Marti Buckley’s First Stop in San Sebastian

Editor’s note: In the latest installment of our recurring First Stop feature, we asked writer Marti Buckley about some of her favorite spots in San Sebastian. Marti is the award-winning author of Basque Country (Artisan, 2018) and The Book of Pintxos (Artisan 2024). She is an experienced speaker, chef and journalist with an expertise in Spanish and Basque cuisine, vermouth, wine and European travel. She has lived in San Sebastián, Spain since 2010 and has been writing for nearly two decades. You can follow Marti on her blog and Instagram.

Barcelona’s Most-Essential Dishes and Where We Go to Eat Them

The culinary scene in Barcelona has seen a slow and steady resurgence since the 1980s, when Spanish cuisine was still being reduced to paella and sangria in the popular imagination. With rampant growth in tourism, Michelin-stars being awarded to local kitchens left and right, and renewed interest in traditional wine-making techniques, Catalan cuisine in particular has become a force in its own right. So, where to find the best traditional Spanish and Catalan food in Barcelona’s many kitchens? Culinary Backstreets has you covered. Our local guides reveal the must-try dishes and drinks of the Catalan capital, and where to track them down, from tapas to top-quality vermouth at an old-school bodega to unforgettable seafood at a family-run marisquería.

Japanese Pub Crawl

Walk into most any izakaya in Tokyo and you’ll find folks gathered around tables overloaded with an assortment of sashimi, yakitori, edamame, cups of sake and bottles of Asahi. Here is Japan’s answer to the tapas bar, outshining most any after-work happy hour. The charm of izakaya dining lies in the variety: From crispy tempura to savory miso cod, each dish demands sharing and, sometimes, a little exploration. Once the exclusive stomping grounds for sarariman (salarymen) to unwind their ties and ambitions, izakayas can sometimes be the domain of tobacco-puffing old men. But times are changing, with spots like Shake Kojima serving mostly female clientele. The izakaya was featured in a popular manga adaptation, in which a young woman ditches her co-workers to eat and drink her way through Tokyo.

Introducing San Sebastian

As we excitedly introduce San Sebastian, our newest Culinary Backstreets city, we sat down to chat with one of our local experts, Sasha Correa. There’s a lot to say about food in this small city on the Bay of Biscay, a place where Basque traditions run deep but that has also made a name for itself in the international fine dining scene. Sasha was born and grew up in Caracas, Venezuela. She first came to San Sebastian in 2007, lured by the city’s gastronomy, and then came back to live here full-time some nine years ago. As a writer and now as a guide, she hopes to convey to others the special spark that San Sebastian and Basque culture have, especially when it comes to gastronomy.

First Stop: Katie Parla’s Palermo

Editor’s note: In the latest installment of our recurring First Stop feature, we asked food writer Katie Parla about her favorite bites and food memories in Palermo. Katie is a Rome-based food and beverage writer, culinary guide, and bestselling cookbook author whose family emigrated to the United States from Palermo. Katie’s work explores the food, culture, and history that shape Italy and its cuisine. Her new book, Food of the Italian Islands, is a deep dive into the food of Sicily, Sardinia, and beyond.

First Stop: Ivan Orkin’s Tokyo

Whenever I come back to Japan, I crave eggs. We go straight to our buddy's house and his wife almost always makes us a bowl of rice with a raw egg on top of it. And that's often my kick-off to being back. There are definitely restaurants where you can get that, but the eggs here are so incredibly delicious that I just crave them [by themselves], with some seaweed sprinkled on top and a little good soy sauce. It is, for me, one of my all-time comfort dishes. We almost always start our days at the FamilyMart, which is one of the convenience store chains near where I stay when I'm visiting. My wife and I have an egg salad sandwich about every other day for the whole trip. For $1.75, they are shockingly delicious.

CB Book Club: Carolina Doriti’s “Salt of the Earth”

Editor’s note: Longtime CB contributor Carolina Doriti was born in Athens, where she grew up in a family with a long culinary tradition. Having studied arts management, she pursued a career as a curator but quickly set her museum work aside to follow her true passion: cooking! Since then, along with her work as CB’s Athens bureau chief, Carolina has been working as a chef, restaurant consultant and food stylist. She is also the Culinary Producer of My Greek Table, a TV series on Greek gastronomy, broadcast on PBS across the US. She has appeared on various cooking shows on Greek and Spanish TV and gives cooking classes and workshops in Athens. Salt of the Earth is her first cookbook.