Thai Experiments and Basque Cuisine at Aziamendi Phuket. Iniala Beach House, Phuket, Thailand. Copyright © 2022 Terence Carter / Grantourismo. All Rights Reserved.

Thai Experiments and Basque Cuisine at Aziamendi Phuket in Southern Thailand

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Thai Experiments and Basque Cuisine at Aziamendi Phuket? Who would have thought. Certainly not us. But that’s exactly what was happening down at sleepy Baan Natai in Thailand’s South. Local Thai chefs working under the guidance of Michelin-starred Basque chef, Eneko Atxa have been creating some of Thailand’s most exciting contemporary cuisine.

You might expect that Iniala Beach House, Thailand’s newest and most lavish luxury retreat, designed by some of the world’s foremost architects and designers, to be located on Phuket’s flashy ‘Millionaire’s Mile’ at Kamala Beach.

But the flamboyant 10-villa seafront property, home to what’s set to become one of Thailand’s most exciting fine dining restaurants, Aziamendi Phuket, is one-hour’s drive north of Phuket’s Kalama Beach, in the sleepy farming village of Baan Natai, just over the bridge connecting Phuket island to the mainland.

We were lucky to spend a couple of nights at stunning Iniala Beach House shortly after it opened – and we were even luckier to spend some time with chef Eneko Atxa of Azurmendi restaurant in Basque Country, who is overseeing Aziamendi Phuket.

Thai Experiments and Basque Cuisine at Aziamendi Phuket

There’s no denying that Phuket, while home to an incredibly delicious ‘Phuket-style’ of Thai cuisine, was not a fine dining destination until Iniala Beach House opened. For haute cuisine, gastronomes went to Bangkok.

So we were very surprised to learn that Iniala’s restaurant, Aziamendi, was set to become the first outpost of Spain’s hottest young chef, Eneko Atxa.

At 35 years old, Eneko is Spain’s youngest chef to receive three Michelin stars for his cutting-edge restaurant, Azurmendi, located in the Basque Country of Northern Spain.

Like Iniala Beach House’s philanthropist owner Mark Weingard, Eneko shunned the glitz and glamour of San Sebastian for a quiet rural idyll when he established Azurmendi in the mountains ten minutes out of arty Bilbao.

It was not so strange then after all to find the passionate, reflective Eneko and his team – chef de cuisine Alex Burger, formerly of Daniel Boulud in New York, who was Atxa’s sous-chef in Spain, and restaurant manager Behzad Davarkia and sommelier Fabien Etienne from Heston Blumenthal’s Dinner in London – serving up their pioneering Thai-infused Basque cuisine amongst the casuarinas on this sleepy, scrubby stretch of Andaman coast.

Such extraordinary culinary talent didn’t end up in southern Thailand by accident.

Iniala’s owner, Mark Weingard, had long been a fan of Eneko’s cuisine and eating at his restaurant a number of times. A former trader turned full-time philanthropist, Weingard once lived in a house on the land (now absorbed into the Iniala property) with his fiancé Annika Linden, who died in the Bali bombing in 2002.

Two years later, Weingard was at Natai Beach with friends when the tsunami hit, destroying everything around them. Those two events motivated him to establish a foundation in Linden’s name, which he later called Inspirasia, dedicated to supporting projects for the underprivileged right across Southeast.

The idea of Iniala Beach House was to generate funds for those projects. Creating Thailand’s most luxurious accommodation with a fine dining restaurant directed by one of Europe’s hottest chefs would surely do the trick.

While Eneko is regarded as a modernist chef, revered for his playful molecular creations, such as an egg yolk carefully pierced with warm truffle broth that explodes in the mouth, Eneko told us that the techniques are simply tools to serve the ingredients, which at Aziamendi will be primarily Thai, local and seasonal.

“In Bilbao, my food is influenced by the environment around me – the mountains, the sea, the four seasons, the fresh produce in the markets,” Eneko told us in a lengthy interview, which we’ll publish here. “In Thailand, we have the sea here, mountains nearby, different seasons, and so much beautiful produce!”

While the tasting menu at Aziamendi is reasonably priced for 14 exquisite courses of Eneko Atxa’s cuisine (THB 7,500/A$250), a fully-inclusive seven-day villa stay starts at A$20,000. It does, however, include all transfers, driver and vehicle at your beck and call, a butler, chef, spa therapist, and housekeeper, all spa treatments, activities, day trips, and meals, including picnics, barbecues, canapés at cocktail hour, and two tasting dinners at Aziamendi.

If you’re not staying at Iniala you can still dine at Aziamendi. See our guide to Phuket’s best resorts and hotels for nearby accommodation. The closest property, Aleenta, is one of our favourite resorts in Thailand, and it’s just down the road.

Iniala Beach House & Aziamendi
www.iniala.com

UPDATED January 2017: Aziamendi has closed so this year we’re planning a trip to Bilbao to dine at Eneko’s restaurant, Azurmendi.

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A travel and food writer who has experienced over 70 countries and written for The Guardian, Australian Gourmet Traveller, Feast, Delicious, National Geographic Traveller, Conde Nast Traveller, Travel+Leisure Southeast Asia, DestinAsian, TIME, CNN, The Independent, The Telegraph, Sunday Times Travel Magazine, AFAR, Wanderlust, International Traveller, Get Lost, Four Seasons Magazine, Fah Thai, Sawasdee, and more, as well as authored more than 40 guidebooks for Lonely Planet, DK, Footprint, Rough Guides, Fodors, Thomas Cook, and AA Guides.

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