Marisqueria Can Santos - la Jonquera

No one comes to Can Santos by chance. It 's entirely unobtrusive and obviously caters to people who have been coming here for years. They have no website, and I don 't think they 'll ever have one. When I put Can Santos into my GPS, it showed me an entirely different location. You 've got to enter the full street address, and then it 's straightforward. In reality, if you 're coming from the south, Can Santos is within 2 minutes or less of the single La Jonquera highway exit; if you 're coming from the north, there are two exits for La Jonquera, and you have to take the one for La Jonquera South, which is adjacent to the toll plaza. Anyhow, once you 've found the place, you discover that it 's very old-fashioned and homey. The owners are really charming, with a warm welcome. La Jonquera being a border town, almost everyone speaks three languages: Spanish, Catalan, and French. We speak French, so I don 't know if the owners speak English. But there is an English menu. No one bothers with the menu anyway, and I haven 't studied it, though I suspect that a vegetarian could find something. In reality, nearly everyone takes the 25-euro menu fixe, which is an unbelievable deal. Four courses plus coffee. First course: a large slice of pan tomate, a generous platter of mixed cold cuts, and a salad. Second course: a truly enormous platter of shellfish, half mussels, the other half a mix of squid, clams, shrimp, and crayfish. Third course: an equally enormous platter of lightly fried fish of various sorts. Fourth course: a choice of simple desserts, like crema catalana. Coffee is included; drinks of all sorts are on offer, at reasonable prices. The fish is of the utmost freshness, and it 's prepared to order, within customers ' sight. Reservations are a good idea, especially in the evening. Again, since La Jonquera is a border town, Can Santos does both French and Spanish hours. So you can have lunch as early as 12noon or as late as 3pm, dinner as early as 7pm or as late as 10pm, perhaps even later. Wonderful place, not fancy, true authenticity.

Not the most glamorous venue or situation but exceptional food and friendly service. Copious is a bit of an understatement. Is normally full by 12.45!

Hermoso lugar! la mujer muy amable. ¡La buena comida! ¡De verdad volveremos!

El mejor sitio de la junquera para hacer un alto y comer.

Pasamos por casualidad y podemos decir bastante coincidencia, ofrecer un menú entrante con mariscos o paella para elegir, brutal, la deliciosa paella, la deliciosa piña bañada en la crema catalana casera y un poco quemado, un deleite total y el precio era muy razonable, volveremos.