September 28: The Berliner Döner Kebab

A group of Timberlands IT folks invited me to The Berliner Döner Kebab for lunch today. The reviews on Yelp and TripAdvisor were mixed, so I accepted with somewhat low expectations. I was pleasantly surprised.

They benefit from a fairly limited menu, so there's not a lot of standing in line figuring out what to get. The counter-service clerk was friendly and quick to take our orders. I eyed the lamb and beef rotating on the rotisserie behind the counter, but settled on getting a Chicken Berliner sandwich.

My co-workers had a Chicken Mango salad, the House Chicken sandwich, and Chicken Fiery Kreuzberg sandwich. Orders placed, we waited a few minutes until our numbers were called, and made the smart move of grabbing a lot of extra napkins. Despite the ample seating inside, we took our lunch to Occidental Park to enjoy what may be one of the last sunny Wednesdays in a while. We dug in as a hobo tried to sell us his magazines. Turning down his offer, I pondered "how do I eat this?" as he took his wares and wandered away.

Two of use went with the "force this in my face and use a lot of napkins" method. My co-worker started that way, but reverted to using a fork to eat the contents when it became obvious that the sandwich offered more bread than he could handle.

Each of my co-workers said their food was very good, with the mangoes in the salad and Kreuzberg perfectly firm, and the lettuce and tomatoes crisp and fresh. My Berliner was similarly good. The diced chunks of tomato were solid yet juicy, the shredded romaine was crisp, not wilted in the slightest. We all agreed that the chicken in our dishes wasn't dry like you sometimes find, but was delicate and softly crumbled on contact. The biggest issue among us, and it's a minor thing, was that the bread is so thick. It's really an unfair complaint, though, as my 30 seconds of research show that's the standard German döner. It'd be like complaining that the salt crystals on a pretzel were too big.

The yogurt sauce on our sandwiches was just there. It wasn't overpowering, it wasn't bad, but it wasn't the star of the show. That's probably as it should be.

Some of the reviews I read also mentioned that the spiciness of the Kreuzberg was so mild as to not be noticable. My co-worker says otherwise; it was spicy enough that we considered that perhaps the owners read those reviews and ratcheted up the spiciness to make it painfully obvious.

Overall, it was pretty good. For the price, compared to other places I've eaten, it was great. I definitely deserves better reviews than I'm seeing online.

The Berliner Döner Kebab
221 1st Ave. S.
Chicken Berliner on fladenbrot, can of Coke, $9.37

Chicken Berliner

House Chicken Mango Salad (left), Fiery Kruesberg (right)