Sunday, March 04, 2018

A Pintxos Tour of Bilbao's Old Town

Gilda

I had a good number of hours ahead of me in Bilbao before jumping on my flight back to Asia. And I was fortunate enough that I found a private tour operator to take me to some pinxtos bars in the old town before I heading back to the airport. One of the things I liked enough to go back for seconds for was the gilda above, a nicely savory and salty bite of olives, peppers, and anchovy that went down the hatch in one bite. There was a spicy option too if you wanted it, but it wasn't that spicy.

Idiazabal cheese pintxo

Hands-down the best item was that item above from a more modern bar called Gure Toki in Nueva Plaza. I don't even know what the dish is called, but it was based on local Idiazabal cheese and was so good that I nearly screamed. Apparently such "hot pintxos" are not as common in Bilbao as they are in San Sebastián, but these guys are more progressive, even winning some kind of pintxos contest a good number of years back.

The pig at Berton

Actually, we had quite a few other hot items, including a small chuletón steak from La Olla in Nueva Plaza, as well as a hot prawn and octopus skewer from Berton (where they had that amusing pig slicing a human leg above). It was fun learning about the slight differences between Bilbao and San Sebastián, including how the txakoli wine isn't poured from high up here for some reason. Anyway, I'm glad that I was able to squeeze this in.

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