I am probably wasting a bit too much time writing this instead of studying for mid-terms like a good, diligent student, but I figured I needed to put this up soon before next year's Berlin Food Week rolls around again. This year's theme for Food Week was "Krautwende", or cabbage reversal, and the challenge to plan the menu around this theme was taken up by 50 restaurants all over Berlin, offering three to four course meals from 29, 49 and 78 euros. Being the poor student that I am, I naturally went for the cheapest deal at 29 euros at Probier Mahl. Forgive the crappy photos because I had forgotten to bring my camera with me that day and had to resort to my infinitely inferior phone camera to take these pictures (Also I was a bit stressed because there were so many old people there judging me as I took countless photos of each course. Any other foodies out there also experiencing this type of social anxiety or is it just me??)
For our appetiser, we had a Sauerkrautsüppchen mit Blutwurstlolli, or a sauerkraut soup with a blood sausage lolly on a stick on top of it. Definitely a very interesting concept, I don't think I've ever had sauerkraut as a soup before, but I enjoyed it. The intense sourness of it reminded me very much of soljanka. I am, unfortunately, not a big fan of blood sausage, and this Blutwurstlolli did not do much to change my mind. My stance on blood sausages remains as anti as ever.
The main course was definitely my favourite, and is described as "Eisbein auf zweierlei Art
Carpaccio und Krokette vom Eisbein mit Wirzkohl-Senf-Chiffonade und Kartoffel-Taler an Kerbelschaum", which basically means (pickled) pork knuckles made into carpaccio and croquettes, with a chiffonade of savoy cabbage tossed in mustard and lastly potato Thalers (not sure how to translate this, maybe medallions?) on top of a chervil foam. While the previous course was very German (you can't get more German than sauerkraut, come on), this reminded me of a meal I had before at Barnyard in London, so quite English in a sense, with the mustard and the savoy cabbage. Small as it looks, it's actually surprisingly filling! I was pretty full by the time I had finished my plate and almost didn't have room for dessert in my burgeoning stomach.
But of course, this is me we're talking about, so naturally I shouldered on to dessert. This was a bit different from the menu online, but if I identified the components right, this was a Rotkraut-Portwein-Eis mit Apfel Minz Kompott und Erdbeeren, or red cabbage-port wine ice cream with an apple mint compotte, and some random fruits here and there like strawberries and raspberries. I have no idea what the seaweed-like thing on top was, but according to the menu it is a "Wirzing-segel" which literally translated is a savoy cabbage "sail", but who cares what it's called? It basically just tasted like slightly caramelised seaweed, but good nonetheless. My only complaint is that the ice cream melted WAY too fast, and also not a big fan of compotes in general (fruits should be eaten fresh!), so the dessert was only a hit for me in the taste of the ice cream but not the rest of the components. I also felt that maybe the chef ran out of ingredients and threw this together at the last minute, because the components don't seem to come together to form a cohesive end note to the meal.
All in all, I would say I definitely enjoyed myself, Probier Mahl really rose up to the challenge to think of innovative and new ways to to incorporate cabbage into the mix. While some things were a hit, and some were a miss, the creativity that went into the menu really impressed me. Lastly, the service was phenomenal. They were a tiny bit slow with the food since they were pretty crowded, but other that that, the food severs were incredibly responsive and very friendly, so five stars just for that! Would like to go again to check out their regular menu though.
Fun fact: "Probier mal" means to have a go at something, while "Mahl" means something along the lines of "meal", put them together and you get "Probier Mahl"! Pretty nifty name for a restaurant, in my opinion.
Address: Dortmunder Str. 9, 10555 Berlin
Opening Hours: Mon - Fri 16:00 to 01:00, Sun 10:00 to 00:00
