Hello, Galeries Lafayette!

Macarons at Galeries Lafayette

My heart went 'ping!' today. I can't believe I've been here for 2 years and *not* visited Galeries Lafayette before now. It's not that I haven't been in the area; it's not that my loyalty to the lovely KaDeWe has prevented me from passing through a different store; it's just that about a decade ago I visited Galeries Lafayette in Paris and was a little underwhelmed. (Though I'm not sure why, probably my taste was just different)


Today though I had some time, and I thought 'why not?'. I was passing and I suddenly remembered a French guy in my German class saying that a lot of the French expats go there to buy really expensive yoghurt. What? Food hall? Expensive yoghurt? Why, doesn't that sound like it might be just like the KaDeWe?

Oh. My. God. It's lovely! It's smaller than the food hall in the KaDeWe, but it's beautifully, darkly lit, and it's like all the products you could ever need but in lovely French packaging! Oh to be a French expat with lots & lots of money! Not that they aren't catering for the Germans and the Brits. There are a selection of Cadbury's biscuits for the Brits and 5KG jars of Nutella for the Germans. (Why would you buy so much that you can barely lift it?). Oh and of course, the Americans haven't been forgotten: yup, they've shipped in more of that Fluff for you guys, ha, ha, ha! (scroll down for the photos)

Pretty cakes: I want to roll around in there with you with my mouth open.

I have very little use for these, but I just want to take them home, line them up and look at them anyway.

These can stay on the shelf though...

I want my peas to have a gold lid!

Beluga Linsen: One of life's essentials, surely???

I can't even imagine trying to explain to Stevie that I spent 40 euros on a tub of Nutella. 

Nuts: I've run out of photos.

You can find Galeries Lafayette at Friedrichstrasse 76-78 and online.

I love it when a plan doesn't come together

Because today I should probably have been packing up our stuff, waiting for the removal men, spending the afternoon cleaning and scrubbing the empty apartment, and moving us into a hotel with a couple of suitcases, our passports, and our tickets home.

And that would have made me sad. Because it was a glorious day, nearly 30 degrees, and I'm not ready to leave Berlin. Not yet. So instead I bought some fresh strawberries and raspberries and sat out on the balcony with a nice book. And I had a quiet celebration in my head. Because I love it when a plan doesn't come together.

Here's to November! (Or maybe next May)

For the love of asparagus

Nobody *needs* a giant inflatable pillow, but if you try it, you'll want one.

We went to the best place with the least memorable name I've been to in ages the other day! I've had to go and find the leaflet just to tell you it's called 'Buschmann Winkelmann Spargelhof Klaistow'. You might know it as the 'Spargel place with with the giant bouncy pillow'. Or  'Hüpfkissen', if you want to order one. And if you try it, you will want to order one. Look! They even have a baby one! 
Anyway, I am getting ahead of myself. Hamish came here on his Kita trip the other week. Cynical old me thought the reason they had brought the kids here was so the staff could all stock up on asparagus at fantastic prices. But in fact it's just generally great. From the moment you get there you get that warm, happy feeling that comes with there being NO ENTRY FEE. That's awfully nice of them. Especially as there are tons to do.

Jumbo white asparagus. 

 For starters you can, as most people probably do, buy a mountain of asparagus. White stuff, jumbo stuff, green stuff, all at a great price. Your pee won't thank you, but it is the best asparagus we have tasted.

There is simply loads for the kids to do. From little Bobby cars, to the hay bales laid out in a maze formation. Below you'll see Orla lying on top of it in the split second when she wasn't running around and jumping about on it like a crazy person. (They also have a corn maze later in the summer which they missed a trick by calling it the 'Maislabyrinth' when quite obviously it should have been called the 'Maismaze'). Honestly I have nothing bad to say about this place. Which isn't like me. I like to be a little sarcastic and negative for humour purposes, ad it's just not happening. I even liked those what-do-you-call-them's below for NOT having crap written on them like 'be my love bunny' - because like them, I like my love notes to be factual. Serious. To the point. And to many, asparagus is love.

The people of the Buschmann Winkelmann Spargelhof Klaistow have a love of asparagus so deep and intense it's like one of those relationships that's gone a bit crazy. Because there is no other reason to assume that normal people will want to eat asparagus ice cream. Even if you place it in the middle of the selection between the strawberry and the hazelnut. (And if you do fancy trying it, then I am just going to assume that you are the same person who buys that bright blue Smurf ice cream. "A kugel of asparagus, and a kugel of Smurf on top please" - AND, if you are thinking "mmm...that sounds nice", please stop by the chemists for a pregnancy test: there may be some good news waiting for you).

The madness continues in the store where there are a thousand un-bought bottles of asparagus liquer. I do love the bottles, and the labelling is nice, but the thought of it alone is making my stomach spasm. Having said that, I would buy it though. Why? Think about it: It is the perfect thing to stock your drinks cabinet up with as your kids hit the age of around 14, 15. You know, when they sneakily start going to friends parties and make up a Coke bottle of mixed alcohol from their parent's booze cupboard. Think you can get the better of me? Ha! You'll never want to drink again after you savour your first Spargel/Cinzano cocktail!

As you can see, they also got a bit carried away with the pasta as well, and decided to *improve* it by making it strawberry. Has anyone tried this? I am wondering whether you could dessertify this and do something marvellous with custard or bread and butter pudding and fresh berries. Otherwise I can only imagine it with salad, and if I even let my mind wander to the prospect of it with a Dolmio sauce, I start coming over all queasy again.

So I am way off topic. I was going to tell you about there being animals, and a climbing forest (Do you do that? See a word like 'Kletterwald', think "that makes sense", and then not know what you should call it in English?). They have flea markets, restaurants, bands playing, playgrounds, fairground rides for teeny tiny kids, a giant wooden boat, quad bikes, horse rides, animal feeding sessions, a forest to walk through, various festivals, oh, and in September they'll be making giant dinosaurs out of pumpkins. As you do.

So, all I can really say is this place is great. You'd love it. It's free for Christ's sake! What's not to love? And if you find yourself low on brushes and creepy things made out of fur that you'd like to stroke as you sit by the fire rocking back and forth in your rocking chair eating your Smurf ice cream, then let me tell you, this place is gonna ROCK YOUR WORLD!

Buschmann Winkelmann Spargelhof Klaistow website: http://www.buschmann-winkelmann.de/

Link for the pumpkin exhibition: just look at the photos. There should be a caption competition for that one with the men with the camel. http://www.buschmann-winkelmann.de/beelitzer-spargel-und-mehr/kuerbisse/kuerbisausstellung/

Tae a haggis supper...

It's Burns Night! You know Robert Burns, don't you? Famous Scottish poet? From my home town (well his house is a 15 min walk along the road from my mum & dad's; not that he's in much, it's mostly full of American tourists these days). Anyway, tonight's his night.

Would you recognise him better if I stuck him on a tin of shortbread?

The 25th of January is Rabbie Burns' birthday. He's 262 years old today. Luckily we Scots don't celebrate this marvellous event with a cake and candles. Instead there will be Burns Suppers happening the whole world over, where you'll see many a kilt, a wee dram or two, and a hell of a lot of haggis being spoken to and stabbed with a dagger, or a knife (whatever's to hand).

Haggis is possibly the most famous Scottish food most people can think of. It's made up of sheeps heart, liver, and lungs (all minced), mixed with oatmeal, onion and suet (and seasoned) traditionally encased in the lining of a sheep's stomach. Nowadays though they tend to come in the kind of casing that they put sausages in, but you can still get your hands on a proper one in the butchers. Being of a 'faddy' type myself, I must admit I am not a fan of haggis. Never have been. And haggis is tradionally served with neeps (turnip) and tatties (potatoes, usually boiled) and I was never much fond of those two things either, so I suspect most Burns nights I have dined on toast.

Seeing as I am not really one for traditional Scottish fare, it might not surprise you to learn that I won't be boiling up a haggis for 3 hours this evening (or microwaving it, as I understand you can do these days), nor will I be popping out for 4 of these....

from: The Art & Mystery of Food 

the traditional ye olde (deep fried in batter) Scottish haggis supper, available at all good Scottish chip shops, because beside the fact I don't like it, they're quite hard to get your hands on here. I am told that the KaDeWe don't stock them (shocking, isn't it?), but you can get them tinned in Broken English, the British shop here in Berlin. Tinned almost has as much appeal as deep fried in batter, doesn't it?

No, we won't be having haggis tonight. Indeed, shame on me, I only realised it was Burns Night when I was wished a happy one this morning when I met a friend for coffee, and we had already made our dinner plans for this evening. You see, Stevie's gone off to Derby for a few days, and we've been left the car, so in fact, dare I say it... we're heading to IKEA for some decidedly un-Scottish Swedish meatballs!*

* As my just desserts for this heinous crime, I am going  to be spending the next few days sewing a kilt for Orla to wear to 'International Day' at school on the 30th. Never having made a kilt, I have high hopes for how it might turn out!

1000 steps... round the KaDeWe!

Main: The Princess & the Pea window display. Inserts: Outside the KaDeWe.  No matter the day there will always  be a crowd outside waiting to get in at 10am. 

It's Christmas time in the KaDeWe. Last week the windows were shrouded while the displays were perfected, but it didn't stop people trying to peek. The theme this year is 'fairytales', and it's been done beautifully. I couldn't wait to see the main foyer display. So I waited with the daily crowds (instead of going to the supermarket) and decided it would be the perfect time for another 1000 steps!

 30 steps... 

If you don't have a silver hand-held mirror that rests on a silver platter, then don't worry: they've got it! Christmas comes in all shades. These pale lilac baubles were rather lovely, though my camera hasn't quite captured their true colour.

Oh, and inside it's just lovely. The foyer is packed full of beautiful things. A zillion things that I wouldn't say no to. Admittedly, that would mean that my house would be chock-full of Christmas tree decorations and scented tealights, but I could be happy living like that. Especially those little tealights that smell like the essence of Christmas and come in the teensiest little ceramic casserole dish complete with lid. Oh, and they have a fine selection of festive fascinators - my favourite was a jaunty cup of tea with lovely ribbons, but I'm not sure if it would coordinate with my snowboots, so I've left it for now...

 50 steps... 

Main: birdcage and birdies, the tree of many baubles and Christmas products piled high. Inserts: Louis Vuitton boots, and the most gorgeously illustrated book of fairy tales. I esp. like the purple cover.

Enter into the world of eclectic prettiness. I have fallen for their gilt birdcages which are dotted around the outskirts of the foyer. They sit atop golden pillars, displaying little feathered or glass birds to clip on to the branches of your tree. Want, want, want...the whole lot. But the foyer complete with all it's overflowing displays is dominated by the KaDeWe's very own ginormous Christmas tree. It's the place to stop with your baby or your boyfriend and have your photo taken for your Christmas card, or more likely your FB profile pic.

 300 steps... 

For the girl who has nothing and wants everything: a crystal studded DeLonghi coffee machine; Red Westco scales: totally worth the money as turn them around and they're a CLOCK!; I do need a hole punch for Orla's school newsletters...

So I skipped the rest of the ground floor which is mainly populated with the cosmetics department and handbags. Which is nice and everything and there are probably more exclusive brands than you'd get in other department stores but really, most cosmetics departments have the same 'look' so I just bypassed it on my tour. The ground floor is also home to an outer perimeter walkway where there are lots of little individual stores. It's here that you can find Prada, Gucci, Tiffany & Co, Chanel, etc, and the lifts without a view. If you are in a rush, avoid the glass lifts in the central atrium, you'll be waiting forever.

I also skipped the 1st and 2nd floors. Menswear & Ladieswear. I couldn't be bothered and I thought I might run out of 'steps', so I went to the 3rd - home of bed & bath, childrenswear, hairdressing, and the creche of joy. But I haven't sorted my photos of it. I love the 3rd floor. I can never get tired of gasping at 50 euro Armani baby bottles, or choking over a completely plain tiny baby t-shirt that costs the same as a return flight to Scotland. And the creche, well I adore the creche and the 3 hours of FREE fun they allow me.

So onwards and upwards to the 4th floor - homewares. When I first arrived in Berlin my neighbour's famous words to me were "Buy your fruit, veg, fish, and meat from the market. For everything else there's the KaDeWe". As I couldn't find a single shop selling mops, I did what my neighbour said and went to the KaDeWe. Alas, while the KaDeWe have most things, they do not stock mops. Unless they are studded with diamonds...

 500 steps... 

They do have a 'My First Barbie' but I'd rather have one of these. Left to right: Van Gogh Barbie, Gustav Klimt Barbie, Sinatra Barbie, Elvis Barbie, Grace Kelly Barbie, and Farah Fawcett Barbie - all 50 Euros each - uh-huh-huh, ooohhh, yeah!

Next floor up and it's toys, stationary, books, and technology on the 5th. I love the toy department. It's not the best one I've ever been in, but it's nice. They have a great selection of Playmobil & Lego, and a lot of Steiff, and Haba, and their play food selection is to die for. Admittedly the play food is far more expensive than the real thing, but you are paying for cuteness, and eh..the creche staff wages.

Lego Santa is back in town; the glorious English-language section of Hugendubel in the KaDeWe; the big Steiff bear who costs more than your house is worth.

  600 steps...  

We're still on the 5th but we're round at the Hugendubel franchise. This is my usual first stop hangout when I drop the kids off at the creche. There is an English-language section - look that's it you can see right there! This is the place that is responsible for some of my stranger forays into literature. I just buy what they have that I haven't read. Especially as I haven't really been in the mood for crime since I got here, so I limit myself to 1 bookcase. But it's made me more experimental, and on top of that, there are seats where you can just sit and read as much of a book as you can in 3 hours and then put it back! Yay!

 800 steps... 

Hello! It's lucky you are protected by glass or I would throw myself at you.

 Just one floor up on the 6th is the KaDeWe food hall. It's great. You'd like it. I promise. It's everything you could ever want at a price you can barely afford! There are unusual, hard-to-get-hold-of things and there are everyday things. I like the bread counter and the cake counter with the lovely little petit fours - they do the tiniest little chocolate eclairs that are only about 3 cm long and a cm wide, they have the broadest range of loaves I have seen this side of the city all displayed beautifully. There are little restaurant stands dotted throughout the food department which are on the ok-side of a-bit-dear. Stevie and I have frequented the Chinese restaurant a couple of times where you can watch your food being prepared as well as watching the world go by and it seems pretty reasonably priced. Really I want to be one of the people hanging out in the Moet bar at 10:30am, having a little glass of champagne while I meet a client. Those are my kind of meetings! Behind the Moet bar you can find the fresh fish; fresh to the point that some of them are in tanks so you can point to the one you want. Around this part of the food hall there are oyster bars which are always busy. Ah, oysters and champagne, or even oysters and beer...if only I liked oysters!

You can buy tea from giant ceramic urns, and choose wurst and cold meats from a massive selection. There are walls of sauces and condiments, a whole section dedicated to different chocolate companies including Godiva. And of course there's the 'American section' which I adore. But you could do all your regular grocery shopping here too. There are fruit and veg sections (see below) which stock everything that you could hope for. I read on someone else's blog that they didn't think people actually shopped there, but that in order to be a proper food hall it was a requirement. I can confirm that I have seen on quite a few occasions people buying potatoes or apples or in fact a whole shopping list of perfect quality produce.

The KaDeWe food hall. This bit has the more exotic things like baby pineapples and plantains, but you could also buy just a regular apple, onion, or orange round the corner. 

 1000 steps... 

Part of the glass roof on a sunny, blue sky, November morning. The seasoning station where you can add herbs, oils, dressings, and spices to your lunch. Nice. Bottom: Dessert. Kids in the creche? Why, yes, I think I will have the strawberries!

From the 6th floor there is an escalator (or lift) which takes you up to the restaurant and bar on the 7th floor. (Just before you get on the escalator you should take a moment to admire the huge Brandenburg Gate which sits in a glass display cabinet. I never gave it too much examination before, but it turns out it's made of 50 kilos of marzipan and took 150 hours to make by hand)  In the restaurant the food is displayed no-less beautifully than you would expect. Everything looks totally delicious. You can buy salads and so on by weight, there is a lovely selection of cakes, always at least two soups, and a wide range of hot meals all freshly prepared. But it is quite dear. You can however get perfect strawberries and cream all year round - but let's just say, you'll pay for that pleasure.

The restaurant itself is set in the roof of the KaDeWe and has great views from the giant arched window which faces out on to Tauentzienstrasse and Wittenbergplatz. You can also see the Fernsehturm from here which is the only place round this end of town that I have actually seen it from. But mostly it's nice just sitting under the glass roof, with a beer, and a new book, and two kids having a great time in the creche 4 floors below. Aaahhh.....

More photos on my Flickr

How to prepare a hearty meal...

Mostly I go food shopping on a Friday evening to one of the big supermarkets where I can get pretty much everything I need. If I want fish I usually go to the market, and if I run out of something and need it desperately for the dinner I am making I tend to dash round the corner to Nah und gut.

I've never been able to work out what Nah and gut's criteria is for product selection is. It's always struck me as a wee bit odd. But I suppose I've never really thought about it that hard. I go in, spot Hob Nobs and just think 'oh, that's a funny one-off product to have in. I wonder if that got sent to them in error'. Because Nah und gut's food section often seems like a whole bunch of incongruous stuff that have accidentally been sent to Berlin instead of Burnley and these strange one-off boxes have ended up in Edeka, where the products haven't been able to sell, and have been sent on to Nah und gut as a last resort before it goes into a skip out the back. Because the other thing about it is that products come and go. One week they will have 30 great big bars of Cadbury's Dairy Milk, and then you won't see that again for a month or two; another time it might be really odd looking Russian biscuits; and the next time maybe it will be Rocky Mountain marshmallows (both regular & mini) or Strawberry Fluff.

One time I had been out all day with the kids and got home at 6pm to discover that I didn't have anything in for dinner. So I nipped round to Nah und gut quickly to get something. As I recall, it was a night when Stevie was playing football so generally he likes to have something hearty and full of carbs and protein. Our local Nah und gut stores all their meat and chicken in an ice-cream style freezer (you know the ones with the slidey-tops that you have to lean into?) , and there's never exactly tons to choose from as there is only one shelf. Anyway on this occasion I got there and all they had were 5 little boxes of quails eggs.

Today I went in to pick up something I'd forgotten at the weekend, and as I walked past the meat fridge I peered in. This time they had packs and packs of chicken hearts - CHICKEN HEARTS! What do you even do with chicken hearts?

So I finally did a search on Nah und gut and discovered (I think - from translating the garbled translation that Google kindly provided me with) that Nah und gut try to provide specialist food catering for the tastes of their local community. So the bigger question is, what kind of people am I living amongst??????

(Incidentally, I went on to the BBC Food website where you can enter an ingredient and find recipes. Should you be salivating at the thought of chicken hearts you might fancy one of their suggestions which actually calls for 12 duck hearts: Salad of duck livers and hearts, snails and bacon with a dandelion and apple salad. ) I know I should be more adventurous, but if it's alright with you I'll pass on the duck livers, duck hearts, snails and bacon, and dandelions and just have the apple thanks.

Kanninchen paella won't make me a better person (pt1)

I was reading Mwa's post earlier about her buying Elizabeth Gilbert's 'Committed' - the sequel to Eat, Pray, Love'. It's about a couple who decide to list their respective flaws to each other prior to their wedding. Is this ever a good idea? There's always the risk that while you list 6 A4 sides of terrible flaws, your boyfriend can only think of maybe 1 or 2 things about himself that he considers negatives. Depending on how long you'd been 'dating', and for me & Stevie that's 10 whole, long, flawless years, I reckon I know most of his flaws and would find it hard not to help him out with a few suggestions. Still, I reckon I'd still have a longer list than him, and that would be enough to make me hate him.

Over the years vague, fuzzy notions I've had about myself have begun to cement themselves in my head as flaws. Maybe it's just as you get older you become more self-aware, and start to realise there are things that you wish were different, but either can't, or can't be bothered to. And then there are the things that you don't consider flaws, but other people do. I'd count my refusal to eat kanninchen paella as one of those. When we were out for our 'one year in Berlin' anniversary, we stopped to get something to eat and Stevie bemoaned my lack-of-adventure-in-food flaw. Stupid paella. Why do they have to be for a minimum of two people anyway? Find me two people who want to eat rabbit paella, and I'll... well, I don't know, probably have a much lower opinion of them. That's bunnies! You can't go eating bunnies! It's just not right. I would have been far more comfortable eating pigs eyelids and god knows what all ground down lovingly into a nice big sausage. And anyway, cast your mind back to Fatal Attraction. Exactly! Bunnies in a pot - never a good thing.

In actual fact the kanninchen paella was just a little follow up to the main event of our anniversary weekend. I'll write about that in part 2. My trip to paradise. Or where more of my flaws (moaning, and my utter hatred of swimming and it's related activities - which absolutely is a flaw (according to Stevie)) are explored.

I predict a riot.

This was Kreuzberg at 'mid-busyiness'. Sadly you can't see as many of the Ray-ban riot mob as I'd hoped.

The Venn diagram of Kreuzburg {Ray-bans, Travellers, Piercings}. But I wonder how many would have been in that little middle section who fit in all three categories?

Isn't that a lovely baldy head? Nice and shiny.

Eh...burger or um... (is that Ray-Bans on her head?)

We went to Kreuzberg today to see the May Day celebrations. We'd been invited to a friends apartment where we could watch quite safely from the windows. I say 'safely' not because the rioting had started, but because there are so many smokers in Berlin and unfortunately Orla & Hamish are just at the right height to get lit cigarettes in their faces.

We got there shortly after 2pm and it was busy but not really busy. But by the time we left the streets were mobbed. There were loads of food stalls lining the street, and while I didn't recognise a lot of it, it certainly smelled amazing. There were barbeques too, and for the first time in my life I smelled a vegan sausage (well about 20 actually) grilling away, and thought 'mmm...that smells nice'.

There was music blasting out from everywhere. Everything from reggae to oh, I don't know what to call it, but you know when it's just like some guy screeching into a microphone and people are doing a lot of head banging, but really it just sounds total crap? Orla put her hands over her ears at that one so I take it she was of the same opinion as me. Anyway, it was really good to go and experience the atmosphere.

I had a moment though as we were walking through the crowd where I suddenly felt like one of the older people there. I turned to Stevie and commented that between the 4 of us we didn't even have as many piercings as any one individual in about a 20 ft radius of us. Quite correctly he pointed out that between us, we don't have any piercings, but well, you get my point.

I also noticed that this appears to be the year of the Ray-ban. They were everywhere. In fact if you had put a turnstile on Kottbusser Tor U-Bahn station and stopped anyone going on to the street who had piercings, Ray-Bans, or was dressed in a manner that suggested they had just got back from 2 years of travelling around Thailand & Vietnam, then we would have pretty much been on our own. I don't have anything against these looks, it just alarms me that I am now looking at groups of well, marginally younger people, and thinking 'you think you all look so individual and yet you all look the same!'. I don't like thinking that. I want to take that thought and lob a riotous beer bottle at it because it makes me feel old and as though tutting at the length of my daughter's skirt is only moments away. I assume I have maybe, 10 years if I am lucky before I hear myself uttering the words "You're not going out in that!". It's probably more like 8, but that seems hellishly close...so we'll make it 10.

Anyway, hopefully tomorrow I will be regaining my youth, for I am off on a special trip. And no, I'm not getting botox...

To see oursels as ithers see us...

Just how is your homeland perceived in other countries? If you had to write a shopping list of foodstuffs that would neatly encapsulate the beloved traditional meals and the nations favourite foods, what would be on it. Chances are you don't see the 'typical' foods of your own country the same way as foreigners do.

The photos above show the American food section of the Ka De We. The Ka De We is essentially the Harrods of Berlin. I love the food department, it's full of interesting stuff at 500 times the normal price. A box of Weetabix for example will cost you in the region of £5. Not that it's that much cheaper in the other supermarkets.

Anyway, one of my particular favourite sections is the American section. It's like they just eat crap! There's not a vegetable in sight. The only fruit that's being boasted about is 'artificial'. Do American's only eat cakes that come from a box or bottle? Do they really have AA meetings for Jim Beam sauce addicts? And what are they doing with all that 'Fluff'? I mentioned the Strawberry Fluff to my American classmate, cause I wasn't sure what you would use it for. Apparently it can be used in sandwiches in conjunction with ...did she honestly say, peanut butter??? Or was it jelly (jam)? Either way, I'm feeling a little nauseous.

Sadly, my photos just miss out the Cheese Zip. I like the name, but the idea of something cheese-based, unrefrigerated, in a plastic bottle slightly turns my stomach. Something tells me it aint 'Bio'!

And if you Brits are sniggering up the back, believe me the British products aren't much better. I'll keep those for another time. Hold on to your Kettle Chips!