Sabin Arana, The Chef

This note comes to us thanks to the Miami Herald:

Basque chefs bask in Miami's glow

By Fred Gonzalez

You might see an accordion player and a tambourine artist around town this week, dressed in traditional Spanish garb, playing music to clap and smile to. They're here from Spain's Basque region with hopes of promoting tourism, food and wine in their part of the world.

Six of the region's top chefs, each with his own restaurant, are in Miami until Thursday, producing invitation-only meals at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden for the local Basque community and the Tides Hotel on Ocean Drive. We caught up with one of them, Sabin Arana, for a chat.

Q: Is it hard working with so many chefs on one menu?

A: More than six chefs, they are six friends, so working together is easy.

Q: How did you prepare for your collaborations?

A: We know we are going to Miami, and we have to get the ingredients in Miami, so the six of us get together and we talk about what we are going to make.

Q: This is your third trip to Miami; for other chefs it's the first. So, where do you go eat?

A: We end up going to places we don't see back home. Like the churrascarias.

Q: What makes food from the Basque region unique?

A: Actually, it's always been a way of eating. In the Basque region, in old times, the mother's typically stayed at home and cooked for the family. So our influences come from this.

Q: Why should people come to the Basque region and enjoy the food, wine and tourism?

A: It's hard to explain. In Spanish, No somos ni los mejores ni los peores. No es por eso. Somos nosotros. [We're not the best, nor are we the worst. That's not the reason. We are just ourselves.]

Let me tell you, that chef sports quite a name.

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