Samer loves a good bakery, and on a few vacations, I’ve set us up to do a bakery comparison day, so that’s why we did it on our last day. The bakeries were in a new part of Berlin that we hadn’t been to, and it was really fun. We went to both Albatross Bäckerei and Monsieur Ibrahim. I thought Monsieur Ibrahim’s cinnamon roll was really good. It was flaky, the dough was not too thick, and it had a lot of cinnamon flavor. I bought focaccia from Albatross and ate it the next day on the plane; it was really delicious. So these are both high-quality bakeries.
The guy working at Monsieur Ibrahim responded to my “Ist Englisch ok?” with “Only for business.” I thought it was hilarious, and we both laughed. It was a funny exchange about how the British aren’t really that great, but as a language, it’s useful.
We made our way to Mitte to visit Haus Schwarzenberg and Hackesche Höfe. These were cool inner courtyard shopping areas. I bought a print that I will have framed in the coming weeks. We found some very fancy chocolate there with a special truffle called the Queen Louise truffle, which was quite delicious.
From there, we made our way back to Schöneberg. We returned to Romeo und Romeo for no other reason than we knew where it was, we needed to go to the bathroom, and we just wanted to sit for a minute. We were going to something in that neighborhood anyway, so it made sense. An old gay guy was complaining to another old gay guy about how young gay men don’t read books anymore and just play on their phones. It just made me laugh.
We had a small currywurst at Tom’s Currywurst. Tom’s has the best currywurst—not the best fries, but the best sausage and ketchup, and they let you add extra spice. I thought it was great. I think everybody should go to it. The guy who runs it, who I assume is Tom, was super friendly. I even bought a magnet from him. I really liked it.
We visited Galerie Newman, a well-known gallery that specializes in homoerotic art. There was nothing in it that jumped out to me. Certainly not the art styles I like. I did buy two art books. They had a small exhibition of Jürgen Wittdorf, and I bought the exhibition catalog. But many of the pieces were over €3,000, which is well out of my budget. None of it spoke to me, so I was unwilling to pay a lot for any of it.
I learned years ago that if you’re going to fly economy, don’t eat the food if you’re coming from Europe. Just go shopping and buy your food for the plane. So I purchased focaccia bread from Albatross Café earlier. I went to the grocery and bought a container of fresh, very good mixed berries. I also bought a cheese sandwich from a bakery near my hotel and a cheese-and-spinach Durum from a Turkish food stall that had opened at a farmers’ market near my hotel that day. And I also bought a Knusperschnitzel that I thought was made of potato, but it turned out to be made of chicken. Anyway, I took all of that on the plane. I ate very well and passed up on every bit of food the flight attendant tried to give me the following day.
For our last dinner in Berlin, we went to Marjellchen. It was a good restaurant, but not a great restaurant. Very old-school white tablecloth–quite boring. One unique and fun thing was that I started with a Pillkaller, a grain alcohol shot with a slice of sausage on top. They said it was a traditional way to start a meal. Seems to be some old Prussian thing. I also had a salad with sautéed chanterelles and a carafe of Riesling. My main course was Zwiebelfleisch Lorbass, which is pork in onion gravy.
All of the food was good, but everything looked old and dusty. Including the vase on my table, which had a fake flower in it with a lot of dust on it, and there was even a little bit of algae on the rocks at the bottom of the vase. It probably didn’t help that a tour bus of British people was eating there. It made me want to return to Elefant, but I had a good meal.
Next: Germany – Conclusion