Igeldo jatetxea. Arrain eta Itsaskien berezitasuna — Restaurant in San Sebastián

Well, having seen the star rating you would have expected some amazing food and Basque hospitality. However, it seems that numerous people have accidentally and repeatedly sneezed whilst adding the star ratings. Either that or the owner has their families held hostage at gunpoint. Allow me to elaborate…. We arrived and were warmly greeted by a server (name unimportant, but surely is held financial hostage and forced to work off his life debt). Drinks arrived quickly and to be fair the unnamed hostage was very personable. We ordered our starters and they were delivered with suspicious haste. The Calamari was average, the octopus was ok but the sardines were awful. At this point all was forgiven and thanks to the company, the ambience was great. We then waited for what seemed an eternity for our mains, here is where the disappointment and the rudeness began! Upon eventually receiving our mains it was obvious that most of the give a fu**s had clearly been left in the kitchen. The turbot to be fair was actually nicely cooked and was tasty, however, the tuna was what can only be described as a ‘weapon’s grade disaster’. If I wanted to pay for rubbish frozen tuna I would have gone to the freezer section of my local pound land, not the home of Basque gastronomy. There are numerous places here with Michelin stars, the closest comparison would be to say that eating a Michelin car tyre would be more enjoyable. We raised this issue with the owner and the response was quite frankly a master class in passive aggressive sarcasm. We informed him that the tuna was undercooked and still frozen inside. It was, it really was, there are eskimos that would have sent that back to the igloo kitchen. I have never wanted to try a tuna sorbet but I can safely say it will not be appearing in the shopping list again any time soon. I digress… the owner instead of, as you would expect, taking our comments on board and offering some kind of apology, managed to display the kind of hosting skills that made Geoffrey Dalmer a household name. He asked us where we came from and we responded, expecting some friendly chat about our respective origins and exchange cultural idioms. Unfortunately this was not to be, he used our respective distances from the nearest freezer, sorry I mean proximity to the sea, as his metric for how little we knew about tuna. The owner continued to unravel his thesis on the exact way tuna should be served, imagine my surprise when he reiterated that apparently as cold as his hosting skills was the answer. He continued to say that we apparently had no idea how it should be served and in essence called us ignorant. I wouldn’t mind but living in the West Midlands of the UK (as far from the sea as is possible) and having still had better tuna steaks served at roadside crack dens. He was fairly rude to the females in our group and one can only surmise that some kind of Norman Bates issues may plague his clearly difficult home life. We asked for the frozen fish to be taken off the bill and apparently this too was beyond his skill set. Basically, don’t, it’s not very good and matey boy who owns it is ruder and more passive aggressive than the entirety of social media rolled into one frozen nugget of...

There are many seafood restaurants in San Sebastian but not many that delivers on fresh produce, relaxed alfresco dining with casual ambiance away from the hustle and bustle of the old town.

Located at the end of the series of restaurants along the pier, overlooking Pier 1 and La Concha in the distance, this is a great place for a seafood lunch, with sun, sea, people and boat watching.

Whole Turbot was perfectly cooked. Octopus was tender but just enough bite. Squid was well seasoned and tender. Txakoli and Kalimotxos paired well with the seafood.

The laid back yet professional service from the multilingual staff made it a pleasant and relaxing lunch. Whislt the place did get full pretty quickly we never felt rushed to leave which meant we could feel at ease and take our time enjoying the food and view.

Be sure to arrive at opening time for lunch as it fills up pretty quickly within the hour due to it's popular location along the pier leading to the Aquarium and Euskal Itsas Museum.

Arriving early meant we were able to grab a front row view of the pier.

Thank you for a lovely meal and we look forward to...

Was recommended this waterside spot because of the scallops (omg yes) and the owners/staff (hi Nathan) and neither disappointed. We swung by after our hike of Mount Urgell around 14:30 and it was busy at this cozy spot, though we lucked out with a table right away. The atmosphere was friendly with what seemed like a mix of tourists and some local though based on its locale, you’d naturally expect a lotta tourists. But it didn’t feel obnoxious at all. We had the grilled octopus, (fried/grilled) sardines, scallops, fries, bread and of course, wine. Everything was delightful but those scallops were really something else. Chatted with one of the owners - turned out his wife and brothers were all working there (met the dog and saw their adorable baby too!) Loved the family atmosphere. Got some lovely recommendations for the area, had a great lunch, and all in all, a fantastic afternoon. Thank you!!

P.S. It looks like some of the reviews here are of the restaurant next...