Under chef Jorge Losa, the kitchen frames itself as renewed haute cuisine, and it preserves two emblematic dishes from Zalacaín's history: Búcaro 'Don Pío,' a consommé gelée with smoked salmon, quail egg and caviar, and bacalao Tellagorri, salt cod cooked in the restaurant's own style.

Zalacaín grew out of Jesús Oyarbide's Príncipe de Viana, first in Echegarate and then in Madrid. In 1973, with French nouvelle cuisine already under way, Oyarbide opened a Madrid restaurant built to compete with the best in France, and, being of Basque-Navarrese origin, named it after Pío Baroja's novel Zalacaín el aventurero. He surrounded himself with the best: Benjamín Urdiain in the kitchen, José Jiménez Blas in the dining room and Custodio López Zamarra in the cellar. With them the stars came one by one, the first in 1975 and the second in 1981, and in 1987 Zalacaín became the first restaurant in Spain to earn three, and figures from across Spanish social, cultural and political life passed through its dining room.

The decline was slow. In 1996 Oyarbide sold the restaurant to Luis García Cereceda, the same year it lost its third star; the second went in the early 2000s, and the last in 2015, by which time the García family, latterly Carmen García, was running it. Insolvency, sped up by the pandemic, closed it in November 2020. In April 2021 Íñigo Urrechu's Grupo Urrechu bought Zalacaín, and it reopened that November, keeping classics such as the pommes soufflées and bacalao Tellagorri and much of the old staff.

It celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2023, marked with a book published with Grupo Planeta, and in 2025 the Cofradía de la Buena Mesa named it Restaurant of the Year in the Community of Madrid, citing its rebirth since the reopening. Today it is owned by Grupo Urrechu, which aims to recover the essence of what was the country's great gastronomic temple for the 21st century. It is recommended in the Michelin Guide and holds one Repsol Sol.

Chef Íñigo Urrechu leads the gastronomic direction, with Jorge Losa in the kitchen, and most of the staff who worked the dining room and kitchen in earlier eras have stayed on. The house describes its cooking as renewed haute cuisine, rooted in the best of French culinary tradition. Two historic dishes remain: the Búcaro 'Don Pío', a consommé gelée with smoked salmon, quail egg and caviar (€49), and bacalao Tellagorri (€39).

The carta also includes Beluga caviar by the gram, a goose-liver terrine, local lobster salad, cod kokotxas, fried sole paupiettes, roast Landes squab, beef Wellington, pig's trotters and Zalacaín-style callos, with mains mostly between €37 and €53. Desserts include crêpes Zalacaín. There is also a tasting menu, 'Un recorrido gastronómico por Nuestra Carta', at €190.

The cellar is run by Raúl Revilla, named Spain's best sommelier at the 2023 Premios Nacionales de Gastronomía, and the house counts it among the best in Spanish restaurants, one where you can still enjoy the traditional degüelle of old Port or the finest aged wines. The dining room is led by Roberto Jiménez, more than 35 years in, and there is a cocktail bar under Víctor Losada.

Zalacaín has three private rooms, each named, like the women in Pío Baroja's novel: Rosita (the companion) for 30, Linda (the exotic one) for eight, and Catalina (his wife) for 12. Works by the painter José Manuel Ciria hang in the restaurant, chosen to echo the colours of its original décor.

Zalacaín is open Monday to Saturday, 13:30 to 17:00 and 20:30 to midnight, and is closed on Sunday and throughout August. Book through the reservation page on its site, by phone on +34 91 140 14 14, or by email at reservas@zalacain.es.