It’s crazy to me to think that Berlin´s Best Coffee is one of the first blog posts I ever put online on the new choiceofmagic. I can hardly recognise the writing and the pictures anymore, but there you go. Your girl who drinks coffee every blue moon, wrote about the best coffee in Berlin, the city that never rests, where I lived for five years before moving to Lisbon. Fast forward a few more years, and having gone back to Berlin, I felt it necessary to write a post about my favourite restaurants in Berlin. Some of the old ones have unfortunately closed in the meantime, but here’s what rocked my taste buds in 2024, as I returned to Berlin on a beautiful spring day.
BREAKFAST / BRUNCH
Full disclosure: Berlin is the city that introduced me to brunch. Brunch was popular in Berlin in 2011 when I moved there, and it remains just as popular today. I’m not claiming that Berlin was the trendsetter (my hunch is that possibly London was a bit ahead in the European brunch scene), but Berlin took it seriously from day one. So I have a pretty much endless list of brunch places I love in Berlin, but I´ll stick to two new fantastic spots I discovered during my 2024 visit. The first one is Benedict´s (I went to the one in Wilmersdorf, but there’s a second one in the East). And while I was warned that their Croissant Royal (smoked salmon and chives cream in a homemade croissant) was absolutely humongous, I still got it just for myself and barely managed to get back up from the table after finishing. Mind you that while it’s priced at 23€ (a lot for a brunch dish imho), it does come with bread buns with Nutella, butter and marmalade before they even serve you the huge croissant with the two poached eggs. Meaning – totally worth it. The second discovery of the trip was Terz in the Schillerkiez. With a very different vibe, Terz lies glued to a church in the iconic Schillerkiez and serves some truly fantastic food (and at a much more decent price than Benedict´s). Whether you’re going for the Turkish eggs (which are actually not called Turkish eggs there) or just a plain salad, the food is solid and the mood wonderful.
LUNCH / DINNER
Yet again, I have countless lunch and dinner spots to recommend, but we’ll stick to three this time – two new tries and one old timer. Firstly, one of the new tries I absolutely loved at lunch time is Cecconi´s – a classy restaurant inside the SoHo House, which you can also find in other cities such as London. The food we had was actually more brunch-y than lunch-y, and we did complement it with plenty of cocktails, but you can pretty much get anything at Cecconi´s. And while the food is certainly good, but I have to say that you mainly come here for the vibes. The second you sit down, you’ll feel like a million bucks. Or like Daisy Buchanan from the Great Gatsby. Secondly, the other new try is KINK which I highly recommend for dinner and drinks. A dark, moody, semi-fine dining restaurant that serves great food and even better drinks, you will need you to book it in advance as it’s rightfully popular. Thirdly, an old time favourite of mine is Osman´s Toechter, a fantastic Turkish restaurant in Eberswalder. You’ll also have to book this in advance as it can get fairly popular but you won’t regret it. Sharing delicious mezzo here and a great glass (or bottle) of wine, while the staff makes you feel right at home will make you longing for coming back over and over again (as I have been doing for the past few years).
DRINKS
Out of all things in this world, the thing that Berlin never lacks is bars. They’re everywhere. Which makes it more difficult to figure out which ones are worth it and which are overhyped. So let me enlighten you. I’ve chosen four Berlin bars – two of them relaxed, underground-is, hipster-y and as random as they get. The other two I’ve chosen are on the opposite spectrum – upscale, fancy and some might say even pretentious. Nonetheless extremely fun, So let’s go.
If you’re looking for a place that is bustling from morning to evening, (and that you can go to right after or before your dinner at Osman´s Toechter), then An Einem Sonntag im August is your spot. They have a smoking section, the music can get quite loud, but with everyone so packed together, books under their improvised tables, you’ll feel right at home. To continue the party, you can move over just a couple hundred meters farther to Zu Mir oder Zu Dir. Now this is a night bar, and while not everyone goes there for dancing, you can enjoy some fun dj-ing there, while sipping on a beer or cocktail. The appeal of the place for me was the utter randomness of the decor – from old tvs to a maneki-neko (the Asian winking cat), to an actual sofa in the bathroom, the place has “Berlin” written all over it and is wonderful in its “Berlinness”.
But now let’s get serious and upscale your bar experience a bit. Over in Gendarmermarkt, you can find the Newton bar. You’ll come here if you want to see some of Helmut Newton’s work, his photographs decorating the walls of this bar where you can have some great whiskey and cigars. I admit this was one of my favourite places to take our management team when they were visiting from NYC. It feels intimate, fun and expensive, so a safe spot to impress others. And finally, we have the creme de la creme, Bellboy. A speakeasy just meters away from the Newton Bar, this place will teleport you into the 1920s. It is simply put – exquisite, and has some of the best cocktails I’ve ever had. You can also have some nibbles here, but what you’ll actually stay for are the drinks, which are as creative as they get. From a cocktail served in a Hulk-like fist cup, with a condom on top, to another served in a ballerina shaped porcelain cup that twirls on your table, you’ll be amazed at the presentation of any single drink you have there, I promise.
STREETFOOD
Now that we’ve done both fancy, and hipster Berlin eateries and bars, it’s time to mention Berlin´s street food scene and to focus on two particular inherently Berlin dishes: the curry wurst and the kebab. For curry wurst, I recommend (after having tried pretty much all of them), Konnopke´s Imbiss underneath the train lines at Eberswalder. They’ve been doing this since the 1930s and their curry wurst is as fantastic as it is cheap (roughly 5€ if you add fries and a sauce to it). As for kebabs, everyone will most likely send you to Mustafa´s Kebab on the Mehringdamm, but while it’s a fantastic kebab, I just don’t feel it’s worth the huge queue. Full disclosure: I feel similarly about getting into Berghain. So if you want a finger-licking kebab that you won’t queue for an hour for, I recommend Mustafa Demir´s Gemuese Kebab at Warschauer Strasse. The veggies are perfectly fried, the meat super tender, and their sauces on par with the original Mustafa´s.
And with this, I now finally feel closure, that having lived in Berlin for as long as I did, I have now honoured it with its own food guide. And who knows, maybe one day I´ll even do a clubbing guide to this marvellous city that never rests? Until then…
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