These five rendezvous with international gastronomy provide an added touch to the screenings in the section.

Five world premieres will make up the Culinary Zinema section, to be opened at the Festival’s 70^th edition by Mibu. La luna en un plato / Mibu. The Moon on a Dish, taking an in-depth look at the famous Japanese restaurant. Virgilio, a portrait of the chef at the restaurant in Lima, Central, will close the section also including a third documentary,La Huella, historia de un parador de playa, and two fictions,Xiao shan he (Nostalgia) and Tsuchi wo kurau junikagetsu / The Zen Diary.

Culinary Zinema, which also comes with themed dinners related to the screenings, was presented this morning at the Basque Culinary Center by its director, Joxe Mari Aizega, and by the director of the San Sebastian Festival, José Luis Rebordinos.

The theatre actor and producer Roger Zanuy (Barcelona, 1978) debuts as a director with Mibu. La luna en un plato , a film revealing the history and sources of inspiration of the Mibu restaurant, a gastronomic temple that has thrilled acclaimed chefs from all over the world who appear in the documentary, amongst others, Ferran Adrià, José Andrés, Massimo Bottura, Joan Roca, Andoni Luis Aduriz, Oriol Castro and Albert Raurich.

Alfred Oliveri (Buenos Aires, 1969), who already brought to Culinary Zinema his debut Tegui: Un asunto de familia / Tegui: A Family Affair (2018) and La leyenda de Don Julio: Corazón & Hueso / The Legend of Don Julio: Meat & Bone (2019), returns to the section with Virgilio, a documentary approach to the chef Virgilio Martínez, whose restaurant Central, situated in Lima (Peru), is listed as the best of the decade in Latin America and number 2 in the world (The World's 50 Best Restaurants).

In La Huella, historia de un parador de playa, the Italian-American moviemaker living in Argentina Alessio Rigo de Righi (Jackson, Mississippi, 1986) takes his camera to a small town in Uruguay where three friends have been working for 20 years on the challenge of creating a beach restaurant like the ones that used to exist in the 50s.

The Chinese director and screenwriter Peng Chen (Shenzhen, 1968) will show his second feature film, Xiao shan he ( Nostalgia), a fiction in which cuisine and food play an important part through the young protagonist, a girl who returns to her hometown where she reunites with her grandmother and her childhood friends.

Finally, the latest fiction from the Japanese moviemaker Yuji Nakae (Kyoto, 1960), Tsuchi wo kurau junikagetsu / The Zen Diary, tells the tale of a writer who lives alone in the mountains, where he prepares zen dishes with the vegetables he grows and the mushrooms he gathers in the hills, reminding us what it’s like to live in nature, with the smell of soil and the wealth of life.

The Culinary Zinema section is sponsored by Nespresso.

THEMED DINNERS

The five feature films in the section will be accompanied by themed dinners running from September 19 to 23 at the Basque Culinary Center and whose common denominator will be the journey to foodie destinations including Uruguay, China, Japan and Peru. The combined tickets for screenings and dinners, costing 80 euros, will go on sale on September 2 at 10:00 and can be purchased from the Festival and Kutxabank websites. The tickets for the films without dinners can be purchased from September 11 at a price of 8.25 euros.

The Culinary Zinema themed dinners will kick off on September 19 to accompany the opening film Mibu: La luna en un plato ( Mibu: The Moon on a Plate), a documentary presenting the Ishida husband and wife team and their restaurant Mibu, one of the world’s most exclusive. For the occasion, chef Albert Raurich, owner of the Michelin one-star restaurant Dos Palillos (Barcelona), and of Dos Pebrots (Barcelona) will offer a gastronomic experience paying homage to the Ishida’s ancestral cuisine.

The evening of September 20 will take us to the food of Uruguay with the team of the La Huella beach restaurant, explaining its history, background and milieu. Vanessa González, executive chef at the eatery, and Andrés Viñales, responsible for its grill, have designed a dinner in cocktail format reproducing the foodie experience of eating at La Huella, based on the local gastronomy, offering diners an authentic and contemporary proposal showing why La Huella is considered to be one of Latin America’s best restaurants.

The dinner on the 21st, to accompany the film Tsuchi wo kurau junikagetsu / The Zen Diary, will be hosted by chef Naoyuki Haginoya, gastronomic director of the Nomo Group, which is involved in several restaurants in Spain. He mixes in his impressive recipes the ingredients of the millenary Japanese gastronomy with traditional Spanish dishes, always under one premise: to be respectful with the past and transgressive with the present.  

With the excuse of screening Xiao shan he (Nostalgia), on September 22 it will be the turn of the Chila restaurant (Madrid and Barcelona). Yinfeng Tang and his executive chef Sanhuai Yu will offer a gastronomic experience revealing one of China’s great culinary traditions: the cuisine of Hunan province. The chef’s dishes will transport diners directly to the gastronomy of the Hunan people, combining tradition and design in imaginative and exciting dishes, rich in aromas and flavours.

Finally, on September 23 Virgilio Martínez will close this edition of Culinary Zinema with a magnificent gastronomic experience. The chef at the Central, second-best restaurant in the world according to the 2022 list of The World’s 50 Best, will design an experience symbolising his gastronomic proposal. Based on an approach concentrating on innovation and exploration, the dinner will reflect Peru’s diverse and enriching ecosystem in the shape of a reflection on Virgilio’s career and professional growth.

This year Culinary Zinema also returns to its usual format of ten diners per table in the endeavour to foster discussion for an even richer experience. The teachers and students of the Basque Culinary Center participate in all dinners, collaborating both in the kitchen and in the service.

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