Visiting San Sebastián in summer? Here's what to eat (and when)
Bonito from the bay, tomatoes that taste like tomatoes, txakoli on a terrace and fireworks over La Concha. A local chef's guide to eating through a Donostia summer.
Summer is when most of you visit us, and I get it: three beaches, long evenings, and a bay that looks like someone designed it. But here’s what the guidebooks undersell — summer is also a very specific eating season here, and if you know what’s at its peak, you’ll eat twice as well as the person next to you.
What’s in season (and what I’m cooking)
- Bonito del norte. Our summer tuna, line-caught in the Bay of Biscay. This is the season of marmitako — the fishermen’s stew of bonito and potatoes that might be the most Basque dish there is. If you see bonito on a chalkboard between June and September, order it.
- Tomatoes. I know, you have tomatoes at home. Not like these. A summer tomato from a Gipuzkoa garden with olive oil and salt is a complete argument for traveling.
- Guindillas de Ibarra. The pale green peppers you’ll see fried with coarse salt. Gentle, sweet, dangerously snackable — the Basque answer to edamame.
- Anchovies and sardines on the grill. Simple, smoky, eaten outdoors. If a beach bar is grilling sardines, cancel your other plans.
Wash all of it down with txakoli, our young, slightly fizzy white wine, poured from a height. It was made for summer afternoons — think of it as the Basque country’s front-porch lemonade, except it’s wine and it’s excellent with anchovies.
The summer calendar
July brings Jazzaldia, the jazz festival, with free concerts by the beach. Mid-August is Semana Grande (Aste Nagusia), our big summer festival — a full week when the city celebrates and every night ends with an international fireworks competition over the bay. If you’ve ever staked out a spot for Fourth of July fireworks, you know the drill: locals bring a bag of pintxos and claim their piece of railing early.
One honest warning from a local: in August the old town gets busy. The bars are still great, but the magic hour moves — go earlier for lunch, later for dinner, and consider the neighborhoods beyond the Parte Vieja, like Gros, where the surfers eat.
Beat the crowds: cook your lunch
Here’s my favorite summer trick, and yes, I’m biased: while everyone else is queueing three-deep at the bars, my groups spend the morning at the market and then cook their own Basque lunch — with the windows open and the txakoli cold.
The Pintxo Cooking class runs through the summer, mornings from 10:00 to 14:30, market walk included. Families traveling with kids have their own version — the Kids & Parents class — because in the Basque Country, children learning to cook isn’t cute, it’s expected.
Come in summer. Eat the bonito. Stay for the fireworks.