Weekend Breakfasts and the Search for the Perfect Chocolate Croissant

Weekend Breakfast at Haus Kempf

Somewhat more elaborate breakfasts on weekends are a tradition in our household from the early days of our relationship. I believe we started it when we moved to California in 1983 and began working full time. It became an opportunity to relax and reconnect over some good food after the stress of the week. Needless to say, we've continued that tradition during our time here in Berlin.

Above you can see an example of one of our breakfasts. Last Sunday we had coffee and tea, a mighty fine fruit quark made by Renate (quark is a kind of cross between yogurt and cream cheese), and some peachy tasting peaches, the first of the season. We usually have either a parfait, scramble/omelet, pancakes, waffles, or something like that which Renate makes, though in Berlin we've not done either the pancakes or waffles due to lack of the proper ingredients or the right tools (namely a waffle maker). In addition, we often have toast, or, here in Germany fresh breakfast baked goods. 

One aspect of Germany that distinguishes it from Silicon Valley is the large number of local bakeries/cafes. For example, we have 5 bakeries that I know of within a 10 minute walk from our house, and probably more that I haven't discovered yet. We even have one that is literally across the street from us, less than 5 minutes away, the Cafe Wilmersdorf:

There are two on the Wilmersdorfer pedestrian mall, Back Factory which is a chain (they have another store a couple blocks up the mall):

and M&M Back which sort of looks like a chain but I've not seen another store of this type:

 In the other direction there's one on the corner of Leibnizstrasse and Mommsenstrasse that specializes in sandwiches:

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But they have a nice collection of other baked goods including Broetchen, croissants, and other items:

The Broetchen are in the back under the bread.

Though Broetchen are usually translated into English as "rolls", there is about as much similarity between a Broetchen and an American dinner roll as there is between a fish and a bicycle. American dinner rolls are usually small and squishy. Broetchen are usually larger and - most especially delicious - have a hard crunchy exterior shell and a soft and tender interior. The literal translation of Broetchen is "little bread", and they are kind of like a miniature loaf of bread.


Here's what a Broetchen looks like before it's gone under the knife. This guy is a rye Broetchen ("Roggenbroetchen" in German):

 And here's what he looks like after being cut in half:

 Especially fun is to cut one in half, scoop out the soft bready interior and eat it:

 then eat the shell and the remainder of the bready part with butter and jam or chutney. Below, the final result just before consuming:

In my experience, nobody else in Europe gets Broetchen exactly right, though the Swedes come close. On a business trip there recently I encountered some really chewy whole grain rolls, quite a change from past trips where the size was about right for a Broetchen but the texture was like an American dinner roll. Quite disappointing on the first try.

I've taken it upon myself to go out on a breakfast baked goods expedition on Saturday and Sunday morning (Saturday the bakeries open at 6:30, Sunday at 8). Like every other expedition, this one needs a goal, searching for something. What I set as my goal was the search for the perfect pan au chocolat (chocolate croissant). So far, the Sandwich Art shop is ahead. Theirs are just the right bit of bitter, and have two lines of filling on the two long sides of the croissant. But I'm still not done looking, maybe in the remaining time I'll find something better.

***  The law in Germany (Datenschutzgesetz) prohibits from posting any picture on the Internet of identifying information  about a person. For example, when we left the Bulgarian class at the Long Night of the Sciences last weekend that Renate wrote about here, one of the woman running the event asked for our permission to post our photos on Facebook an their Web page about the event. For this reason, I've obscured the license plates in this photo.