San Sebastian and the local region is a hotbed for amazing food – whether its fine dining in any of the Michelin starred restaurants (San Sebastian has three three-star restaurants alone and the most Michelin stars per capita) or picking up something from the local pinxtos/tapas bars, you are guaranteed some pretty good nosh.

Mugaritz is only a two Michelin-starred restaurant but it climbed to number 3 (from #5 last year) in The World’s 50 Best Restaurant Awards for 2011, just behind Spain’s top restaurant El Celler de Can Roca which sits at number 2 in the world. A bit of that climb, it has to be said, was arguably due to the (controversial) leaving out of El Bulli from the list – historically Spain’s top restaurant, was left out most likely because Ferran Adria announced it would close after the 2011 season.

I must admit part of the reason that Su Yin and I chose Mugaritz for a dining experience in San Sebastian was because of its position in The World’s 50 Best Restaurants. Ha ha – such foods snobs! We only had three nights in San Sebastian so we wanted to make the most of it ..

Mugartiz is located way outside of the centre of town, at least a 20 minute drive? so be prepared to factor in the cost of the cab to and from the restaurant (and also factor in the fact that at the end of the night the meter is also likely to start at a crazy 12 euro flag fall …) Its location is very quaint and beautifully green though.

When we first arrived at the restaurant, and after taking the obligatory photos on the outside, we were taken to sit outside in the garden area. We were kind of confused as this was not standard restaurant behaviour but soon they started to ply us with amuse bouche. First they put together a non-alcoholic (at our request) green tea, fresh mint and lime aperitif before bringing out focaccia with tomato smashed on to it. Very delicate.

Then a trio of treats: Starch and sugar crystal spotted with pepper praline and spider crab, Olives, tapa beans and thyme and Toasted legume beer. The beer was served as a broth (therefore warmed) and certainly … interesting. I wasn’t sure I was loving all the flavour combinations but I could appreciate the delicacy and thought that went into the dishes.

We were even more confused after we’d finished with our amuse bouches as plenty of waiters came walking around but never really indicated at any stage that we should move into the restaurant. Well, we took it upon ourselves to do so!

Inside, the restaurant was quite large but broken up by white screens. Pleasingly there was also a lot of space between the tables. Floor to ceiling windows lined the outside walls and until the sun set at least gave the room quite an open air feel. Oh, and we had a little bench for our bags which was quite cute.

Upon sitting down we were presented with two cards, one which was marked “150 min … submit!” and the other “150 min .. rebel!” Turning over there were words which were consistent with the words on the front – supposedly depending on which card you chose to run with it would determine how you would feel or interpret the food to come. Honestly, like the first half an hour we’d been at Mugaritz, it just caused more confusion!

So, that’s the intro for our experience before the food started to come proper. What did we eat? Our first course was a mouthful of “The greenness of tear peas animated by blood sorrel and mascarpone”. The peas were incredibly crunchy but I felt a little underwhelmed by the overall flavour of this dish.

The Anchovy and Vinegar sauce which came next wasn’t actually on our tasting menu so we were surprised by its arrival. If you like anchovy then you would love this dish (I didn’t) – very intense flavour.

Pickled onion, tendon and tuna essence followed. Whoever would have thought of pearing tuna essence and pickled onion? The essence was quite mild to be honest but I adored the onion. I could see that there was a trend developing in our dishes – that of showcasing the regional food with one primary ingredient instead of having all these things going on at once.

Taking a leaf out of Noma’s book (not really sure who started the concept) we got a bit interactive when a mortar and pestle was delivered to our table. We had the opportunity to break up a bunch of spices and seeds before the waiter threw in fresh herbs and poured in a fish broth.

The texture of the next dish of Silky bread stew, infused with pink geranium leaves covered with crabmeat was interesting. The crabmeat and the broth was divine, not sure I was loving the sogginess of the bread so much. I guess you could liken it to having dumplings in the soup.

A simple Hazelnut and beans stew was up next. I liked the sugar shards that topped the nuts.

A surprised break before our next dish – a visit to the kitchen! Score. Supposedly there are 35 chefs who work in the kitchen for one night’s sitting. The kitchen was very calm, as I’ve found with many fine dining restaurants. There is a separate kitchen for prepping new dishes, a separate area for cold stuff downstairs with a video so that when the chef needs an ingredient he gets it immediately after it is shelled. There are three chefs who manage the garden and herbs. It was cool to see all the induction lamps and also seeing the chefs using tweezers for presentation.

Pork noodles with “arraitxiki” extract and toasted rice was the dish that arrived at the table after our visit to the kitchen. This was another dish where I didn’t really like the texture of the ingredients. A bit too slimy for me (thank goodness at least for the crispiness of the toasted rice) and I felt it was a little over-seasoned.

Filet of hake and milky reduction of stewed cabbage sprouts. Luscious citrus spread. The hake was lovely and fresh but I was very surprised at how bland this dish was. Not sure what the thought behind the milky reduction was.

The Textures of coastal fish brought flavour back to the table. It was very simple but sometimes simple is all you need.

Quail Armagnac. What? Odd.

Mugaritz had not been following their menu very faithfully so we were afraid that the next dish of Iberian pork tails, crispy leaves and toasted sweet millet oil was going to be left out for the night! But they’d saved their best (savoury) dish for last! The tail was perfectly cooked, tender but with a very crispy skin. The only neg was that it was a little oily in the mouth and might turn off those who don’t like that feeling or too meaty a taste.

Cool vanilla brioche and barley cream was the first off the Sweet train. Refreshing and incredibly light – it felt like we were eating cold, vanilla flavoured air.

Sticking with the white theme, Lemon cream with daikon radish and unsweetened sugar was a delight. We Asians are used to mixing vegetables and sweetness so I wasn’t surprised that this dish worked very well.

Finally, my favourite dessert dish of the night: Broken “walnuts”, toasted and salted, cool milk cream and armagnac jelly. The three items of the edible walnut, the jelly inside it and the cream combined well to give the texture and balance that served to push the flavour of all three items to the fore.

From beginning to end Mugaritz was a perplexing experience for me. Some dishes were okay, some dishes were disappointingly bland or of weird texture, with one or two dishes which stood out (but in comparison to some other restaurants I’ve been to didn’t actually come out and grab me as too exciting.) Service-wise it too was a mixture of experiences – slow at first with water top-ups (which at least was free), plates were never actually placed in front of me but off to the side, bread wasn’t provided until about the fifth course (is this a Spanish thing?), coats weren’t ready upon leaving and there was no offer to call for a taxi ahead of time so we ended up waiting for nearly 20 minutes for one to arrive at the end of our meal. On the other hand we were brought into the kitchen and for the most part our waiters were friendly. Don’t forget the added touch of toothbrushes in the toilets.

I really wanted to love Mugaritz (especially at 165 euro (before service!) but I hate to say that at the most all I can say is that it was alright.

PS I do have to point out that other tables who appeared to be having a different sort of tasting menu seemed to have food which was both more substantial and delicious tasting. Perhaps you get different dishes upon subsequent dishes?