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Spain dominates best Restaurant awards but misses top spot

Three restaurants in Spain were ranked among the top ten but the prize went to Italian eatery Osteria Francescana.

Published: 20 June 2018 10:24 CEST
Spain dominates best Restaurant awards but misses top spot
Chef Joan Roca of El Celler de Can Roca. Photo: AFP

Italy's Osteria Francescana was crowned the world's best restaurant for the second time on Tuesday at an awards ceremony put on by British trade magazine Restaurant, beating out top eateries in Spain and France.

Spain's El Celler de Can Roca, a restaurant in Girona, northeastern Spain, which is run by the three Roca brothers and took the top honour in 2013 and 2015, came in second place. 

El Cellar de Can Roca “thrives on the endless creativity of the trio of gastronomically talented brothers behind one of the most acclaimed restaurants on the planet,” said the guide.

This year's list puts are two other Spanish restaurants in the top ten, both Basque, proving that the cuisine of the northern Spanish region is one of the best in the world. And Spain maintains a total of seven restaurants on the top 50 list.

In at number nine is Mugaritz in San Sebastián: “a powerhouse of activity hidden in the green hills of the Basque Country”, explains the guide.

The restaurant is run by chef Andoni Luis Aduriz, known simply as Andoni who, according to the World's Best Restaurants guide, “is the natural heir to Spain's most pioneering chef after Ferran Adrià (formally of elBulli).

And at number ten is Asador Etxebarri, where chef Victor Arguinzoniz is described as having “a remarkable ability to coax out explosive flavour from seemingly simple ingredients, most of which are grilled over an open hearth.

Arguinzoniz worked in a flag factory for years before buying the restaurant in the town around an hour from San Sebastian with his father and uncle and teaching himself to cook.

Although Spain was pipped to the top spot by an Italian restaurant, it still dominates the list with three entries in the top ten, compared to one entry each for Italy, the USA, and Thailand.  

Both France and Peru had two restaurants in the top ten list.

READ: Ten delicious Spanish dishes you must try before you die

Restaurant magazine, owned by William Reed Media, launched the awards in 2002 and they are now as coveted by restaurants as Michelin stars, although the methodology used to select the best restaurants has faced criticism, especially from several French chefs who say it remains unclear.

There are no criteria for putting a restaurant on the list, which is based on an anonymous poll of more than 1,000 chefs, restaurant owners, food critics and other industry insiders from around the world.

Each member gets 10 votes and at least four of those votes have to go to restaurants outside their region.

The 2018 list of 50 best restaurants included eateries in 22 countries – but over half were in Europe. Six are in the United States, six in Latin America and six in Asia.

Tuesday's ceremony also handed out individual chef awards.   

Britain's Clare Smyth, who catered the dinner at the royal wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle last month, was named best female chef and France's Cedric Grolet best pastry chef.

Peru's celebrity chef Gaston Acurio, who is known for combining classic European techniques with typical ingredients from the Andean country, was given a lifetime achievement award.

The top restaurant award has gone to Spain seven times, the most of any country. In addition to El Celler de Can Roca's two wins, ground-breaking Spanish chef Ferran Adria's El Bulli, which he closed in 2011, took the prize a record five times.

READ MORE: These are 2017's 10 best fine dining restaurants in Spain 

FOOD AND DRINK

Why do they pour cider like that in Spain’s Asturias?

The green northern region’s drink of choice is cider but it’s the method waiters have of pouring it from a great height that catches the attention of ‘out-ciders’.

Published: 29 February 2024 15:40 CET
Why do they pour cider like that in Spain's Asturias?

They say Asturian blood is 50 percent water and 50 percent cider, and given the 40 million bottles produced every year in the region, it doesn’t seem too hard to believe.

However, it’s the method of serving cider in Asturias which really captures the imagination. 

The bottle will either come attached to a contraption which sucks up the cider and splurts it into a wide but thin-rimmed glass.

Or the waiter will come out every few minutes to grab your bottle and glass, lift the former high up with one arm and the latter down low around waist height before pouring some of the cider into the glass from at an arm’s length. 

There’s even a verb for this action – escanciar – to decant.  

The objective is for the cider to be shaken and aerated so that its natural carbon dioxide ‘awakens’.

When it is poured from above and hits the glass, carbon dioxide bubbles are produced that make the aroma of the cider come alive.

It’s good and normal for there to be splashback when pouring Asturian cider, but the aim is still to get most of it in the glass. (Photo by MIGUEL RIOPA / AFP)

These bubbles go away quickly so once served, the customer should quickly drink the culín (small bottom) up in one swig. 

The action of escanciar imitates how cider would be traditionally served when it went directly from big oak barrels to the glass, as cider has been the drink of choice in Asturians since before Roman times. 

READ ALSO: Why Spaniards’ habit of drinking alcohol every day is surprisingly healthy

This is after all natural cider which doesn’t come with the sugar, additives and pre-carbonated mixes of brands such as Strongbow, Magners or Kopparberg.

“It took me some time to get the hang of pouring cider, I missed the mark a lot, and my arm used to get very tired at first,” a Latin American waitress at a bar in Gijón told The Local Spain. 

Many sidrerías (cider houses) and restaurants have cylindrical tubes on wheels where escanciadores (the waiters in charge of pouring cider) can put the glass in to avoid making a mess on the floor or splashing customers, as there is always some splatter even if they don’t completely miss the mark. 

A waiter pours cider for customers at a cider bar in the northern Spanish city of Oviedo (Photo by RAFA RIVAS / AFP)

The more old-school chigres (cider house in Asturian) prefer to have sawdust all over the floor to absorb the spilt cider.

To pour, tirar (throw) or escanciar (decant) cider like an Asturian, you should tilt the bottle slowly from above and aim for the cider to hit the top part of the inside side of the glass, which has to be held at a 45-degree angle. It’s this that brings out the effervescence out in la sidra natural.  

So when you visit the beautiful region of Asturias and you tuck into their famously ample servings of fabada asturiana (Asturian bean stew) or cachopo (meat, cheese and ham all together in breadcrumbs), washed down with one or two bottles of sidra, now you’ll understand what’s behind this eye-catching tradition.

READ ALSO: Eight fascinating facts about Spain’s Asturias region

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