San Sebastián bars and a mushroom allergy

Everyone told us about a bar called Ganbara which I already had on my list due to a Instagram reel showing a dish with mushrooms and an egg yolk in the center. We dropped off our bags and walked immediately to Ganbara which was about to close at 3:30.

I freaking love mushrooms fyi. That first photo of the bar with plates of mushrooms stacked high was a dream. In the second picture, there are four types of mushrooms on the plate we were served and they are all covered in butter.

Funny start to this place, the server came over to ask what we wanted and we ordered a wine called “Viura” and he said “esta blanco” and then pointed to the “vino tinto” section and I said “si quiero Viura” and he repeated that it was a white wine in Spanish thinking that I didn’t understand I guess and still pointing to the red section on the menu. So I smiled and said “entiendo, pero quiero vino blanco” and we all laughed a lot because I have no idea why he assumed we would want red wine but it was very funny.

Anyway, back to the mushrooms. Phil is allergic to the porcini rub at work but has never had an issue with any other mushroom. He really liked the thick white mushroom on the top side of the dish and my favorite were the morels on the bottom. We were enjoying this amazing dish and phil said “I think I’m reacting” but stayed calm. He insisted on continuing to eat his fave mushroom on the plate. We also had some Foie gras on toast and a chorizo pig in a blanket type thing. We finished up there but Phil was starting to get itchy.

I said “maybe one of those mushrooms was a porcini” so we googled it and sure enough had a good laugh to find out the one that Phil liked and insisted on eating was in fact a porcini mushroom.

I suggested grabbing a Benadryl at a pharmacy but he said he was fine so we moved on to the next bar.

This one was crowded but we snagged these two pinxtos that looked yummy without knowing what they were. The closer one is carmelized goat cheese and the further one was a piece of steak with some sort of fruit slice and salsa. Phil continued to feel itchy but was still insisting he was fine. On to the next bar.

This one I had seen online also. Foie gras on toast, a meat skewer, and sea urchin soup! I hate sea urchin but supposedly this was good? At least in soup form it takes away the nasty texture. It tasted almost like lobster bisque except that it was sea urchin. One bite was enough for me. Foie is hard to mess up and I’m loving that we can eat it at nearly every bar for like €3. Phil starting to look more red and itchy so we decide to walk a bit and maybe walk it off?

The beach here is beautiful. We stopped down for a beach photo shoot which I thought might distract Phil who was turning into one giant hive at this point.

Finally he said “maybe we should get that Benadryl” and so we went to the pharmacy and she gave us some pills. Still he said it was a minor reaction and only took one. By the time we walked back to the hotel, Phil looked much more worried. We were tying to find a place to buy bottled water but had to give up on that. I was stressing about what to do next but also managed to laugh in between the stress about his insistence on eating those porcini mushrooms.

Once we got back to the room I convinced him to take a second allergy pill and that seemed to have done the trick. I applied cold compresses to his hives and he slept it off.

Honestly a bit scary! Neither one of us have allergies so this was a new experience. Turns out you can be allergic to only one specific type of mushroom! But damn were they good!