Txangurro
Basque spider crab dish: shredded crabmeat sautéed with onion, tomato, brandy and breadcrumbs, baked back inside the crab's own shell.
Txangurro is both the Basque name for the spider crab (Maja squinado) and the most famous dish made from it. The canonical preparation is txangurro a la donostiarra (San Sebastián-style): the crab is boiled, the meat is picked from the shell and legs, sautéed with finely chopped onion, leek, tomato and a splash of brandy, mixed with breadcrumbs, returned to the cleaned shell, topped with more breadcrumbs and baked until the top crisps. Eaten straight from the shell with a small fork. The dish is one of the foundational plates of Basque cuisine, on most traditional San Sebastián restaurant menus, and increasingly common on serious Catalan and Madrid seafood menus too. Closely related to the French crabe farci but with its own Basque seasoning profile.
How it's served
Baked in the crab's own scrubbed shell, served hot with the crisped breadcrumb crust on top. Eaten with a small fork directly from the shell, often as a starter. Most traditional Basque restaurants serve it as a one-shell-per-person portion.
Regional variation
Txangurro a la donostiarra is the canonical version. Other Basque preparations exist (txangurro a la plancha, with the crabmeat grilled and seasoned simply) but the baked-in-shell version is the reference. Outside the Basque Country, the dish appears on serious seafood menus in San Sebastián's diaspora.
- Origin
- San Sebastián, Basque Country
- Etymology
- Basque word for 'spider crab.'
Where to try it in Barcelona
One restaurant on Guidavera mentions txangurro in their kitchen description.
Frequently asked
What is txangurro?
Both the Basque name for the spider crab (Maja squinado) and the most famous dish made from it. The dish is a preparation of shredded crabmeat sautéed with onion, tomato, brandy and breadcrumbs, baked back inside the crab's own shell. The canonical version is txangurro a la donostiarra.
What does 'a la donostiarra' mean?
In the style of Donostia (the Basque name for San Sebastián). Used on Basque menus to signal a San Sebastián-style preparation: usually a combination of onion, tomato, brandy and parsley, applied to seafood. Txangurro a la donostiarra is the most famous example; rodaballo a la donostiarra (turbot) is another.
Is txangurro hard to find outside the Basque Country?
Less than it used to be. The dish is now on serious seafood menus in Barcelona, Madrid and other Spanish cities, especially restaurants with Basque chefs or a Basque-influenced concept. The spider crab is in season from late autumn through winter; the best txangurro is in November-March.
Related terms
- PintxoBasque equivalent of a tapa: a single bite, often skewered with a toothpick onto a slice of bread, displayed on the bar for self-service.
- TxakoliLight, slightly sparkling, very dry Basque white wine, traditionally poured from height into a tumbler.
- Al pil-pilBasque emulsion technique where salt cod and olive oil are swirled together off-heat until the gelatin from the fish thickens the oil into a glossy yellow sauce.