"Any day now, I'll win the Planeta Prize," says Karlos Arguiñano.

Karlos Arguiñano's latest "child" weighs 2.4 kilograms. It's called 'Cocina para todos' (Cooking for Everyone) and carries the Planeta surname. It has 700 pages containing 560 recipes. Just in time for Christmas, it introduces a new cookbook that will sweep the novelty tables. It's a classic for this season, like Mariah Carey's Christmas carol that returns home like the traditional Christmas nougat. Arguiñano (Beasain, 1948) has presented his new "book child" in Aia, a town where Amaia, the youngest of his six biological children, makes delicious txakoli wine.

Arguiñano's numbers are impressive. At 77 years old, he has been on TV for 37 years, hosting nearly 8,000 programs in which he has cooked about 13,000 recipes. He started on TVE in 1981, attracting three million viewers. Since then, he has been on both channels of the Basque television ETB, Telenorte, Telecinco, channel 13 and the public ATC in Argentina, and Antena3 where he currently shines as the king of the kitchen with his 'Cocina Abierta' (Open Kitchen).

But he is also the veteran monarch of culinary publications. He published his first book in 1990. 'El menú de cada día' (The Daily Menu) sold one and a half million copies "for which I didn’t receive a dime". "The publisher from Serbal was a crook who flew off with everything, which was a lot," he recalls with a smile.

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With a print run of 110,000 copies and priced at 24.90 euros, -a reasonable 10 euros/kilo-, 'Cocina para todos' (Planeta) is the twelfth cookbook in an unbeatable series that has sold more than one and a half million large-format books.

Planetary Irony

It hits the bookstores with figures reserved for fiction authors like María Dueñas, Dolores Redondo, or Arturo Pérez Reverte. Arguiñano has no plans to publish fiction or his jokes for now, but he doesn't rule anything out, including memoirs. "If we continue like this, I might win the Planeta Prize someday. As soon as I learn to write, I'll start," jokes the author in front of some executives from the publishing giant. "I couldn't have lived off my jokes, but other things...".

He feels free to do whatever he wants and, of course, to continue telling those bad jokes that season his recipes. "No network has ever told me what I have to say, so I say whatever I want," boasts the affable and popular chef who estimates he has "spoken alone for more than four thousand hours."

"At 77, I still have the desire to cook every day, healthy, affordable, and fun. I think of those who have to feed three or four people on a salary of 1,200 euros. Not those who own four boats. I don't cook elvers, nor fresh kokotxas nor lobster. I rarely make dishes for a celebration," he says with a more serious expression.

Fulfilled Dreams

"I can't afford to get sick," says this hyperactive communicator who leads a team of almost 20 people at his production company Bainet and who guards a brand "that would not release just anything." "I have no pending dreams. I'm old, but fresh.

I have far exceeded my expectations. I own restaurants, a hospitality school, a hotel, wineries...I've produced movies, sponsored a motorcycle team, pelota players, and several women's handball teams," he lists.

He details this at the K5 winery run by Amaia Arguiñano, an industrial engineer and oenologist. A 15-hectare vineyard and 50,000 vines on the edge of the Cantabrian Sea, in Aia, near Zarautz, where the chef has his restaurant. In Aia, he produces between 50,000 and 75,000 bottles of txakoli of various qualities. All from the same type of grape, Hondarrabi zuri.

His fifth son, Joseba, who shares the screen with him, joined the presentation and contributed 58 recipes to the book. "He's not as funny as me, but he's smarter and much more prepared," says his cheerful father. To keep it all in the family, his sister Eva Arguiñano signs another 56 dessert recipes.

Good humor is a key ingredient for Arguiñano. "I'm quick-tempered, yes, and sometimes I have a bad temper. But it passes quickly. Bad temper complicates life. You have to let it go and start afresh. Without humor, you can't lead a healthy life," he assures, recovering his frank and contagious smile.

The ironic vein comes from his father "who was very funny." "My mother was very lame. When my father introduced her to my grandmother, she was suspicious and my father told her: 'don't worry, mom, we already know which foot she limps on.'"

He doesn't quite know how he ended up in the kitchen. Young Arguiñano was a bodyworker at CAF, assembling doors and roofs of locomotives. "My first salary was 5,000 pesetas and I thought I would be happy managing my dough. But my father again used his humor: 'Yes. You're going to manage your dough but also your own house,' he said, inviting him to move out."

"Eating well is not about eating a lot or expensive, it's about eating a variety," repeats another of his mantras, the chef of tasty, substantial cooking. Every time he starts a TV adventure, he begins with the same recipe, "hake in green sauce in honor of my mother" he explains.

Now he offers "simple recipes with ingredients that are neither expensive, rare, nor complicated, from natural and seasonal cooking." From "lifesaver" dishes that are cooked "in a snap" to more elaborate recipes to treat oneself or others, from steak tartar with pumpkin to mushroom soup with crispy cheese, including battered anchovies with piquillo sauce.