The quarter of culinary variety

Prenzlauer Berg is a multicultural quarter and home for people from all over the world. Evenly diverse are the possibilities to satisfy your appetite: whether your out for German or African food, want to try the Japanese or even the Swedish kitchen – be sure to find it right around the corner. This culinary guide guides you through the simple-but-honest and the extravagant.

Let’s start our adventure with something sweet and light. If you’re the type for cheese cake the „Drei-Käse-Hoch“ near Kollwitzplatz is the place for you. Whether it’s cheese cake with poppy seed, with tangerine, with cherries or as a muffin: all the pastries are baked with fresh and regionally sourced ingredients. This, by the way, is a hallmark of food in Prenzlauer Berg: it’s fresh, environmentally sustainable and locally prepared. Enjoy these qualities at „Ralf´s Tortenatelier“ or at „Anna Blume“ which are great places for tortes and pralines. If you just fancy a relaxed cup of coffee you’ll find countless opportunities to recharge your batteries and watch the buzzing and scuttling around you at the usual hotspots like Kollwitzplatz or Helmholtzplatz, Schönhauser Allee or Kastanienallee – or head for the more intimate cafés in quiet side streets.

Small and sweet

Pasteis de Nata, Portuguese pudding cakes, are served at „Kahrmanns Own“, Bötzowstraße, at „Kaffe“, Immanuelkirchstraße or at „Bekarei“, Dunckerstraße. „Cafe Stockholm“ pampers you with Swedish cinnamon rolls. Enjoy pea or blackberry tartes in the French cafés „Le Gapias“ at Winsstraße or „La Porte“ at Naugarder Straße. Or just hit one of the hundreds of bakeries with their bistro tables and cozy seating corners serving everything from almond and chocolate croissants to nougat pastries. If you’re lucky your cup of Java is roasted in the in-house roasting plant. We recommend you just go with the flow and drop on a chair whenever you feel like taking a break. The diverse atmosphere of Prenzlauer Berg can be enjoyed everywhere in the quarter – for free.

From South and east

The largest non-German nationality in Prenzlauer Berg is ... drum roll, please! ... Italian. Thus, you’ll be able to find Italian restaurants galore. The Sardinian menu goes heavy on fish and is rather hearty: pasta is served with potatoes and beans. Tuscany hails with rabbit in white wine with olives or gnocchi with veal. Or go Sicilian with anchovies, calamari and cuttlefish. And, of course, you’ll find pizza. If anyone scoffs at your seemingly mundane choice silence them with the info that pizza was added as a world cultural heritage. And in Prenzlauer Berg there is pizza prepared by Neapolitan chefs.

But the kind of restaurant of bistro you’ll find most often beckons with Asian dishes, especially Vietnamese, followed by Japanese and Thai food. The dishes are wholesome, healthy and delicious. So the rice balls in mango sauce, spring rolls or salad with lemongrass and rice blends well with the way of life in Prenzlauer Berg. 

Off the beaten tracks

Apart from these obvious choices this quarter can also surprise you with fondue restaurants, currywurst, Ethiopian or Brazilian food. Cosmopolitan lunch and dinner choices in a cosmopolitan quarter. You can even tune out all other senses and experience a very unique dinner at the „Dunkelrestaurant“ where you dine blindly, as all light is blacked out – leaving only your taste buds up and running!

No culinary summer guide is complete without the mention of – yes, you guessed right! – ice cream. Produced in many and innovative flavours in Prenzlauer Berg you’ll be spoilt for choice: organic or vegan ice cream, ice cream with goat milk, fair trade, topped with fruit, sprinkles ... oh well, you get the idea.

-al-, July 2018, translation: A. Hartmann, klippenschreiber.de