Andoni Luis Aduriz receives La Vanguardia’s Special Comer Award 2025 for his contribution to avant-garde cuisine at an international level.

14/10/2025

During the Comer La Vanguardia 2025 Awards gala, held at the Hotel Arts in Barcelona, Andoni Luis Aduriz was honored with the Special Comer Award for his nonconformist vision, his constant curiosity, and his ability to transcend the boundaries of cuisine.

Andoni received the award from Pep Gatell and Nadala Fernández, of La Fura dels Baus, inside a giant wooden egg —a creation by the artists themselves— that held the trophy within it. The chef dedicated the recognition “to those who are not invited to the table, to the ignored and the discarded,” advocating for a gastronomy with social conscience.

In the same spirit, he took the opportunity, together with the members of La Fura dels Baus, to share the project that Pep and Nadala are currently developing around food and dysphagia — an initiative aimed at offering gastronomic support to people living with this condition, seeking to preserve the pleasure of eating beyond physical limitations.

The project brings together oncologists, nutritionists, and chefs, exploring the hedonic dimension of eating to improve the quality of life of those who need it most. It was born from Pep Gatell’s own personal experience: after being diagnosed with esophageal cancer, he lost both his esophagus and stomach, though retaining his sense of taste and smell, and now receives enteral nutrition.

From Mugaritz, we are contributing to this initiative through the development of a recipe collection focused on the sensory and emotional dimension of eating, reaffirming our commitment to a gastronomy that goes beyond pleasure — one that nourishes connection, empathy, and life.

In this fifth edition, the following were also recognized:

• Carles Gaig, for a lifetime dedicated to traditional Catalan cuisine.
• The Gazan artist Ahmed Muhanna, recipient of the Special Commitment Award, for his testimony on hunger as a weapon of war.
• Evelyn Megías, winner of the Familia Torres Gastronomic Story Award for her work Flor de invierno (Winter Flower).

The event, hosted by journalist Cristina Jolonch, brought together some of the greatest figures in gastronomy — Ferran Adrià, Carme Ruscalleda, Joan Roca, the Torres brothers, and Fina Puigdevall, among others — in an evening that celebrated creativity, empathy, and the transformative power of cuisine.