  some of the best seafood i've ever had.  also the cheesecake their is perfect.  leagues better than the overrated tickets offering.

stateside (i'm from the US), ive been to EMP, blue hill at stone barns, cosme, le bernardin, and saison.  EMP is all hype and the poster child for everything wrong with these types of lists and rating systems.  it went from awkward as hell when humm and guidara first bought the restaurant from meyer and started its ascent up the ranks to aloof self-aggrandizement as the world vindicated their efforts towards attaining accolades as their chief priority.  blue hill at stone barns is fantastic, gorgeous in every way.  i have no idea how or why cosme is in the top 50, much less how it outranked the other US restaurants listed.  the food was decent but everything else about the meal i had there was tremendously mediocre.  le bernardin is my favorite of the 3-michelins in new york.  sublime.  haven't been in a long time, though.  and for as incredible as saison is (best fine dining meal i had before visiting spain), it's also relatively unpretentious and a lot of fun.  no dress code, and they play 80s music in the dining room.  i drunkenly sang along to don henley with another guy on the other side of the dining room with an equally mortified date.

side note, this year's "one to watch" from the pellegrino list, single thread in sonoma, is extraordinary.  kyle connaughton is a master, and one of the few instances these days of a chef who has truly honed his craft and put in his time before opening his own restaurant.  not some trust fund kid or ex-banker pumping money into the business until the hype train pulls up.

[Ken Gargett]

17 minutes ago, gnosmas said:

this list is the worst kind of elitism, though admittedly largely inconsequential unless you're trying to get a table at one of these places or using it as a guide while traveling.  that the world's foremost authorities on gastronomy are a tire company and a bubbly water pilferer is pretty telling.  sort of useful as a gateway into the world of haute cuisine but at best misguided when accepted as doctrine.  but like the oscars, it's a fun ceremony for the industry to pat itself on the back.  

that said, i really love fine dining and have been to a handful on the list.  the wife and i did our honeymoon in portugal and spain last  year.  azurmendi was the first ranked restaurant we hit.  gorgeous space and has the distinction of being the most sustainable restaurant in the world.  everything was pleasant enough but nothing that was perspective-altering.  3 michelin stars is a bit of a stretch.  i had long dreamt of dining at asador etxebarri since i first saw it on no reservations (rip bourdain) some 15 years ago.  it was everything i wanted it to be, though not every bite was extraordinary.  one course was actually downright bad.  but the cumulative effect of years of waiting and anticipation, and eating at a restaurant where the chef is actually doing all the cooking, at such a primal level, was an unforgettable experience.  the gambas de palamos as prepared by victor arguinzoniz is one of the best things i've ever had.  a perfect ingredient prepared perfectly. 

once we got to barcelona, we had dinner at enigma (albert adria's newest venture), lunch at el celler de can roca, dinner at tickets, then lunch at disfrutar followed by dinner at estimar over the course of 3 nights and 2 days.  enigma was stunning and was a bit concerned that it may have set the bar too high.  el celler de can roca dashed those concerns.  it's the meal i think about the most from our trip.  maybe my favorite dining room of any restaurant i've ever been in.  save for a couple bites amongst the onslaught of canapes, the food is emblematic of everything one hopes for when going to one of these blowout dining experiences.  inventive and engaging, but always delicious first, and a loving, singular reflection of the terroir.  "no one else is having this experience outside of this place."  what pushed it into the realm of the transcendental was the wine pairing.  i've never had a pairing where the synergy between the food and wine was so perfectly dialed in.  it's pure magic, or at least it must be, because i've never experienced anything quite like it before or since.  and because i'm a glutton with a bit of a sweet tooth, i asked if the desserts from the smaller tasting menu could be included in our tasting, and they obliged.  jordi's desserts are otherworldly.  unfortunately the cigar dessert wasn't available that day.  had a pretty bad time at tickets (clearly resting on their laurels) and disfrutar was a bit of a one-trick pony with an unpleasantly disjointed menu.  if anyone is heading to barcelona anytime soon, i HIGHLY recommend estimar.  it's a small seafood restaurant from a longtime adria disciple that is an absolute gem.  they display the day's offerings on ice in front of the kitchen.  some of the best seafood i've ever had.  also the cheesecake their is perfect.  leagues better than the overrated tickets offering.

stateside (i'm from the US), ive been to EMP, blue hill at stone barns, cosme, le bernardin, and saison.  EMP is all hype and the poster child for everything wrong with these types of lists and rating systems.  it went from awkward as hell when humm and guidara first bought the restaurant from meyer and started its ascent up the ranks to aloof self-aggrandizement as the world vindicated their efforts towards attaining accolades as their chief priority.  blue hill at stone barns is fantastic, gorgeous in every way.  i have no idea how or why cosme is in the top 50, much less how it outranked the other US restaurants listed.  the food was decent but everything else about the meal i had there was tremendously mediocre.  le bernardin is my favorite of the 3-michelins in new york.  sublime.  haven't been in a long time, though.  and for as incredible as saison is (best fine dining meal i had before visiting spain), it's also relatively unpretentious and a lot of fun.  no dress code, and they play 80s music in the dining room.  i drunkenly sang along to don henley with another guy on the other side of the dining room with an equally mortified date.

side not, this year's "one to watch" from the pellegrino list, single thread in sonoma, is extraordinary.  kyle connaughton is a master, and one of the few instances these days of a chef who has truly honed his craft and put in his time before opening his own restaurant.  not some trust fund kid or ex-banker pumping money into the business until the hype train pulls up.

you've nailed can roca. what a place. you must have been at the newer place, from your description. the old place up the hill looked like mom and pop's spaghetti house from the outside. i remember their list as being one of the most comprehensive but definitely the cheapest i'd seen. so many bargains. 

on one visit, we did the wine/food matching. i was stunned, not just at the selection which was brilliant, but that every table doing this had a new bottle opened for them. how can that be economical? just love it.

[Ken Gargett]

14 hours ago, El Hoze said:

I have wondered ever since whether the menu that night was just a miss, or whether the place has indeed become a parody of itself. Usually at a place like that you’ll have a few misses but will have at least a couple “wow”s and I kept waiting for even half-wow. We did have a wine pairing that was very interesting. Still more or less glad we went as we got a great story out of it. 

Out of curiosity at which seafood restaurant did your somm end up at? 

 

this was the article on the somm from mugaritz. from matt kramer at wine spec. the pic is matt, not the somm. 

Pouring Stars

A Burgundian sommelier puts down deep roots in Spain

Photo by: Jon Moe

Matt Kramer finds a French sommelier in love with the wines of Spain.

---

Matt Kramer
Posted: April 17, 2018

 

---

GETARIA, Spain—Even for the food-obsessed in Spain’s Basque Country, where two- and three-star restaurants are only the brightest lights in a veritable Milky Way of star-studded restaurants, one of the most revered is a “mere” one-star: Restaurante Elkano.

Talk to anyone who frequents these sorts of places and you are guaranteed to hear a sigh of satisfaction and a gush of admiration for this modest-appearing family restaurant in the center of this small town. And it’s hardly without competition, as Getaria, with a population of just 2,815 people according to the 2017 census estimate, boasts yet other famously fine restaurants, such as Restaurante Kaia Kaipe.

Getaria has long been, and still is, a fishing village. You can see the trawlers lined up in the town harbor. You can also see some of the fishermen themselves on the sidewalk outside of Elkano, chatting with the cook working at Elkano’s outdoor asador, or wood-fired grill.

Before entering the restaurant we stopped to gaze at the grill, and one of my guests, an inquisitive sort, wandered over to more closely inspect the grill, which had two massive fresh turbot being carefully cooked over the coals. He asked permission to roam yet further and a slender young man, casually dressed, replied in easy English, “Sure. Feel free.”

While our friend sniffed around, we talked with this affable fellow who had no idea that we were guests of the restaurant. For all he knew we were just some Americans walking past. Clearly, it didn’t matter to him.

“Those two guys over there,“ he said, nodding at two burly men grinning and laughing with the cook, “are local fishermen. They supply us with some of our fish. We have a relationship with them. In fact, they are the second generation of that relationship. Elkano bought from their fathers before them. Fish are not just fish here.”

He then strolled off into the restaurant and the next we saw him, he was offering us the wine list after we were seated in Elkano’s simply yet comfortably furnished interior. He gave us a warm greeting and explained that he was the sommelier, Nicolas Boise.

Further inquiry revealed that Mr. Boise (pronounced bwahz) is a transplant from Burgundy—with a five-year stopover in England, which explains the fluent English—who now makes the Basque Country in Spain his permanent home.

The wine list, for its part, is of a piece with the restaurant’s style and its food: superbly selected, reasonably, even modestly, priced and without any pretension. It proffers mostly Spanish wines with a smattering of choice French wines, especially Burgundies. Oddly, for a temple consecrated to the freshest imaginable fish cooked simply yet exquisitely, the wine list has about as many red wines as it does the more expected whites.

I arranged to chat later with Mr. Boise, as I was intrigued by the wine list he created as well as by his guaranteed-to-be-unusual personal story. After all, sommeliers from Burgundy are hardly commonplace in Basque Country restaurants, never mind that the French border is just a 45-minute drive from Getaria (and you can knock 15 minutes from that if you’re in San Sebastián, which is closer yet to the French border).

“I was born and raised near Chablis,” he began. “And I had no predisposition for wine. My father was involved with agriculture, but not wine. Anyway,“ he continued, “I was a very, very bad student. So I went to Auxerre to study in a four-year program where you were trained to be either a chef or a headwaiter. I wasn’t sure which I would be. All I knew was that I wanted something that would always keep me going. Since I found myself much more comfortable with sommeliers, it turned out to be wine.”

That Mr. Boise, now 33, has a gift is apparent from his substantial résumé, never mind his relative youth. “I have something like 17 stars to my name,” he notes, referring to the various Michelin-starred restaurants where he’s worked.

“Anyway, after doing more coursework in winemaking and wine-tasting, I first went to work as a sommelier in Monaco. But I didn’t like it. It’s Monaco, you know. There was no interest for who was behind the wine, behind the label.

“So I went to the U.K., thanks to a connection with a French colleague. This was incredible when you think about it,” he comments. Why was that? “Because I didn’t speak any English! Not a word,” he adds, shaking his head at his youthful swagger. “I spent a year at the Hotel du Vin in Bristol, which was part of a chain created by Gerard Basset, the famous sommelier. Actually, I was surrounded by Frenchmen. But I learned English anyway,” he laughs.

From there came a stint at the Vineyard at Stockcross, a Michelin two-star owned by Sir Peter Michael, who is better known by wine-loving Americans for his namesake Sonoma County winery (his 2012 Cabernet Sauvignon Oakville Au Paradis was Wine Spectator's 2015 Wine of the Year.) After that were jobs at two French three-stars and, finally, two years at the famous English three-star restaurant the Fat Duck, in Bray, just west of London.

“I loved it there,” recalls Mr. Boise. “We could taste anything. It was there that I learned about Italian wines, which really changed my palate. It was a great experience.”

But, to modify the old saying, as good sommeliers go, he went. “They wanted me to stay at the Fat Duck but I felt that it was time to leave the U.K. So with their blessing and recommendation I was hired as the head sommelier at Mugaritz in 2010.”

Mugaritz is a Michelin two-star, a country restaurant that’s a 20-minute drive southeast of San Sebastián. Famed for its adventurous molecular gastronomy, its 47-year-old chef-owner Andoni Luis Aduriz previously worked at the legendary, now-closed El Bulli and is considered by some to be the heir to El Bulli’s Ferran Adrià for his creativity. (“It’s a place where we sometimes even serve meals,“ quips Mr. Aduriz on his restaurant’s website.)

“I was only 25 years old when I went to Mugaritz,” says Mr. Boise. And did he speak Spanish at the time? “Not a word! It’s incredible yet again, I know. I didn’t even know where San Sebastián was. Or the Basque Country. It’s amazing that they took such a chance on me.”

And what, for that matter, did he know about Spanish wines? “Nothing, really. What little I knew I learned in the U.K. And that meant just Rioja—and only the big brands, at that. I was blinded by Italian wines at the time. I felt lost when I arrived in Spain.”

Today, of course, it’s a different story. By the time Mr. Boise took on the job of sommelier at Restaurante Elkano in 2016, he had not only learned Spanish, but married a Basque woman and now has two children, ages 1 and 3. (His Basque, he admits, is still rudimentary, although his wife is a native speaker; she, for her part, works at the Michelin one-star, Kokotxa, in San Sebastián.)

Now, Spain calls to him passionately. “What I discovered was the smaller wineries and all these various winemaker projects that are going on,” he says. “What I now see in Spain is that they’ve decided to go further into their past. The latest generation is inspired by what went on a long, long time ago, before it was big brands and big wineries.

“For example, there’s the movement to no chemicals. Natural wines. I don’t always agree with everything I taste with natural wines, but I appreciate what they want and why they want it.”

Mr. Boise’s interest in such wines is discreetly signaled on Restaurante Elkano’s 700-wine list by the notation “low SO2” next to such natural-style wines. “We actually have about 1,200 different wines in the cellar, but we’re holding some back because we want to give some wines additional age,” he explains.

“What’s most important to me and for Elkano is that everyone has to find his or her happiness on the list. The biggest problem I have with some sommeliers is that they sell what they want to sell, not what people like. Myself, I first want to know what they like. And if, say, they like Chardonnay—who doesn’t?—I might suggest a Godello, which is rounder and has a nice texture. Or a white Garnacha from Catalunya. I’m also really excited by the wines, white and red, from the Canary Islands.

“We want to be fair in price as well. Some people tell me that I’m crazy to price our wines so modestly. But wine is meant to be drunk. A restaurant is not a museum, after all.”

And what about all those red wines on the list? Even though Elkano does offer meat dishes, surely most of the guests order fish?

“They do,” confirms Mr. Boise. “But before I arrived there were more red wines on the list than white. It’s amazing. People didn’t care. They were locals. And for them, Txakoli notwithstanding, wine is red. Their wine culture was for red, especially Rioja, more than for white. But that’s changing rapidly,” he adds.

“The thing to remember about Spanish wines, my biggest lesson and discovery,” says Mr. Boise, “is that in Spain you have to look at the people rather than the places.

“This is because they are recovering from their past, from what they’ve done previously. They need to break from the ‘brand thing.’ That’s why in Spain the people are more important than the place.”

[kwsaw63]

I've been to Gaggan and Nahm in Bangkok, plus Odette is Singapore. Odette was a really enjoyable experience with great food and service. Been there twice and happy to go back again on special occasions (or if someone else is paying the bill! )

Gaggan & Nahm  I would not go back to. Food was good at both places but Gaggan just felt like they were trying too hard and the tasting menu was just disjointed. Nahm just had no ambience. You felt like you were in a bog standard hotel restaurant.

Whilst not on the list, my favourite restaurant in Bangkok is Bo.Lan. You get authentic Thai cuisine done very well, great service and fantastic ambience. In my books, it beats Gaggan & Nahm hands down.

[Ken Gargett]

11 minutes ago, kwsaw63 said:

I've been to Gaggan and Nahm in Bangkok, plus Odette is Singapore. Odette was a really enjoyable experience with great food and service. Been there twice and happy to go back again on special occasions (or if someone else is paying the bill! )

Gaggan & Nahm  I would not go back to. Food was good at both places but Gaggan just felt like they were trying too hard and the tasting menu was just disjointed. Nahm just had no ambience. You felt like you were in a bog standard hotel restaurant.

Whilst not on the list, my favourite restaurant in Bangkok is Bo.Lan. You get authentic Thai cuisine done very well, great service and fantastic ambience. In my books, it beats Gaggan & Nahm hands down.

i think bo lan was in the top 50 last year. nahm was the thai restaurant of david thompson, an aussie but a fabulous thai chef. the people behind bo lan came from nahm. i saw thompson left nahm a little while ago. would be interesting to know if it was before or after your experience.

thompson ran darley street thai in sydney for years and it was always considered one of australia's best, of any style. i ate there twice. both times, loved the food but both times, the worst service imaginable. ended up in fairly serious arguments with staff both times. they were appalling and arrogant and not terribly competent. in fact, i can't recall having a dispute with staff at any place which matched either visit. i'd need to hear some very good things before i'd ever go near one of his places again. 

[kwsaw63]

1 minute ago, Ken Gargett said:

i think bo lan was in the top 50 last year. nahm was the thai restaurant of david thompson, an aussie but a fabulous thai chef. the people behind bo lan came from nahm. i saw thompson left nahm a little while ago. would be interesting to know if it was before or after your experience.

thompson ran darley street thai in sydney for years and it was always considered one of australia's best, of any style. i ate there twice. both times, loved the food but both times, the worst service imaginable. ended up in fairly serious arguments with staff both times. they were appalling and arrogant and not terribly competent. in fact, i can't recall having a dispute with staff at any place which matched either visit. i'd need to hear some very good things before i'd ever go near one of his places again. 

Ken, I went to Nahm when David Thompson was still there. Don't get me wrong, the food was great but the place just had zero ambience. I felt like I was sitting in a 3 star hotel café. Just didn't match the quality of the food.

[Ken Gargett]

4 minutes ago, kwsaw63 said:

Ken, I went to Nahm when David Thompson was still there. Don't get me wrong, the food was great but the place just had zero ambience. I felt like I was sitting in a 3 star hotel café. Just didn't match the quality of the food.

seems he focuses on the food to the exclusion of all. curious. and a shame. 

[El Hoze]

1 hour ago, Ken Gargett said:

this was the article on the somm from mugaritz. from matt kramer at wine spec. the pic is matt, not the somm. 

Pouring Stars

A Burgundian sommelier puts down deep roots in Spain

Photo by: Jon Moe

Matt Kramer finds a French sommelier in love with the wines of Spain.

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Matt Kramer
Posted: April 17, 2018

 

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GETARIA, Spain—Even for the food-obsessed in Spain’s Basque Country, where two- and three-star restaurants are only the brightest lights in a veritable Milky Way of star-studded restaurants, one of the most revered is a “mere” one-star: Restaurante Elkano.

Talk to anyone who frequents these sorts of places and you are guaranteed to hear a sigh of satisfaction and a gush of admiration for this modest-appearing family restaurant in the center of this small town. And it’s hardly without competition, as Getaria, with a population of just 2,815 people according to the 2017 census estimate, boasts yet other famously fine restaurants, such as Restaurante Kaia Kaipe.

Getaria has long been, and still is, a fishing village. You can see the trawlers lined up in the town harbor. You can also see some of the fishermen themselves on the sidewalk outside of Elkano, chatting with the cook working at Elkano’s outdoor asador, or wood-fired grill.

Before entering the restaurant we stopped to gaze at the grill, and one of my guests, an inquisitive sort, wandered over to more closely inspect the grill, which had two massive fresh turbot being carefully cooked over the coals. He asked permission to roam yet further and a slender young man, casually dressed, replied in easy English, “Sure. Feel free.”

While our friend sniffed around, we talked with this affable fellow who had no idea that we were guests of the restaurant. For all he knew we were just some Americans walking past. Clearly, it didn’t matter to him.

“Those two guys over there,“ he said, nodding at two burly men grinning and laughing with the cook, “are local fishermen. They supply us with some of our fish. We have a relationship with them. In fact, they are the second generation of that relationship. Elkano bought from their fathers before them. Fish are not just fish here.”

He then strolled off into the restaurant and the next we saw him, he was offering us the wine list after we were seated in Elkano’s simply yet comfortably furnished interior. He gave us a warm greeting and explained that he was the sommelier, Nicolas Boise.

Further inquiry revealed that Mr. Boise (pronounced bwahz) is a transplant from Burgundy—with a five-year stopover in England, which explains the fluent English—who now makes the Basque Country in Spain his permanent home.

The wine list, for its part, is of a piece with the restaurant’s style and its food: superbly selected, reasonably, even modestly, priced and without any pretension. It proffers mostly Spanish wines with a smattering of choice French wines, especially Burgundies. Oddly, for a temple consecrated to the freshest imaginable fish cooked simply yet exquisitely, the wine list has about as many red wines as it does the more expected whites.

I arranged to chat later with Mr. Boise, as I was intrigued by the wine list he created as well as by his guaranteed-to-be-unusual personal story. After all, sommeliers from Burgundy are hardly commonplace in Basque Country restaurants, never mind that the French border is just a 45-minute drive from Getaria (and you can knock 15 minutes from that if you’re in San Sebastián, which is closer yet to the French border).

“I was born and raised near Chablis,” he began. “And I had no predisposition for wine. My father was involved with agriculture, but not wine. Anyway,“ he continued, “I was a very, very bad student. So I went to Auxerre to study in a four-year program where you were trained to be either a chef or a headwaiter. I wasn’t sure which I would be. All I knew was that I wanted something that would always keep me going. Since I found myself much more comfortable with sommeliers, it turned out to be wine.”

That Mr. Boise, now 33, has a gift is apparent from his substantial résumé, never mind his relative youth. “I have something like 17 stars to my name,” he notes, referring to the various Michelin-starred restaurants where he’s worked.

“Anyway, after doing more coursework in winemaking and wine-tasting, I first went to work as a sommelier in Monaco. But I didn’t like it. It’s Monaco, you know. There was no interest for who was behind the wine, behind the label.

“So I went to the U.K., thanks to a connection with a French colleague. This was incredible when you think about it,” he comments. Why was that? “Because I didn’t speak any English! Not a word,” he adds, shaking his head at his youthful swagger. “I spent a year at the Hotel du Vin in Bristol, which was part of a chain created by Gerard Basset, the famous sommelier. Actually, I was surrounded by Frenchmen. But I learned English anyway,” he laughs.

From there came a stint at the Vineyard at Stockcross, a Michelin two-star owned by Sir Peter Michael, who is better known by wine-loving Americans for his namesake Sonoma County winery (his 2012 Cabernet Sauvignon Oakville Au Paradis was Wine Spectator's 2015 Wine of the Year.) After that were jobs at two French three-stars and, finally, two years at the famous English three-star restaurant the Fat Duck, in Bray, just west of London.

“I loved it there,” recalls Mr. Boise. “We could taste anything. It was there that I learned about Italian wines, which really changed my palate. It was a great experience.”

But, to modify the old saying, as good sommeliers go, he went. “They wanted me to stay at the Fat Duck but I felt that it was time to leave the U.K. So with their blessing and recommendation I was hired as the head sommelier at Mugaritz in 2010.”

Mugaritz is a Michelin two-star, a country restaurant that’s a 20-minute drive southeast of San Sebastián. Famed for its adventurous molecular gastronomy, its 47-year-old chef-owner Andoni Luis Aduriz previously worked at the legendary, now-closed El Bulli and is considered by some to be the heir to El Bulli’s Ferran Adrià for his creativity. (“It’s a place where we sometimes even serve meals,“ quips Mr. Aduriz on his restaurant’s website.)

“I was only 25 years old when I went to Mugaritz,” says Mr. Boise. And did he speak Spanish at the time? “Not a word! It’s incredible yet again, I know. I didn’t even know where San Sebastián was. Or the Basque Country. It’s amazing that they took such a chance on me.”

And what, for that matter, did he know about Spanish wines? “Nothing, really. What little I knew I learned in the U.K. And that meant just Rioja—and only the big brands, at that. I was blinded by Italian wines at the time. I felt lost when I arrived in Spain.”

Today, of course, it’s a different story. By the time Mr. Boise took on the job of sommelier at Restaurante Elkano in 2016, he had not only learned Spanish, but married a Basque woman and now has two children, ages 1 and 3. (His Basque, he admits, is still rudimentary, although his wife is a native speaker; she, for her part, works at the Michelin one-star, Kokotxa, in San Sebastián.)

Now, Spain calls to him passionately. “What I discovered was the smaller wineries and all these various winemaker projects that are going on,” he says. “What I now see in Spain is that they’ve decided to go further into their past. The latest generation is inspired by what went on a long, long time ago, before it was big brands and big wineries.

“For example, there’s the movement to no chemicals. Natural wines. I don’t always agree with everything I taste with natural wines, but I appreciate what they want and why they want it.”

Mr. Boise’s interest in such wines is discreetly signaled on Restaurante Elkano’s 700-wine list by the notation “low SO2” next to such natural-style wines. “We actually have about 1,200 different wines in the cellar, but we’re holding some back because we want to give some wines additional age,” he explains.

“What’s most important to me and for Elkano is that everyone has to find his or her happiness on the list. The biggest problem I have with some sommeliers is that they sell what they want to sell, not what people like. Myself, I first want to know what they like. And if, say, they like Chardonnay—who doesn’t?—I might suggest a Godello, which is rounder and has a nice texture. Or a white Garnacha from Catalunya. I’m also really excited by the wines, white and red, from the Canary Islands.

“We want to be fair in price as well. Some people tell me that I’m crazy to price our wines so modestly. But wine is meant to be drunk. A restaurant is not a museum, after all.”

And what about all those red wines on the list? Even though Elkano does offer meat dishes, surely most of the guests order fish?

“They do,” confirms Mr. Boise. “But before I arrived there were more red wines on the list than white. It’s amazing. People didn’t care. They were locals. And for them, Txakoli notwithstanding, wine is red. Their wine culture was for red, especially Rioja, more than for white. But that’s changing rapidly,” he adds.

“The thing to remember about Spanish wines, my biggest lesson and discovery,” says Mr. Boise, “is that in Spain you have to look at the people rather than the places.

“This is because they are recovering from their past, from what they’ve done previously. They need to break from the ‘brand thing.’ That’s why in Spain the people are more important than the place.”

I had figured Elkano! Now that place is insanely good!!! One of my favorites. The turbot there is amazing, they cut it up for you in all of these precise pieces almost like nose to tail. Incredible place. I could eat there every day. Thanks for digging it up Ken. Much appreciated!