Andoni Luis Aduriz

Andoni is predestined, one of those people that open their mouth and amaze without making a sound, uttering a word or presenting a concept. It’s easy to imagine what happens when they really go to work. In the case of this Basque chef, he rushed ahead of himself: in 1994 he came second in the first edition of the Spanish championship for young chefs, the following year he won and, three seasons later, in 1998, he opened the shutters of Mugaritz in Errenteria, not far from San Sebastian. Just long enough for people to get to know him and, in ’99, a guide assigned him the award for Best Restaurant in Spain and another for the best cheese dish. Another year and the same guide praised him for his attention to Cuban cigars and in the same year (2000), there were those who paid tribute to him for a cod-based dish, bearing in mind that in Spain cod doesn’t have the same negative, poverty-stricken aura that it has in Italy.

To cut a long story short, Andoni very carefully chooses the ingredients, taking his attention way beyond their mere purchase. Class of 1971, he behaves shyly and politely, he loves to further his knowledge of every ingredient, exploring it at sensorial and historical level. He leaves nothing to chance to avoid being taken by surprise at the consequences of a combination. You get the impression that the real test, the tangible realisation of a recipe, is just a little extra something because everything has been studied beforehand, reactions included. His book on Bacalao (cod) is fundamental, that on eggs should be memorised, that on foie gras is intriguing and Clorofilia, dedicated to the use of flora in cooking, with leaves, sprouts and flowers alongside fish or meat is splendid and stimulating. It isn’t a vegetarian book, but the identification of paths that can take a close up look at moments which might seem insignificant. Since 2008 he has been a member of the organisation panel of Gastronomika, a Basque and international cooking congress organised every year in November in the Kursaal in San Sebastian. Since 2011 and 2012 he has returned to the podium of the best restaurants in the world: third in the 50 Best behind his majesty Redzepi and the Roca brothers.