Rekondo

Igeldo Pasealekua, 57, Donostia, Gipuzkoa, Spain

Appearances can be deceptive. Rekondo, kissing a vertiginous bend on San Sebastián’s Igeldo hill, could be an unassuming rustic steakhouse. Yes, there’s a panoramic terrace overlooking the western bay, but the simple cream walls and occasional oil painting give few hints to its extraordinary food and wine. Although visited by Antonio Banderas, Pedro Almodóvar and A-list matadors, it’s largely a local secret; an unpretentious antidote to the city’s avalanche of Michelin stars. Chef Iñaki Arrieta keeps it traditional, local and divinely Basque. There are starters of blood sausage from Urt, and raw fish carpaccio with pomegranate and avocado, while mains include a creamy roasted and puréed spider crab gratin, and rich hake cheeks with parsley sauce. If he sources further afield, it’s for Spain’s finest produce: Extremaduran ham, Asturian beef, Segovian suckling pig. Even more remarkably, the restaurant’s anodyne car park conceals owner Txomin Rekondo’s wine collection, voted one of the planet’s five best cellars by American magazine Wine Spectator. Its hand-written Registro de Vino of 127,000 bottles includes 35 pages dedicated to Rioja. IB. 00 34 943 212 907, rekondo.com