Local and sustainable dining in Berlin

Posted on February 25, 2015 by hautepasture

Hallo!

Guten Tag!

Sorry I’ve been MIA around here. Mr HP and I adopted a dog at the beginning of the year and my free time has since evaporated. Now that we’re in a routine I’m hoping to be able to write more.

Plus, winter is depressing and demotivating. So this is just a quick post to try to get back into the swing of things.

Mr HP is in Berlin, and asked me for a restaurant recommendation. I, in turn, asked Google. Here’s what I found:

In “The Global Guide to Local: Berlin” from Modern Farmer, we learn that in Berlin “there is a compelling movement toward sustainable design and community-based markets – and it’s growing fast.” The article lists sustainable food-related businesses of different types, including two restaurants – Katz Orange, specializing in seasonal, local organic produce and happy pigs (“…one of Berlin’s most adventurous and upscale farm-to-table places to eat” according to this list), and Kantine at David Chipperfield, offering simple food made from local ingredients – and a food hall/produce market, Markthalle Neun. At the market, according to Alternative Berlin, “…you can find an incredible array of delicious, sustainable, local food (as well as a brewery!) sourced in ecologically and socially responsible ways, in direct contact with the producers.”

Kantine’s success led to the creation of a second location, Das Lokal, which sources game from the forests surrounding Berlin. Wild game is about as far from industrial livestock as you can get!

Kantine is not to be confused with Kantine Kohlmann, a …”trendy bar and restaurant [that] uses local, sustainable ingredients to make delicious modern twists on German classics” per this article.

Pantry is a homey, affordable, recommended dinner spot whose “…produce and animal products are allegedly procured during visits to local markets or shipped in from within a 100km radius.”

For a splurge, try the “quite near” (as opposed to the “far away”) menu, which is based on local ingredients, at Reinstoff. Another special occasion destination is Pauly Saal, which sources local ingredients, including from its own garden.

And finally, it doesn’t get much more local than the Café and Restaurant in Prinzessinnengarten, which sources ingredients from Prinzessinnengarten itself.

We serve local and regional organic food and drinks if possible and support small-scale organic producers in and around Berlin. All the revenues from the bar and the kitchen contribute directly to the non-profit learning activities in Prinzessinnengarten.

Prinzessinnengarten is an urban farm raising organic produce, and neighborhood education center where the community can learn about sustainable living. The garden, built on an abandoned city plot, is run by a non-profit and tended by volunteers, and hosts workshops and other educational opportunities. It reminds me of a similar effort in Perth that I was lucky enough to visit last year.

Here is a map showing the locations discussed in this post. If you visit any of them, or if you know of others that should be included, let me know in the comments!

Stockholm’s Best Burgers

Posted on October 7, 2014 by hautepasture

Just before Team HP left on a short jaunt to Stockholm, the ever-observant Mr HP caught a tip in one of Huffington Post’s ubiquitous Top X Most Amazing [Random Thing]s Ever lists: the Number One Greatest Burger Outside America is at Flippin’ Burgers in Stockholm–and, per the article:

All Widegren’s beef is grass-fed, sourced from local farms, and ground in-house. A nearby bakery provides the buns.

As a recently recovered pescatarian, I have discovered that I love a good burger, but my rule is that I will only eat a burger if it’s from a local, happy, pastured, hormone- and antibiotic-free, humanely slaughtered cow. Flippin’ Burgers does it right:

Well, we only buy meat from small producers who have an eye on animal husbandry and slaughter. With animals staying outside and eat grass because they simply feel the best of it… Right now, we use E-marked Archipelago Meat from a small slaughterhouse in Värmdö who slaughter animals mainly from farms in the Stockholm archipelago. We have also worked with Swedish Grass Meat and Greens Farms .

In Charlottesville this summer, Mr HP and I have enjoyed a Sunday tradition of burgers and beers at Champion Brewery: Every Sunday Champion hosts JM Stock Provisions and their magical grill of delights, serving fantastic burgers from local, pastured, hormone/chemical free cows, and man, are they good. So we were excited at the prospect of local happy-cow burgers on Sunday despite being 4200 miles from home.

Flippin’ Burgers has a wait for tables ALL THE TIME. We arrived at 5 and still waited for a half hour at the bar. While there, we got some tips from the (normal-sized) man next to us polishing off his order of FIVE cheeseburgers.

Based on our bar friend’s recommendation, we opted for Burglers, a basic cheeseburger with lettuce, tomato, and house sauce. Mr HP got a double because he is extra manly. My sad phone pictures do not do the food justice, so you’ll have to take my word for it that these burgers were excellent: juicy, flavorful, not too saucy, and the buns were fresh and not overly bready (you know how sometimes there’s too much bread for the quantity of innards? these were well-sized).

Part of the fun of the Flippin’ Burgers experience was the Americanish diner scene. The food was American-inspired: burgers, fries, and Ben and Jerry’s milkshakes. The Swedes next to us ordered Blue Ribbon beer (PBR to you and me). The Spotify station (Spotify started in Sweden, remember? Seems like all restaurants/cafes/stores here have “Check out our playlist on Spotify” signs.) was heavy on early-90s American Top 40. But we were surrounded by Swedish-speakers and we were drinking Swedish beer, so all culture was not lost.

We considered sharing a milkshake for dessert, but instead shared another burger for dessert. Five Burger Guy’s ladyfriend recommended the Cricket burger, which is not made of crickets, but rather a burger topped with cream cheese, pickled onions and jalapenos, inspired by the Cherry Cricket in Denver; this was our dessert.

Oh what a terrible picture. The onions were sweet, so it was sort of dessertesque. I wonder how the calorie count compares to that of a milkshake… no, I don’t want to know anything about the calories involved in this meal. It was an interesting and surprisingly tasty combo, but the more traditional burger was better in my opinion.

In conclusion, pastured, local, happy cows make the best burgers, and if you’re craving a top-notch burger in Stockholm and have the time to wait for a table, check out Flippin’ Burgers. If you’re craving a top-notch burger in Charlottesville, meet me at Champion on Sunday!

Cheers! (i.e., British kudos)

Posted on July 17, 2011 by hautepasture

A couple shout-outs from HP’s recent trip to London…

Marks and Spencer’s Forever Fish campaign:

M&S has had a sustainable fishing policy for 12 years and 84% of the wild fish sold at M&S is now independently certified by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) or undergoing MSC certification. But now M&S wants to take it further – and that is where Forever Fish comes in. Through partnerships with WWF and Marine Conservation Society, education programmes in primary schools and Fish of the Month promotions, the plan is to take the lead to make sure our sea life is protected for future generations to enjoy.

and Chop’d, which uses local ingredients where possible:

Wherever possible we work with the seasons. Every September we take the van down to Kent to pile it full of heirloom apples from Brogdale Farm, home of the National Fruit Collection. Every spring we gather bagfuls of wild garlic from the woods of West Sussex.

All our chicken comes from a single farm on the Essex/Suffolk border, is barn reared and meets farm-assured and ‘red tractor’ standards.

There’s a farm in London?

Posted on July 7, 2011 by hautepasture

Today, Haute Pasture went on a field trip to Hackney City Farm, which is actually located within the city of London. From their About page:

For over 20 years, Hackney City Farm has been giving the local community the opportunity to experience farming right in the heart of the city.

It offers an opportunity for children and adults to get up close to a range of farmyard animals and to learn about where their food comes from and why that matters.

Britons seem to be much more concerned with the source of their food than Americans, and maybe programs like Hackney City Farm have a lot to do with that. It’s important to remind people that animal products come from animals, and not machines. The disgusting people involved in the recently-exposed abuse at the Iowa pig factory apparently never learned that lesson.

Some pictures from the quaint little urban farm:

Another reason to eat local food

Posted on June 5, 2011 by hautepasture

E coli outbreak: German officials identify beansprouts as likely source

From the article:

Scientists suspect the source of the contamination may have been poor hygiene either at a farm, in transit, or in a shop or food outlet.

This encouragement to eat locally-sourced food isn’t a suggestion to avoid German beansprouts specifically, but rather a suggestion that cutting down on the number of middlemen involved in the journey of your food from farm to plate decreases the likelihood of contamination somewhere along the way.

Royal factory farming

Posted on May 10, 2011 by hautepasture

All the fuss about the royal wedding made us wonder about factory farming in the UK. How does it compare to factory farming here in the US?

The big difference seems to be with the level of awareness of consumers in the UK, which in turn influences the behavior of agribusinesses and legislators. British consumers in general are more advanced in their views on factory farming than their American counterparts. This description from World Society for the Protection of Animals explains the mindset of many British consumers:

The UK has broadly high welfare standards in the UK, as well as strong consumer awareness regarding eggs and meat. As a nation of animal lovers, free range eggs are an everyday item and shoppers by and large try to buy ethical and high welfare meat products.
However, milk and dairy products are less well understood and our dairy industry as we know it is under threat to intensify production.

In response to the dairy industry threat, British charities and nonprofits are fighting the applications of mega-dairies seeking to set up shop in the country, because, as we know, factory dairy farms are bad for the environment, bad for the animals, and bad for consumers. Currently, the WSPA says, the average dairy farm in Britain is home to only 113 cows, with very few farms housing more than 200 cows; compare that to the US where some mega-dairies pack over 15,000 cows into cramped indoor quarters.

Other ways Europe is ahead of the US in farm animal treatment: the UK has an Animal Welfare Minister and government-created Farm Animal Welfare Council to enforce farm animal treatment standards; the EU outlawed battery cages (effective next year), pig tail docking, veal crates, and pig gestation cages (effective in 2013); and the EU banned the administration of growth hormones, growth-enhancing drugs, and human antibiotics to food animals. The concept of animal sentience is much more accepted in Europe: that animals are intelligent and feel emotions.

It seems that, like the hats they wear to fancy events, British consumers and legislators are quite sophisticated regarding animal welfare. Even if we Americans don’t want to adopt their headwear fashions, we should at least strive to emulate their outlook towards livestock.

Haute Pasture

raising awareness of farm animal welfare

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