berlin dinner club | past events

 

Quick Thinking Duck Dinner, Friday, 19th December 2003

A man walked into the produce section of a supermarket in Sydney and asked to buy "half" a head of lettuce. The New Zealand lad working in that department told him that they only sold whole heads of lettuce. The man was insistent that the boy ask his manager about the matter. Walking into the back room, the boy said to his manager, "Some asshole wants to buy a half a head of lettuce." As he finished his sentence, he turned to find the man standing right behind him, so he added, "and this gentleman kindly offered to buy the other half." The manager approved the deal and the man went on his way. Later, the manager sought out the boy and said, "I was impressed with the way you got yourself out of that situation earlier. We like people who think on their feet here. Where are you from, son?" "Wellington, New Zealand, sir," the boy replied. "Why did you leave New Zealand?" the manager asked. The boy said, "Sir, because there's nothing over there but whores and rugby players. "Really!" said the manager, brusquely. "My wife comes from New Zealand!" The boy replied: "No shit!!? Who did she play for?"

Above story kind of sums up what we have to do this month, which is improvise real quick! You guys took so long to vote that by the time we figured out we should be going to Storch, the place is now booked out for weeks. Oh, well.

Anyway, I thought we might be tired of all these garish winter lights and shopping and winter markets and cakes and I thought that we will do something completely different for December's dinner. So we're going ducking, Peking duck to be precise. This place claims to do duck the original way that it's done in Peking, so my lips are watering already, especially since I *really* had eaten Peking duck in Peking before. The restaurant is called, appropriately, "Peking" and it's on Ku'damm 73, so it's real easy to get to. The menu is reasonably priced, and Peking duck (which is 2-3 courses, if done properly) is around 18-20 EUR or so, the last time I looked.

So if you feel like you're a little fed up with the Christmas spirit and stuff like that and want something a little different, then send me an email asap on chris@berlindinnerclub.com. I'm not expecting a big crowd as it's such short notice but all those that make the list will get a confirmation email and map telling them where and when we'll meet for drinks before going to the restaurant. Like I said, dinner is on Friday, 19th December and we'll meet up for the drinks at around 19:00 as usual.

Chris

 

Dinner Report

Well, guess who's the bright spark who forgot the digital camera, eh? Sorry, but no pictures this time of the 3 huge ducks we had for dinner, nor of our efforts to put the Barbary Duck on the endangered species list.

Dinner started with some so-so tim sum dishes, nice but nothing especially worthwhile mentioning, although the one person who arrived later barely had anything left for his starters which sort of indicates the food wasn't *that* bad. Then we had 3 mountains of crispy grilled strips of duck skin (resting on heaps of prawn crackers), which we ate with plum-sauce pancakes, sprinkled over with spring onions and thinly-sliced cucumber sticks. That was pretty good. It was followed by lots of clear duck soup, cooked with some simple vegetables. That's pretty good too, though it needed some salt. Finally, we had 3 huge plates of fried duck meat in vegetables served with lots of fried rice. Needless to say, we were stuffed to the gills, and not at all a bad 4-course dinner for just around 25 EUR per person, including drinks.

Later, we moseyed over to the bowling alley where, regrettably, I was thrashed by most of the ladies and especially by a geeky physicist who's only doing bowling for the second time in his life. Bugger. The only thing I would comment about the bowling alley is that they sell shoes very cheap there. I paid only 1,60 EUR for a pair of quite comfortable leather loafers, with odd, long white laces. However, the design was not too nice so I gave them back. The rest of the dinner crowd were still bashing those pins down when I left, so I don't know when the night finally ended.