Berlin Rick Stein's Long Weekends

A little bit of what you fancy does you good,

and that's precisely what I think about taking off for a long weekend.

Not too far away, not obvious like Paris or Rome,

I'll dive into the culture, take in some history,

but food will always be key.

So, this week, if you like hearty dishes like roast pig's knuckle

and lots of beer served with 3,000 happy diners,

or if you prefer the latest new-wave take on really local cuisine,

or if you might like to take a self-drive sightseeing

tour in a classic old car...

Well, this could be for you.

# Hey, Rick

# Where we going this weekend? #

Berlin, actually.

# Are we flying a few hours away

# For some delicious food they say?

# So, Rick, make the booking and let's get cooking

# And get those taste buds going this weekend. #

I must say, I'm really excited.

I've just got off the plane and we're going to the hotel

and I've never been here.

So it's just that incredible sort of, like, wonderful anticipation.

I started reading up about the food and about the architecture

and about the museums, but really it's the food

that's drawing me here.

What am I going to find?

Well, I thought it was going to be lots of pork knuckle

and potatoes and dumplings and sauerkraut.

Yes, I'm going to find that,

but what I've been reading is there's this really cutting edge.

There's a lot of very, very, sort of, arrogant chefs saying,

"This is how we're going to do this in Berlin,"

and I think that's what Berlin, for me, is going to be all about.

It's an attitude.

It's an intelligent, artistic, but very, very

"it's us" sort of attitude.

Wow.

This is just how I imagined Berlin to be. Look at that. An old Mini.

Duvet in the back. I had one of those. This is fab.

-Evening.

-Hi, good evening.

-Lovely hotel. Very unusual.

-Thank you. It is.

-My name's Stein.

-I'm checking in.

-All right. Let me have a look.

-And you're Rick, right?

-Rick, yeah, yeah. And you are?

-Is it your first time with...? I'm Caroline.

-Oh, hello, Caroline.

-It's your first time here?

-Yeah, yeah.

-It's very, very...

-In Berlin as well, or...?

-Yes, yes.

Oh, really? What brings you here?

I'm having a long weekend doing a bit of filming, actually.

Oh, right. Cool.

'I've only been here for an hour, but I'm getting a feel for this.

'A basic, down-to-earth, no frills, mixed with a dash of the demimonde

'and a good sprinkle of post-war modernism.

'I have a feeling that I'm going to find Berlin anything but dull.'

Gosh. HE LAUGHS

Oh, this is so good!

Look at this. Look at the ceiling.

It looks like an old car park.

Pipes and wires everywhere, but, I mean, this is really...

I sort of think this is a sort of zeitgeist

of the whole Berlin experience.

I'm told we're opposite the zoo here,

so in fact this room is supposed to overlook the monkey house.

Presumably that's what the hammock's for.

I can lie in there and watch the monkeys.

I'm not going to, cos I'm a bit clumsy.

"No hunters in jungle rooms."

Lovely bit of German sense of humour, I think.

HE LAUGHS

I was tempted to have an early night, but I had to eat,

and one of the restaurants I have heard a great deal about

from my chefy friends is here.

Nobelhart & Schmutzig.

It's a hot ticket in Berlin, but fortunately the owner,

a fierce-looking man called Billy Wagner, had heard of me.

It's a bone-dry Lambrusco, unfiltered.

A really straight starch.

Enjoy.

Billy has a set menu.

That's all there is.

Take it or leave it.

It's fiercely local.

They don't even serve lemons.

It's like theatre-in-the-round,

where the kitchen becomes a stage.

The best thing is to eat in the kitchen.

When you are at a friend's place, you know,

and when they have a dining room and they have a kitchen,

everybody is at one point in the kitchen

because people are cooking there, you know, and talking.

I know, and you're trying to cook and they're all standing over you

with a glass of wine, saying, "How are you, Rick? How is everything?"

And you're trying to work...

Exactly, exactly.

Here the chef is more a waiter, you know, like more a person who

serves the food and shows... Gives the people spirit.

To start, the slices of smoked eel with icewine vinegar jelly,

garnished with fresh radish shoots.

Then barbecued baby leeks.

Later they are gently fried with slivers of speck lard,

thin slices of tasty fat with crushed fennel seeds.

I love the way they curl up like spring flowers in the sun.

The leeks are presented rather like a mini version of Stonehenge

set in a lake of pork stock.

Now, neck of saddleback pork, first barbecued for five minutes

and then finished off in the oven for another five.

Blanched salad leaves garnished with frozen pine needles.

Yes, frozen pine needles, and, yes, they taste lovely.

What a great idea.

That's a reduced pork stock made with meat juices and wine.

Well, that is trout and it's actually wild trout.

And very fresh.

Very, very lightly seared,

so in fact it's sort of, like, raw in the middle,

but that's how I like oily fish like trout and salmon.

The mashed potato, I don't know how they've done it, but it's smoked.

It's got this smoky flavour.

And you've got this puree of kale.

It's like a sauce of kale.

I don't know if this is allowed.

Mmm.

Would you ever think about putting, like, pork knuckle or,

you know, sauerkraut or anything on the menu?

We had pork knuckle on the menu,

but German cuisine is not a German cuisine - you have regional cuisines

because Germany was, until 1840-something, was split up.

It wasn't one country, you know?

So German cuisine is something which is not existing.

And if people tell German cuisine, it's probably Austrian,

to be honest.

HE LAUGHS

Well, that was a nice light supper.

Time for bed now.

I hope to see monkeys in the morning.

Don't see any monkeys. It's a bit chilly for them, I guess.

When I was, well, about 19, 20,

I took a job on a German freighter out to New Zealand.

And I was on it for about three weeks

and this is what we had for breakfast every day.

Maybe with the odd beer or two, because we were young.

I was working in the engine room and it was hot all the time.

I just remember we had just lots of cold things for breakfast.

Excuse my fingers.

What I really like is we've got some nice little sauces to go

with my smoked salmon.

Here's some horseradish.

And I think just cucumber, because I'm going to have a very,

very full day of things like pork knuckle, potato dumplings,

sausages, sauerkraut. So a light, healthy breakfast, that's the thing.

Berlin has a favourite dish that Germans have taken to their hearts.

It's not everyone's cup of tea.

The food snobs here absolutely hate it.

Nevertheless, they sell nearly a billion of them

in Germany every year and indeed in Germany

there's so much envy on who invented this dish.

Hamburg says it comes from there. Dortmund the same.

But I believe it was born here in Berlin.

If you're not sure what I'm talking about, it is, of course,

the famous currywurst.

You either love it or "Nein, danke."

I know I shouldn't, but I really do like currywurst.

I mean, all it is is bratwurst, tomato ketchup and curry powder.

But somehow it sort of works.

The sum is greater than its parts, if you see what I mean.

It was invented in the late '40s by a lady called Herta Heuwer

from the British section.

Now, I reckon this is not a British invention,

but I think the curry powder came from the British -

if you imagine the troops maybe going out for a few beers,

seeing some bratwurst with tomato ketchup

and just maybe having a bottle of curry powder in the old kitbag

and just sort of sprinkling it on the top.

And Herta, being a commercial woman

and tasting it, would have thought, "We're onto something here."

It may not be true, but I think we can take a little

bit of patriotic pleasure from the story.

If currywurst is number one in the fast food chart,

then I reckon the doner kebab is not far behind.

Food, as I've always said, is a by-product of events,

and in the 1960s, loads of Turkish guest workers came

to West Germany to help rebuild the ravaged cities and factories.

Naturally they bought their own food,

and, well, it's obvious - voila.

The doner kebab lives with pride alongside the Frankfurter,

the bockwurst, currywurst and no doubt pizzas too.

As it's my long weekend, I guess I can go wherever I like.

I don't have to follow any guides, only my imagination.

And the stories I've read about Berlin,

especially the stories of the Berlin Wall...

The wall that cut the city in half and spawned 100 spy novels.

You have to remember that the city of Berlin was

well into East Germany and West Berlin was

governed by the Americans, the French and the British.

I'm glad there are parts of the wall still standing because it really

makes me think, how could anyone in their right minds do this to a city?

Sticking a ruddy great wall inches from your front windows,

separating and dividing roads, rooms, neighbourhoods and families.

It's a travesty.

In fact, it's a monument to travesty

and one that lasted for nearly 30 years.

-You're coming from England, am I right?

-Yeah, yeah.

Everything you see here was no-man's-land.

And do you remember the wall?

I was five years old when the wall was built, you see.

And it was one of my very first memories when I was a little boy.

And I remember so well that we tried to catch

a view from our grandparents which were standing on the other side

of the wall in the distance by maybe 150 metres.

What, your grandparents were in East Berlin?

Both of them did live in East Berlin,

but if you are a little boy about five years old, of course

you don't understand anything about the special political situation.

The only thing you can't understand is why it is not

possible to see Grandpa and Grandma no more.

I'm sorry. What's your name? I've... HE LAUGHS

My name? My name is Hans.

Well, very nice.

-You are?

-My name's Rick.

-Rick? Nice to meet you, Rick.

-Very nice to meet you.

I was just thinking when you were saying this...

It's so moving, but I was thinking,

sometimes conversations with taxi drivers astound you.

I'm a child of my town and I love to tell people

which are obviously interested about the history of my town, of course.

It makes me much more happy than instead

you are asking for next table dance bar or something like that.

Or where you can get some good German food.

German food. Do we mean curry sausage? Do we mean fish?

Do we mean...? What do we mean, schnitzel?

HE LAUGHS

BIKE'S BELL RINGS

Oh, I'm really soaking up atmosphere here.

I mean, for most of my youth - the Berlin Wall went up in '61,

came down in '89 - East Berlin was a no-go place and just endless

stories about desperate people trying to get across the wall.

And when the wall finally came down, there was a mass exodus to the West.

And places like this, you could almost get buildings for nothing.

Rents were either low or non-existent,

so of course lots of young people came here, opened clubs,

discos, restaurants, you name it.

And the result of that now - I find that really exciting -

is this sort of massive upsurge of, sort of, fun and excitement,

because buildings were so cheap.

This old brewery, it used to be one of the biggest in Germany,

is the site for one of Berlin's new trendy restaurants.

It's called La Soupe Populaire.

That's French for "soup kitchen."

It's very popular

with cool young diners who seem to love lots of concrete

and old industrial paraphernalia,

creating a setting fit for a film noir shoot-out.

Gosh, this is so Berlin. You see that crocodile there?

Legend has it that towards the end of the Second World War,

the Allied bombing was getting so intense that the zoo near here

was bombed and the crocodile tank was fractured

and all the water flowed out. And they didn't want the crocodiles

to die, so they brought them here

and put them in one of the beer vats.

Not in beer, but in water.

Very German, isn't it?

-Michael.

-Yeah, you are Rick?

-Yes, good to meet you.

Nice to meet you. Welcome to La Soupe Populaire.

It's just extraordinary, this lovely kitchen in this very old building.

We built the kitchen like a cage inside. These are my chefs.

What we do here...

Every dish is inspired from our mothers and grandmothers,

so it's typical German food, or Berlin-style food.

We take the original dishes,

like Konigsberger Klopse, it's called in Germany -

-that's meatballs from the veal...

-Yeah.

..and it comes with a beetroot salad, mashed potatoes

and sauce from chicken stock and white sweet wine.

So, in a bowl containing a kilo of veal mince,

plus chopped head meat for that gelatinous touch

and some chopped tongue for texture, Michael adds capers and parsley.

Next, two eggs, about 100g of breadcrumbs,

some salt and white pepper - about 20 turns.

Two tablespoonfuls of sweet mustard.

I love German mustard.

Now, like mud pies, you mix and form the meatballs with wet hands.

That's very important.

And you simmer very gently in chicken stock.

For the sauce, heat about half a litre of chicken stock

and then some single cream, about 150ml.

Add some butter and keep whisking.

Two tablespoonfuls of semolina, and whisk until that sauce thickens.

And now some sweet white wine, about half a wine glass full.

The meatballs take about 20 minutes to cook through.

The sauce is done, nice and silky, and so is the mashed potato.

The Konigsberger Klopse, a famous East Prussian dish,

resurrected into a lighter form.

Oh, that late arrival - breadcrumbs, lightly fried in butter,

and a little ball of shaven beetroot and apple salad

with a touch of strawberry vinegar.

It was quite superb.

In fact, I ate it with Per Meurling.

He's a passionate foodie

and writes a blog about Berlin restaurants.

Well, this is, just as I expected,

very light.

Can you just pronounce it again?

It's pronounced "Konigsberger Klopse".

-Konigsberger Klopse.

-Exactly.

Classic Prussian dish.

I just think this is the way forward.

If you want to do local food, do it like this,

just a little bit of a twist. I think it's fab.

This restaurant, it stands for the new way of Berlin chefs

and German chefs who are coming in and saying,

"We want to do things different.

"We want to make it... We want to take the German cooking

"and cuisine to the next level and make something out of it."

It really, really is good. It hits the spot with me. It really does.

I'm glad you like it. Cheers.

Just before sitting down to enjoy

that magnificent Konigsberger Klopse,

I noticed on the menu a starter of marinated salmon,

and it got me thinking.

I was looking for German flavours

and maybe doing a cured salmon dish, so I thought beetroot,

I thought caraway, and I came up with this sliced salmon dish.

And with it I'm going to do a German-influenced salad -

cucumber, apple and horseradish.

So I'm just going to mortar and pestle-ize caraway seeds

and some white peppercorns.

I think caraway seeds are very, very Northern European,

and I love the flavour.

So now I'm just going to add a little bit of salt.

Well, a little bit - I always say a little bit.

Probably be a bit astonished by how much salt

and how much sugar is going into this.

But bear in mind, this is a cure.

I'm going to put this in the fridge now,

weighed down for about 48 hours.

By the end of it, you'll hardly notice it's salty.

It is all leached out in osmosis.

Now, then, beetroot.

That goes into the processor,

and followed by all the salt and sugar,

caraway seeds and white peppercorns.

And then the boring bit.

Whizz it all up.

That'll do.

Oh, lovely smell. Heady stuff.

Now the salmon - look at that. It's beautiful.

Cut from the centre, so it's really thick,

and you get a much sweeter, deeper cure.

So this is a type of gravadlax

for which you need copious amounts of clingfilm,

which hopefully will keep in check that flavoured salt

that will, after a couple of days, work its preserving magic

into the fillets of the salmon,

changing its colour and giving it a sweet flavour.

Now, to weigh it down,

a piece of wood and a really heavy copper saucepan -

the sort of saucepan I used to work with in the restaurant 30 years ago.

It weighs a ton and will ensure that the precious cure

will reach all the vital parts over the next 48 hours.

Next, the salad, and in a nutshell, it goes like this.

Slice quite finely using a Japanese mandolin.

Respect these - they're very sharp indeed.

Slice cucumber, apples and onion.

I mean, have you ever seen a TV chef wearing a blue plaster on his hand?

Respect these Japanese mandolins!

Now two spoonfuls of horseradish.

I mean, it's ridiculous -

I just took it out of the cupboard and it cut me!

And salt, sugar and cider vinegar.

Now a drizzle of rapeseed oil, which is getting more and more popular.

It's getting to the stages where it's competing

with virgin olive oil. Rapeseed oil!

Throw in the cucumber, apple and onion.

Roughly chop the dill and add to the salad mix.

Now, the moment of truth.

That looks really good.

So, now to slice.

Fab.

Beautiful.

Look at that. It couldn't be better.

And the salad of apple, cucumber and dill

with a touch of horseradish - perfect.

I wouldn't mind that for my lunch.

When I mentioned Berlin being a must location for a long weekend,

everyone said, "Fabulous for a winter break."

Fireside beers, party food and all that stuff.

All I can say is that on this particular winter's morning,

it's very, very cold here.

-It's a funny place to come for a long weekend, isn't it?

-Why?

-Well, it's just a bit noir.

-I like noir!

It's like Christopher Isherwood, Bertolt Brecht, Otto Dix.

You know, black, melancholic stuff. It's what Berlin's all about.

Yeah. I suppose so.

Well, it is for me, anyway.

You want sun all the time, I suppose, don't you?

You like happy, sunny skies.

I like a bit of black, a bit of noir.

It's sort of... It suits, really.

One of my so-called friends suggested that

if I wanted to see the city then take the tour in a Trabant,

that legendary symbol of East Germany,

the car with a ten-year waiting list made out of Duroplast,

a communist type of Bakelite.

Well, it didn't rust!

The tour is certainly different.

INDISTINCT VOICE FROM RADIO

You see, you listen to a commentary on a walkie-talkie

that comes from the lead car.

Sometimes you can make it out.

Sometimes you can see out of the windows.

I have to say, it's not the ideal way to capture

the greatest features of this German city.

-FROM RADIO:

-The Burgermeister, they say the best burgers in town.

RICK LAUGHS

RADIO VOICE CONTINUES INDISTINCTLY

CAR HORNS BLARE

BLEEP

HE LAUGHS

If I don't end up in the local police station, I don't know what...

Presumably... HORN BLARES

BLEEP

CAR HORNS BLARE

-CAMERAMAN:

-You've got it, Rick.

-I wouldn't hold your breath.

-FROM RADIO:

-Watch the policeman, ja?

-Got to get these

-BLEEP

-gears organised.

I'm stumped.

Looking forward to lunch?

I'm looking forward to anything but driving this bloody thing.

That's a no entry, there.

HE LAUGHS

Completely, utterly stuffed.

At last I found third gear,

and I turned the radio off to celebrate and felt free.

And this is a glimpse of Berlin.

What was that like?

Terrible!

Terrible. Didn't hear a word.

HE LAUGHS

I got the hang of it in the end.

Now I'd like to show you how to get to one of Berlin's

most popular restaurants.

Follow me, please.

Well, they said something about it being round the back

of the Westin Hotel, but I must admit I'm beginning to lose heart.

This is so industrial. Who would know how to come round here?

Said something about a chandelier.

There we are.

HE LAUGHS

Must be... Oh, there we go.

A chandelier will guide you to a door,

and there will be a sign that says Cookies Cream.

And that's it!

BUZZER

So noir. So Berlin.

-Cookie.

-Hello.

-Heard a lot about you.

-Heard a lot about you!

-Great that you're here.

-It's nice to be here.

Well, I have to say, I really didn't expect

to walk into a packed restaurant.

I thought it would be more like a Chicago speakeasy joint,

like they had in the gangster films.

But this is a packed vegetarian restaurant

and it's only seven o'clock in the evening.

The origins of this restaurant came from the famous Berlin techno clubs,

and so when Cookie, the owner, got bored with discos,

he started to create some very exciting vegetarian food

using, in this case, the same Technics turntable!

This is a flan made from pureed sunflower seeds

and Jerusalem artichokes.

The green is liquidised watercress and parsley oil.

There's more to it than this,

but I'm afraid, being a simple cook, I couldn't take it all in.

And anyway, I've only got a CD player at home!

Now, you might think this is not my sort of food,

and of course, it's not what I'm brought up to do.

But I've just thrown away the rule book here in Berlin

and I must say, that looks like a piece of art.

Well, this is paper-thin potato strips

topped with mashed potato and creamed spinach

with a tiny splash of Noilly Prat.

Radishes, now built up into layers.

A julienne of spinach on top with chopped pistachio,

sesame dressing with a fried egg yolk -

a lot of work there.

There's loads of dishes here. I could go on and on.

But nobody's going to cook these at home

and that's the point - that's why people come here.

They get something unique, and it's not just a substitute for meat.

Cookie, I'm really interested about...

I mean, it's a really avant-garde, for me, restaurant.

-But tell me, you started off in nightclubs.

-Exactly.

I started off years back, 22 years ago.

I opened up my first little bar

in the cellar of the house where I was living.

-Legal?

-No, it was illegal. Of course it was illegal!

In those days you had to have illegal clubs.

So why didn't you carry on with clubs? Obviously so successful.

It was a lot of fun. I had a lot of fun.

I love electronic music, and Berlin is electronic music place.

But then I started getting bored of it

and I decided to then reinvent myself

and open up in the same venue a restaurant.

Well, I had a club, and I mean, didn't have time

to get bored with it cos it was closed down by the police.

But I reinvented myself as a chef.

I heard, yes.

-Similar.

-We've got a lot in common.

-Similarity.

So, a lesson learned in Berlin -

the more difficult it is to find, the more attractive the venue.

But for many locals here, they don't want to go

finding their way around car parks and loading bays looking for a sign.

They want a table heaving with beer, sausages, wine and sauerkraut.

Sometimes on a journey you just want to get grounded,

and this place, the Hofbrauhaus,

is where ordinary Berliners go to let their hair down.

This is the biggest beer tavern not just in Berlin,

but in the world.

THEY YODEL

But if you like pork knuckle -

that's roasted pork knuckle and potato dumpling -

Wiener schnitzel and chips,

currywurst - it wouldn't be Berlin without currywurst -

oh, and spaetzle - that's a soft dumpling-like pasta -

and lots of sausages,

then this could be for you.

Especially if you like to drink litres of cold Pilsner beer.

Indeed, many people think of this as quintessential German food.

It isn't, really.

It's the food of Bavaria

that goes so well with lederhosen and dirndl skirts,

snowy mountaintops and grassy meadows

full of contented cows wearing huge bells.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

I bet 98% of people watching this

would think this is just typical German food.

And the Berliners are a bit snooty about this sort of big beer hall

and eating crispy pork knuckle -

they like boiled pork knuckle.

But for me, I love restaurants,

and this is just a great expression of a fabulous restaurant.

OK, it's a little bit naff - yes, it is.

But I was just thinking,

imagine we had beer halls like this in England

serving roast beef and Yorkshire pudding

and having Chas & Dave on the stage.

OK, a bit naff,

but everybody would love it!

Well, that definitely wasn't noir,

and I really enjoyed it.

Actually, that is a must for a long weekend.

Eisbein, eisbein, eisbein.

That's cured pork knuckle.

Roasted or boiled, it's lovely.

But when it arrives on your plate it's a bit daunting,

so I thought, why not do the same thing but use a bacon joint?

A streaky bacon joint.

Do it with some lovely home-made sauerkraut

with some yellow split pea puree and delicious German mustard.

So first of all, in goes my bacon joint.

That's basically just streaky bacon in the whole piece.

Next I've got an onion studded with cloves.

Lovely scent of cloves. Always goes well for me with ham or pork.

Now some chilli, just cos I like it,

and then some brown sugar.

I love the sweetness of the brown sugar

with the saltiness of the bacon joint.

Then some black peppercorns - about a teaspoon of those.

Maybe a few more.

Plenty of bay leaves off my tree.

And now some cider - just about 300ml,

about half a pint in old money, of cider.

And finally top everything up with some water.

I'm just going to leave to simmer now

for about 45 minutes to an hour.

So while that is simmering away,

I'm going to make a super quick sauerkraut.

You may say this is not a good idea,

sauerkraut should be matured for weeks,

but I tasted it next to some bought sauerkraut

and found it very nice.

So you slice up an onion thinly,

and I'm going to fry it in rapeseed oil gently.

I like rapeseed oil.

I know many people who think it spoils the landscape

when it's growing. I love those bold yellow squares

among the greens and the golds and the browns.

I think it's fabulous.

Now slice up, as thin as you can, white cabbage.

Remove the base and cut it into thin strips.

Chuck that into the onions and tamp it down,

getting those cabbage pieces covered with the oil.

Next some caraway seeds.

I think this is one of the distinctive flavours of Germany.

Then salt,

and cider vinegar.

And now cider.

And as my old friend Keith Floyd used to say,

if you can't drink it, for God's sake, don't cook with it!

Finally, water.

And I'm just going to let that simmer now

for about three quarters of an hour

and then it will be done.

Not quite like ordinary sauerkraut.

This is an unsmoked bacon joint and will not disappoint.

It's ready to serve after very nearly an hour.

It's cooked to perfection and it slices easily.

I have to say, I much prefer it to one of those scary pork knuckles

and it's a lot easier to carve.

That, with my home-made sauerkraut and a split pea puree,

will be wunderbar.

Best served with fabulous German mustard, called senf.

Try and find that in the shops over here.

Best of luck!

Finally, the sun has got his hat on.

I've got to show you two places high up on the food map of Berlin.

The first one is KaDeWe,

a department store famous for its food.

It's the sort of place you could spend a whole day in,

tasting this and trying that.

They allowed us to film provided we came at some unearthly hour

before the customers arrived.

I just feel so privileged to be here early in the morning

before any people get here.

I was told once that Michael Jackson used to ask

to go into big department stores just so he could do his shopping

when there was nobody there.

There is this real sense of sort of excitement.

What I about this - I mean, look at it.

I love the colour coordination.

I mean, it just is a delight to the eye.

And this - well, it's just made me

want to reach out for a frying pan, it's so fresh.

Sashimi-grade tuna,

turbot, sole, monkfish.

Well, this is a sight I love -

a complete counter of smoked fish. The Germans love smoked fish.

I just want to run through a few of these,

just to tell you why I like everything so much.

Starting on the left,

smoked mackerel, and very heavily smoked mackerel.

Behind that is what we call bloaters.

That's herring, smoked herrings with the guts still in them.

At the back we've got smoked cod's roe.

I love smoked cod's roe, a real delicacy.

That'll be from Iceland.

Here we have smoked halibut.

Prize here - look at it with the little gold medals on it.

Smoked eel, the favourite smoked fish in Germany.

Here we have what they call saibling,

which is what we call Arctic char.

And over here we have what they call butter mackerel.

I know it as white tuna.

Very, very fatty fish, really good for smoking.

Cured salmon dishes here, some halibut as well.

And right over here - I was hoping to see those -

at the back, smoked sprats.

I love a smoked sprat.

I've just ordered up some delicious oysters.

And what I love above almost anything -

smoked eel. Almost I love it as much as the Germans do.

And with smoked eel...

Mm.

..luscious, fatty smoked eel,

you have to have horseradish cream - made freshly, of course.

It cuts through that fattiness.

So really - this is about nine o'clock in the morning -

I shouldn't be, but I am enjoying a glass of German Riesling

and I don't understand why we don't drink more of this in the UK.

It's fabulous.

I said there were two places I wanted to show you.

Well, the other one is the famous Hotel Adlon,

probably the most famous hotel in Germany.

I love hotels, especially older ones.

They give off a whiff of history.

Greta Garbo coined her famous phrase, "I want to be alone,"

while filming Grand Hotel here.

Charlie Chaplin and Marlene Dietrich were guests,

and the great Escoffier cooked here.

On a former famous occasion,

the Kaiser was heard to say,

"How can I repay you for such a lovely meal?"

and Escoffier said, "Give us back Alsace and Lorraine."

Now, I've come here not for a meal

but for their rather grand morning cocktail,

the Kaiser Cup.

-Hi, Rick.

-Hi.

-I want to do the Adlon Kaiser Cup for you.

-Love it. I came here for it.

-Yeah? Oh, fine.

I want to take fresh strawberries for you.

Uh-huh.

And after I'm going to take fresh raspberries,

blackberries also.

Good.

And I'll take some blueberries also.

Lovely.

Many fruits, it's good.

And then we take a shot of gin.

-A little shot of Cointreau.

-Yeah.

Liking it, liking it. Not too much.

It's a good mix. And a little shot of grena...

-Grenadine.

-Grenadine, yes, it is.

And up last...

-Plenty.

-Fresh champagne.

-Big bottle.

Bit early in the morning for it, but...

-It's wonderful in the morning.

-Is it?

-In Berlin we drink it at this time.

-I bet you do!

-I want to do a little decoration.

-Oh, good.

Looks like a cape gooseberry, we call them.

And Rick, now I have for you a wonderful Adlon Kaiser Cup.

-Thank you.

-Enjoy your drink. Cheers!

-Oh, wow.

I'm looking forward to it.

Cheers.

Ah!

-Set up for the day.

-Perfect.

Well, I had to come to the Adlon Hotel

because I've just been reading Christopher Isherwood -

in fact, rereading Goodbye To Berlin.

And the main character in it, Sally Bowles,

would have come here looking for a nice young man,

because she was really looking for somebody to meet

with lots of money to marry.

But meanwhile she was a singer in a nightclub,

called the Windermere club, and not a great singer.

Not nearly as good as Liza Minnelli was in the film Cabaret,

which was based on Sally Bowles.

But the thing about Christopher Isherwood

and the book is there's lots of food in it and lots of drinks,

and Sally herself only lived on prairie oysters.

And he describes her making one - breaking some eggs into a glass,

bit of Worcester sauce,

and the main bit, the most important bit -

stirring it up with the end of a fountain pen.

This grand hotel survived the bombing,

the rockets and the artillery rounds

as World War II came to an end.

But, the story has it, Russian soldiers,

probably wanting to celebrate their victory,

destroyed most of the Adlon when it caught fire

in their attempt to break into the wine cellar.

It was doomed, in the end, by the demon drink.

I'm really interested in the last war.

Well, lots of people my age are,

because it was a living history for us.

The bombsites were all over the place.

So I met with a military historian here, Nick Jackson,

who takes people on tours around the great battle sites of Berlin.

And most of the people want to be taken

to a muddy, half-empty car park.

Not much to look at, but we're standing in

what is the political heart of Nazi Berlin.

Below here was where Hitler's bunker was built.

So he spent the last four months of his life here,

and this would be the final scenes of World War II

and the last scenes of Hitler's life would play out here.

Seems extraordinary that there's all these people here

coming to stand on a bare bit of ground to talk about things.

-I mean...

-It has this pull.

-Yeah.

Hitler's last days. It's a fascinating story.

But in a strange way almost historically sort of trivial,

when you think of the enormous history

and the legacy of World War II,

and leaves this as a place of historic interest

rather than importance.

And for that reason it will lie forever,

and perhaps rightly so, a place buried below the ground

that you need to imagine rather than someplace that you could see.

If you dug it up now, some fragments still remain,

but it's been left, and I think perhaps rightly so,

-as just this bare car park area.

-Just a patch of mud.

-Yeah.

Well, I quite fancy some lunch.

-Me too.

-Do you fancy going for some...?

-I know just the place.

-You do?

Where? Whereabouts?

Well, it's actually Berlin's oldest restaurant,

with traditional Berlin fare.

-Like?

-Eisbein.

-That's the pig...

-The huge steamed pork knuckle.

-I think you might like that.

-Yeah, I like the sound of that.

-Stuffed cabbage, veal meatballs with a caper sauce.

-I'm liking that.

Konigsberger Klopse. The real, proper, hearty Berlin food.

Oh, this looks very nice.

-Wow.

-Berlin's oldest restaurant.

Certainly looks it.

It's called Zur Letzten Instanz.

This is a bit daunting, Nick. Um...

-Where do I...?

-It's certainly hearty portions.

I think perhaps the best would be first to remove its outer casing.

Oh, OK.

So is that normal, not to eat the outer casing, or...?

I think so, yeah. One would leave the blubber.

I quite like a bit of blubber.

But it's one of the reasons why, of course,

it's worth coming to this restaurant.

I mean, traditional Berlin food is very hard to find

and it doesn't get much more traditional than eisbein.

I mean, this is actually delicious.

Quite a lot of it is bone, I think.

You've only got two or three pounds of pork to deal with.

THEY LAUGH

-And what have you got there?

-I've got a stuffed cabbage

served with meat and caraway, with mashed potatoes.

-Think of Berlin food, its function would be to fill you up.

-Yeah.

-With what is essentially cheap materials.

-Yeah.

And to keep you sort of behind the plough for 14 hours a day,

or to help you survive a siege.

I like food being connected to sort of where you are, really,

rather than ethereal chef stuff.

Talking of being connected to where you are, I mean,

I find Berlin really interesting. It's quite sort of...

I mean, we have this little joke amongst ourselves -

it's quite noir, you know? There's a sort of edginess about it.

It's sometimes quite funny.

But there's a sort of willingness to be confrontational

and daring, I think.

Perhaps, in a way, I think that might be...

Again, they're echoes of its past.

I think Berlin today, the city of artists,

the city of tolerance, this "anything goes" element -

and really, that's true.

I mean, you really can do just about anything you want in this town.

I think... Also, I feel like Berlin has the same sort of relationship

with the rest of Germany as maybe New York does

to the rest of the States.

Yeah, it's like a sort of... I like to call it Republic Berlin.

It's always had this sort of separate status.

There's nowhere like Berlin. It is its own little world.

I think that's what makes it so special for visitors.

But I must say, this is a lot to get through. I may not finish it.

You're not getting down until you've finished.

Fair enough. Fair enough.

That was the oldest restaurant in Berlin!

Napoleon was supposed to have eaten there, and Goethe -

maybe not at the same time. Lovely, classic German food,

but the thing I like most of all was their apple cake.

Loads of apple on the top of it

and finished with demerara sugar and cinnamon.

So, first of all,

taking out the core of these apples with my apple corer.

Where was life before an apple corer? I don't know.

There we go.

And now just slicing those apples up as thinly as I can.

Now that's the first job, but I'm not going to need those immediately,

so I'm just putting those into a little bowl

and squeeze some lemon juice over them to stop them going brown.

Turn them over a bit.

That's fine.

And now to make my cake batter.

First of all, some unrefined caster sugar -

a nice colour, I think -

and some softened butter.

There we go.

A whisk happening.

So now I am going to add my eggs, one at a time.

That's just simply so the batter doesn't split.

OK, that's nice and light and airy.

And now I'm going to knock my flour in - this is though a sieve.

The reason for doing this is not really to get the lumps

out of the flour - the flour doesn't really have lumps any more.

Baking powder, as well, to assist in the raising process.

So when I say knock in,

it's just to get as much air as possible into the mix

to make the batter nice and light.

So there we go.

Now a big metal spoon.

I just like to use this for folding flour in.

I'm using the biggest possible spoon here,

just to avoid losing any air if I can.

It's just getting a little bit tight there,

so I'm just going to add a tiny bit of milk,

just to loosen up the batter a little bit.

I love this cake tin - it's one of my oldest cake tins.

It cost a lot of money, but it's really nice and thick -

that matters to me. A good feel to it.

So just smooth that over, like that.

There we go.

Probably won't make the British Bake Off, but I do like making cakes.

Now put my apple in a neat little round.

Fan them out round there, like that.

I've got my oven on at 170 degrees centigrade, gas mark four.

And finally, I'm just going to mix this demerara sugar

with some ground cinnamon and scatter that over the top,

and that's going to go in there for about...

Oh, there's one in there already - how funny!

HE LAUGHS

How silly of me.

Well, I've often said it's very bad manners for TV chefs

to taste their own food and comment about it.

But that's delicious.

Rot ist stehen, Grun ist gehen.

Very important, that.

It doesn't matter if you're a punk anarchist or a Bolshevik rocker,

you always, in Germany, wait for the little green man.

MAN SPEAKS GERMAN

-Oh, yeah.

-Yeah, yeah.

HE LAUGHS

Very strict. "No jaywalking."

If there was a place which people in the west

could say was the epicentre of the Cold War,

then I think this would be it - Checkpoint Charlie.

Now, for three euros, you can have your photograph taken

with actors playing border guards.

But 50-odd years ago, this was the place

where the famous stand-off happened.

Where tanks, Russian and American, faced each other like gunslingers,

each waiting for the other one to draw first.

I can remember this in the '60s.

I can remember this stand-off.

We were all really nervous in those days.

We thought the Third World War was going to start.

It's my last evening here in Berlin

and I've been invited out for dinner, which is nice,

but I've been here long enough

to know it's going to be dinner with a difference.

Maybe dinner in a high-rise car park

or an old munitions factory.

After all, it is Berlin.

I'm going to a dinner here organised by a couple of chefs -

they call themselves guerrilla chefs -

and it's in an old crematorium.

Well, it wouldn't be anything else, would it? It's so Berlin.

I'm a bit on edge because Marcus, one of the chefs,

is a head bouncer for a big techno club here.

It's he who looks people in the eye

to decide whether they're the right stuff to enter.

Very noir.

Very Berlin.

KNOCK ON DOOR

It's Marcus and Christian.

-Hello. Hi, Rick.

-Christian?

I'm Christian. Nice to meet you.

-Marcus, nice to meet you.

-Come in.

-Thank you.

ROCK MUSIC PLAYS

This is the type of catering for those who find difficulty sleeping.

You first of all hire a massive place -

this crematorium is perfect -

make sure it's spotless, of course,

advertise amongst the foodie friends of Berlin

that something big is going to happen, create a menu,

hire in waiters and waitresses,

musicians, cocktails makers...

In fact, hire in everything.

-Christian, you've had to set all this up from scratch.

-Exactly.

It's not like a normal restaurant you go into -

they have everything set, the tables are there.

You don't have to worry about anything, so...

It's really like we have to build the restaurant first.

So, Marcus, what do you mean by "guerrilla chefs"?

Guerrilla chefs, you can call it, that we...

We make it an event for one night

and we want to provide something new, something different,

on a location you could never thought of

that there would be something...

-Like a crematorium.

-Yeah.

-You know, what you're doing,

I keep saying, "It's so Berlin."

It just seems that there is a sort of, like...

You know, there's a sort of energy and a sort of willingness to

-try new things.

-You have...

The things you have to do, the things...

At the end of the day, it could stay only for a year

and then people are fed up.

People are bored of pop-up...

It's the same with street food markets -

people go there, they're excited, they get something new.

But maybe in a half year

we don't have any people who want to come to the dinner,

so we always have to create something new,

we have to be special.

For us, it's like a whole weekend in a club.

HE LAUGHS

'The first course is an eclair, a roast beef eclair,

'filled with red onion marmalade and topped with horseradish.'

'And then you dip it into a hot beef consomme - yum.

'Then pan-fried scallops,

'warm pulses flavoured with vinegar, sugar and sesame oil,

'an apple vinegar and lemon mayo,

'crisp bacon and Japanese green tapioca,

'and fresh shoots. Crikey!

'A puree of chervil roots, fried sausages,

'apricot mustard with chunks of black fried radish

'and shredded red and white cabbage and carrots with vinegar.

'Wow!

'Finally, chocolate brownie with passion fruit,

'chocolate mousse and a red sauce made with apple and pomegranate.

'Chunks of dark chocolate with roasted almonds

'and chocolate toffee. Yowser!'

Well, I do like Marcus' take on a beef sandwich -

it's light and I love the horseradish in it.

However, it's past nine o'clock,

the first course has only just come out.

I think I'm in for a long night at the crematorium.

Maybe a fitting end to my long weekend.

I think this is Berlin on a plate.

This is why young chefs and artists are coming here.

The property prices are relatively low

and so people like Marcus and Christian are putting on this show.

Now, if it works, that's great. Let's do another one next week.

If it bombs, well, never mind.

We may have lost a few euros,

but we've learnt something in the process.

Well, that's Berlin, too.

As one mayor said about ten years ago,

"We may be poor, but we're sexy."

Marcus, Christian, thank you very much.

-We're very grateful that you came.

-Aw...

-Have you ever been to Berlin?

-Before? No, no.

-Oh, really?

-You should come back.

-You should come back, definitely.

Like a shot, boys. Like a shot.

-Thank you very much.

-Thank you.

# Hey, Rick, where we going next weekend?

# Are we flying a few hours away for some delicious food? They say

# We can try dishes in Roma or Barcelona

# For something more exotic, go spices of Morocco

# Yes, you can take your pick

# And even break the ice in Reykjavik

# So, Rick, make the booking

# Let's get cooking

# And get those taste buds going

# Next weekend. #