Two nights only!!!

After a lot of inter-continental communication we are honored to announce that we have a Guest Chef with us for 2 nights only, October 2nd and October 4th. Please visit www.robertocortez.com and have a look at the amazing cuisine that will be on offer in Berlin’s  most intimate dining environment. We are taking a maximum of 10 diners for each of these evenings and would advise you to book early to avoid disappointment. The theme of the menu that Roberto has put together for us is, in his own words,  the “Liquid Dinner Elemental :
Utilizing the delivery of extreme flavor by way of liquid.
Then accompanied by solid, soft and crunchy food elements alongside.
All with custom made eating utensils and cutlery.”

This promises to be the best dining experience available in Berlin in 2009, don’t miss it!!

Water, water everywhere ….

… but we haven’t drowned! We’re still here! So … sorry to all you curious diners who have been requesting slots with us, but it’s been a long, WET summer. First of all, we put together our summer menu at the start of June, and then it rained …… and rained ….. and rained. As if we hadn’t had enough water, we had a leak from the flat above that brought down our kitchen ceiling  and we had to cancel all bookings for July (see our photo of the leak in action!). A saga with the insurance company was FINALLY resolved 2 weeks ago and the kitchen has been restored and the paint is drying. On October 2nd we will be operating once again – and we have a REAL surprise in store!! We have a Guest Chef for 2 nights only, all the way from Los Angeles, an amazing Chef who has cooked for the greats and who has requested some nights with us. Please visit www.robertocortez.com and if you like what you see, please send us a mail. This is a real one off and a real honour for us. There will be a different contribution expected for this evening but it promises to be the best dining experience to be had in Berlin – mail us and we’ll give you the details. Book fast!! More very soon ……

‘Written for men by men’

This brilliant recipe was given to us by James, one of this weekend’s diners, and had he not reminded me that I was looking for recipes, I would have forgotten to get the guest book out once again… so thank you James, for reminding me, for bringing a recipe, for bringing your wife and for being such lovely guests.

Taken from ‘The Stag Cookbook’, a 1922 classic which teaches cooking to men ‘weakened by a fire of feminine raillery & sarcasm’, I give you (via James):

Hudson Maxim – Spaghetti

Take one package of vermicelli or spaghetti, and put it into a saucepan, crushing it in the hand, then put in hot water, and salt a little more than will suit the taste, and boil for an hour.

While the vermicelli or spaghetti is cooking, take a quart of milk and heart three-quarters – or 24 ounces – of it until it boils. Then stir into the eight ounces of cold milk a level cupful of flour, or two tablespoonfuls of flour, pretty well heaped, and then stir the thickened milk into the boiling milk and cook slowly for ten minutes.

Then add three-quarters of a pound of good, ripe, old American cheese, and about half a pound of butter. Then drain the water off the vermicelli or spaghetti and put in from one and one half pints to a quart of canned tomatoes. Heat the vermicelli or spaghetti to the boiling point; and while the mixture of cheese, butter, milk and flour is still hot, stir the two together, then keep hot and serve hot. Do not boil any more, because further boiling would tend to cause the tomatoes to coagulate the milk in the mixture. I prefer to use a mixture of vermicelli and spaghetti instead of all spaghetti or all vermicelli.

- – - – - – -

Well, I’m not sure what the health authorities would say about ‘ a little more salt than will suit the taste’, but I think any recipe that calls for ‘good, ripe, old American cheese’ has got to be a winner. Picture me, later in the week, in my local German supermarket asking for ‘old American cheese’. Wonderful. I’m also pleased to see that they advice against cooking the pasta for longer than an hour. Because, quite clearly, 60 minutes is the perfect length of time to boil pasta.

I promised you ‘Mammy’s Lemon Cake’, and it IS coming – I just need some more time to translate it from the original German.

Welcome!

If you’ve just found us via the New York Times, welcome - pleasure to have you here! We’re a small secret supper club in the heart of Berlin, serving up a five-course meal for absolute strangers every Friday, Saturday and Sunday. There’s a little more information about us here, and you can read what other guests have to say about us here. And if you’d like to make a reservation, just go here!

I’m going to post another guest recipe a little later today, so stay tuned for another charming treat – ‘Mammy’s Lemon Cake’…

(Update: I got a little busy with the cooking, so you’ll have to wait until tomorrow for the recipe - to compensate, there might even be two…)

Food literature

Molly Wizenberg's 'A Homemade Life'

What is your favourite book on food – that isn’t a cook book? Do you have a cherished tome you turn to when your culinary intellect needs stimulating?

I love Alix Kates Shulman’s Drinking The Rain - in fact so much that I have read it over fifty times in the last ten years – which is not really a book about food per se, but food is definitely a theme; finding it, preparing it, enjoying it.

Other people have recommended Isabel Allende’s Aphrodite, which I haven’t read yet, and I’ve also heard that Molly Wizenberg’s A Homemade Life: Stories and Recipes From My Kitchen Table is supposed to be wonderful (and if it’s anything like her blog, Orangette, it definitely will be).

Have you got any favourites?

Schmorgurken

Another interesting (read: slightly strange) recipe from this weekend comes from Viola, born and raised in the Treptow district of East Berlin. Viola and her friend headed into the Berlin night with Johan (of the ’summer soup Granny style’) and his friend after dinner on Saturday, and from what I gather it was a pretty late night. Love it when that happens.

Unfortunately, I think Viola was struggling a little to write by the candle light from the table, and so this recipe is somewhat of an approximation of the actual thing (and also translated from the German…) – forgive me if it doesn’t totally make sense (and thank you Viola)!

Schmorgurken

- 1-2 green gherkins

- 3-4 tomatoes

- low fat bacon

- mince meat

Fry the bacon, add the tomatoes + pepper and salt, cook for a long time, add the gherkins, at the end add meat balls (mince meat +  onions + eggs shaped into balls) -> ready! Guten Appetit!

Though I do enjoy the brevity of this recipe – it’s so easy! Just add some things, cook for ‘a long time’, and then, suddenly, it’s ready! – there are just one too many question marks over this one… Like, don’t you have to fry the meat balls first? Or do they just go in with the tomatoes? And what about the eggs?

It is a pretty well known fact that those East Germans loved their Spreewald Gurken (you can read a little more about them here) but I’m still not wholly convinced. Maybe you had to be there.  Or maybe someone can enlighten me on the enduring lure of the Gurke?

Sunday dinner

With the weather here in Berlin at an all-time low, what you really need on a cold Sunday evening is a nice, hearty pot of lovely ‘chicken alla left-over’ (well, what you really need is an excuse to open that bottle of 2005 Volnay you brought back from last year’s holiday in France). And voila! Sunday is saved.

For two really hungry people, you will need:

- four chicken breasts

-fresh rosemary, sage and thyme

-about 250g fresh vine tomatoes

-two glasses of white wine

-a drizzle of balsamic vinegar

-a couple of bay leaves

-about five slices of Serrano ham

-three small anchovies

-salt, pepper, chili powder

-two fat cloves garlic

-dried mushrooms, soaked in boiling water for about 15 minutes

Turn your oven on to 200 degrees.

Halve your chicken breasts and fry them in a little olive oil until lightly coloured but not cooked all the way through. Set aside to cool a little.

Quarter your tomatoes and put in a lidded casserole (I love my Le Creuset wannabe from Ikea). Throw in your herbs, crushed garlic, wine, mushrooms, balsamic vinegar and anchovies, mix it all up and season well. 

Once your chicken has cooled a little, wrap each piece in some Serrano ham and tuck in to the casserole. Put the lid on and bung it in the oven for about an hour.

Open a bottle of wine you’ve had for much too long and enjoy a glass whilst the sweet, rustic cooking smells fill your kitchen. Maybe put some jazz on that your lovely friend in Barcelona sent you in the post. Or the final movement of Mahler’s 7th.

Set the table and marvel at the fact that the sun finally came out to show its face, just before 8pm. Serve with bread, mashed potatoes, quinoa, pasta – whichever carbs take your fancy (we had leftover bread from last night – very nice to soak up the lovely liquid left in your casserole). Be transported to the south of France. Remember the earth, and the colour of the water in the Tarn, and the sun on your skin.

Afterwards, if you’re not too full, you might stroll down the street and buy an ice cream from the tiny shop with the bright pink facade, or you might just sit on your sofa and dream and relax and enjoy the rest of the evening.

Happy Sunday!

‘Summer soup Granny way’

Last night Johan, one of our diners visiting Berlin from Finland with his friend Oliver, left this wonderful recipe in the guest book:

Summer soup Granny way

- new potatoes

-cauliflower

Boil in little water

- add peas and other seasonal vegetables

-add milk and a lot of dill and season lightly

Something like that, make it work

I just love that last line, ’something like that, make it work’. I think this might be proof that asking people to remember and write recipes at the end of a long meal with lots of wine might be a little ambitious… Thank you so much Johan, we will definitely try this!

We do have a few more recipes to share – East German, American and Costa Rican - so check back later in the week…

 

Last minute places free!

Just had a last minute cancellation for four places tomorrow night (Sat) at 8pm. Get in touch if you’re up for some food and wine in the company of at least three different nationalities!

Great night tonight. It’s a lovely feeling sending eight full and happy people out into the Berlin night (though it is an awfully cold night – three degrees! THREE! This is supposed to be summer, right?). Such a good crowd – and there’s some recipes coming up as well!

Weekend inspiration

Image from Marie Claire Maison

Here’s some weekend food inspiration to brighten your days until we’re back on Monday, hopefully with some recipes and stories from our dinners!

Here is a lovely recipe for sea bass gravlax from Keiko at the beautiful food and photo blog Nordljus – just the sort of thing to bring back the sunny weather.

I am dying to try Clotilde’s Lemon Thyme Creme Brulee. And she makes it all sound so easy…

And finally, some visual candy – a beautiful kitchen via Marie Claire Maison *sigh*.

Have a great weekend, and drop us a line if you’d like to come over for dinner!

(Update: here’s Jorge’s post on secret restaurants!)