Foodie Berlin: ZUKA Dessert Manufaktur

Very often when I expected a lot of time enthusiastically to go checking some cakes place everyone was talking about and left it with a big disappointment. I discovered ZUKA around one year ago during a walk with a friend, entered to see what it is all about and waited and waited till paying a visit. Somehow, I wanted to be sure that this place is for real and will stay open for longer. 

I went there during the week, around the middle of the day and it was almost empty. Some guests were enjoying the last summer days and were enjoying the outside places. However, I remember to see the place almost full in the evening. The overall design of the curvaceous location with a window wall was a bit disappointed as I expected more elegance after looking at the tempting pieces of cake. Another disappointment was the absence of wifi, something almost normal for many German places. 

After a bit of hesitation, I ordered a peach green tea tart and an eclair. After the disappointing KaDeWe eclair experience where I paid a lot for being offered a very sugary pastry, this time the sweetness was moderate, but the pastry a bit tasteless. The cold cream of the filling and the sweetness of the dots of chocolate changed the impression and till I was done I was having my sugar shoot. Before going further with the tasting, I allowed the very normal cappuccino to clean my mouth.

The fine green tea wall with a strong macha taste hide a white mascarpone cream, the only sweet part of the cake, with peaches on the top. Every single bit of it revealed new pleasures and alll the three elements of the cake balanced and completed each other. At the end of it, my eclair impression was just modest. 

The cakes can be also ordered for home. The prices are acceptable and the service is moderately friendly. Every single sweet temptation is offered on a small golden paper, and looks tempting enough to feed even the most sophisticated sweet teeth. This time, my sweet adventure was not disappointing. 

Foodie Berlin: Koshary Lux, Oriental Street Food

There is rarely something that can surprise me in terms of food in the Western part of Berlin, but this summer offered me many reasons to think that there are so many things on the move here too. As one day in August I was slowly walking around Savigny Platz, a colourful place with spicy smells caught my eyes and called my foodie curiosity: Koshary Lux on Grolmanstrasse 27. 

In a friendly ambiance with an even friendlier service, here it is served 'Oriental Street Food', trying to mix the shuk - market traditions - from Marrakesh, Beiruth, Algier or Cairo. The menu has one of success dishes on Friday evening - the Moroccan carot salad (with chilli and cumin), dates salad with goat cheese and celery, walnuts and baby spinach, meaty sandwiches and tomato soup. Many choices for both vegetarians and non-vegetarians. For the beginning, I ordered a fresh Egyptian lime lemonade with mint that was so fresh and delicious - moderately sugarly - that I wanted one more time and the recipe too. Do not expect shawarma or falafel or humus and it is good this way.

The portions are available in both small and big portions, offered at affordable prices. Although hungry, the Koshary mix fed me enough although if not that spicy - introduced to me as moderately - I would have been tempted for one more try. It has lentils, rice and maccaroni with tangy tomato sauce, topped with caramelized onions, chickpeas and a pistachio-spice blend. Brought in a very simple metal bowl it has an interesting mixture of tastes and aromas that makes you think to busy shuks and unknown worlds.

For the end of my short first stay, I took a dessert too: a muhallabiya - milk pudding with rose water sirup, almonds and pistachios. A natural sweetness of the pudding meeting successfully the springles pistachios and almonds which offer a good balance. 

This order was enough to open the appetite for more. Maby they introduced some more meals for the autumn season. If not, still there are some things on the menu that would love to test anyway. 

Lavish dinner at Himmelspagode

Last week, I was heading to Briesetal part of my project covering 100 Places to See in Germany when I passed near a huge pagoda in the middle of Hohen Neuendorf. At first, was thinking that maybe I was dreaming or was it too hot for my imagination, but realized that it was exactly what I saw. Too busy to stop for an investigation, I decided to keep it on the top of the return agenda. Meanwhile, we kept debating whether it is a temple or a restaurant, with most of the voices saying that it should be a restaurant. 

Many hours later, we were at the gates, and took one of the places on the outside terrasse of the Himmelspagode, ready to enjoy the pleasant summer afternoon wind and our meals. The menu was not making our choices easy - with various choices of Thai, Chinese and sushi. While waiting for the food, had a look indoors - slightly air conditioned - instantly transported in the middle of a (foodie) Chinese bedtime story: 400 places, three floors, one reserved for private business lunches and other events, enormous candelalbra and a big pond with tortues and red fish. The three big halls: Kaisersaal, Pekingsaal and Himmelsaal are carefully decorated in the classical Chinese style, with engraved mirrors and colourful glass paintings inspired by flora and fauna. 

One of the many waiters bringing the orders with a smile, dressed in colourful traditional clothes, brought us fortune cookies. With the classical music on the background, we tried to understand the message sent to us...

Hopefully, the food arrived fast and we gave up our intensive thinking. Out of the dishes we ordered, sushi was not the strongest point of the menu, but eating sushi at a Chinese restaurant is always a problematic choice. Instead, my fried noodles with black sesame were simple with moderate amounts of onions, and some pinches of carrots. The rice was not as oily as the Asian imbiss next my office door, with enough veggies to make it rich in taste.

While waiting for the sweet parts, I enjoyed my cold coffee - not the usual Vietnamese coffee I am so in love with. Rich in icecream and fatty cream that diminishes the strong coffeine taste.  

As usual, the sweets are for me the most important part of an Asian meal. I simply cannot have enough of them, with their moderate sweetness and combination of fruits. Our co-shared meals included baked balls of sticky rice filled with a mousse of red beans. Balanced taste with the natural sweetness of the honey and pineapple. 

The baked bananas - my choice - were not such a big surprise, maybe too fried, or too oily and the banana were too mashed for my taste. Maybe I was just having enough of all the food and of the long hours - around four - spent on the balcony of the pagoda with a view over the outdoors lake surrounding the circular building. 

The restaurant is open from Monday to Saturday, from 11.30 to 23.00. It has another two (much smaller) restaurants in Berlin, at the KaDeWe and Kaiser Pagoda in Potsdamer Allee. The prices are moderately to high, but given the good service, the ambiance and the quality of the food, it is one of those places that you always keep in mind to return, whatever the price and the distance. 

Foodie Berlin: Shaniu's House of Noodles

Although I was told several times that there is a delicious Asian/Chinese foodie life outside Wilmersdorf, I am stubborn enough to keep exploring all the local temptations in my area. When mentioning noodles, Shaniu's House of Noodles was often mentioned as a serious option to test and taste, so yesterday, trying to save a quite hectic day, I arrived there just in time to grab the lunch offer. The restaurant is situated on Pariser 38, a couple of minutes of walk away from the Spichernstrasse metro station. 

The offer changes every day of the week - the restaurant is open all round the week, a special event for the Berlin restaurants in the Western side - and includes a dish of noodles plus a salad or soup. The place was looking simple yet not precarious, with some nice white lamps and a Tiffany lamp in my corner, with changing light colours. The classical jazz background made me forget about all the things that did not work out during that first half of the day. 

The order was taken and brought relatively fast. The menu includes not only traditional Chinese dishes, but also some classical Asian fusion cuisine, plus an impressive offer of Italian and French wines, and other sorts of drinks too, many of them displayed in the bar area. My first choice was a kettle of green tea, a very simple sort. The noodles are traditionally Chinese, but by request - and for 2 extra Euro, one can also order the house made ones or the delicious udon (always my first choice of noodles).

The service is impressively polite. As I refused the meaty soup I was brought, it was replaced kindly with a salad, finely chopped and adorned with a very spicy sauce that gave a new life to the otherwise boring leaves of salad. Especially when are you fighting with a cold as I did

The main dish was made of noodles with vegetables, brought in plates of Asian inspiration. The noodles were delicious, not that oily as I experienced in similar restaurants, and with a good add of shiitaki mushrooms, Chinese cabbage, broccoli and delicate shreds of carrots. The natural tastes were kept. The veggies are bringing a light balance to the tasty nutritious udon noodles. 

The prices are relatively moderate, with a 2-course meal and a drink going around 9 Eur. The vegetarian offer is not that varied - get used with it when you are visiting a genuine Asian restaurant anyway - but the memory of the delicious udon can make my day any time, although I will keep ordering the same meal over and over again.