Berlin Reified | Food, design and life in Berlin

The light after yesterday's storms made me melt

The scenery was mostly unremarkable but I did find this tree and horse

Returned (Brandenburg)

Oh, but it's a wonderful thing to be home and eating scrambled eggs from the chickens you watched scratching in the yard just a few hours earlier. Have you ever seen eggs such a rich shade of saffron? They gratify all my ideas of what it means to keep healthy, happy birds. (My plate, if you're curious, was ten pence from a charity shop on Easter Road in Edinburgh.)

Wednesday afternoon

Errands in the afternoon, to the photo shop, to the children's toy store, to the post box and the Italian shop, to the knitting shop (I have a new project!) and the bakery for bread.

The basket on the left has a teapot and two cups. Kate and I sat in the park drinking fresh mint tea swirled with Brandenburg honey and making plans.

Now David, S and I are off into the sun and green. Happy Easter!

Returned (Edinburgh)

The best visits reverberate even after you're back. I spent a few days in Edinburgh with Clare and brought home the sound of gulls, the taste of Valvona & Crolla's San Francisco sourdough bread and Troy's quinoa salad, some linen skirts and a little leather satchel from the flea market that S now carries about with great glee.

It had been so long since I walked for hours in a city in that unencumbered way that's only possible when you haven't got a stroller to push. We went to the Cameo and the Fruitmarket Gallery Cafe, and cleaned up at the Stockbridge charity shops. Now home and unpacking, and wondering at that string of golden days that's stretching out before us. This April is divine.

The blind shop (or, The beautiful & the useful)

The blind shop is an exemplary union of beauty and use. Those zebraed brushes make me want to dust. (I never dust.)

I don't know what I'd rather do, ruffle the tops of these brooms and feel the prickle of the bristles, or trace my finger along those neat red and blue stripes.

This workshop is run by a charity founded to help the visually disabled. They have a museum too.

They buy some of their goods from suppliers, but many of the brushes and baskets are made on site. They will also recane your chairs.

Werkstattladen, Blindenhilfswerk Berlin e.V. Rothenburgstraße 14-15, Berlin-Steglitz (map)
Open Mon-Wed 9am-4pm, Thu 9am-5:30pm, Fri 9am-2:30pm
Tel. 030 / 792 50 33

Bread & Honey

Right now I want simple things and just a little of them. I drizzled my buttered bread with Italian chestnut honey and that breakfast's earthy sweetness has occupied me all morning.

Gray photos for a gray day (Hansaplatz)

I went for a walk around Hansaplatz the other day.

The street at dawn / Spring in Berlin

This morning I stepped onto the balcony and all I heard was birdsong. (I put a little video here.) Sometimes Berlin still feels so private.

A day out in Dahlem (Café Lenné)

I couldn't resist Domäne Dahlem's spring festival last weekend. Hearty platefuls of fluffy Salzkartoffel, herb-flecked Quark and crispy bacon-strewn Bratkartoffel were just what the doctor ordered. Afterwards I finally bought a few pieces from the indigo workshop. (Do you remember this post from way back when? I've been coveting their handmade cloth since then.)

It seemed a pity to go straight home afterwards so we walked east on Königin-Luise-Straße til we got to the Königliche Gartenakademie. Adjoining Berlin's Botanical Garden, this posh garden center features products from Manufactum and other high-end suppliers. They also organize workshops and garden tours abroad, and will help you plan your garden.

When I heard they had a garden cafe I pictured Rosendals Trädgarden or Petersham Nurseries. It's a little too cramped to be quite that, but still, my heart leapt when I saw this sunny path leading to the cafe!

The white cast-iron chairs tucked against the greenhouse walls were all occupied, mostly by families and older couples lingering over a late brunch. We made our way to the terrace and took a seat beneath the sheltering pine. The staff — clean-shaven men in crisp dress shirts — were harried and unwelcoming. I managed nevertheless to buy a slice of Engadiner Nusstorte and retreated to the sun to fork mouthfuls of crumbly pastry and caramel-clogged walnut clusters while persuading S not to pluck the tiny oranges from their ornamental tree.

Café Lenné, in the Königliche Gartenakademie, Alteinsteiner Straße 15A, Berlin-Dahlem (map)
Open Tue-Sat 10am-7pm, Sun 10am-4pm (15 March-14 October), Tue-Sun 10am-5:30pm (15 October-14 March).
Tel. 030/ 832 29 273