THE LOCATION
Located on a dimly lit street in Neukölln, a neighborhood in the south of Berlin, Coda is a small venue on the ground floor of a residential building. Modest in appearance from the outside, it features a dark facade covered with graffiti, glass windows and curtains, a discreet doorbell, and a glass door that discreetly displays the name of the venue. From the outside, it is quite unnoticeable.
They only open for dinner, starting at 7 PM.
The atmosphere inside is lively yet relaxed with dim lighting. There is background music with a distinct subwoofer, but conversation remains comfortably possible. The venue is small, accommodating a maximum of about 20 guests. There is a bar with 4 high stools at the corner and 5 tables. I had reserved a spot at the bar, facing the kitchen, to watch the cooks at work. The clientele that day was quite young, mostly between 30 and 40 years old, and I was surprised by the relatively few photographs being taken. However, every table paused their meal one or more times to go out for a smoke.
RENÉ FRANK – THE STORY – THE TEAM
Born in Wangen (southeast of Baden-Württemberg, southern Germany) in 1984, René Frank is considered one of the best pastry chefs internationally. With academic training as a chef rather than a pastry chef at institutions such as the École Ducasse in Paris and the Culinary Institute of America in New York, he recounts working at Pedro Subijana’s Akelarre in 2007 at the age of 23, with Oriol Balaguer at the Lenôtre pastry shop in Paris, Georges Blanc, and also spent 6 months in Japan, at RyuGin in Tokyo and Kikunoi in Kyoto and Lampart in Switzerland. After about 3 years traveling the world, his longest stint (2010-2016) was as head pastry chef at the now-closed La Vie (Osnabrück) under Thomas Bühner, which received its third star while he was there in 2012.
With academic training, experience in restaurants worldwide, and having won the “Pastry Chef of the Year” award from Gault & Millau and the German Busche Verlag and Rolling Pin, in 2016 he opened Coda along with his partner and interior designer Oliver Bischoff. René explains that he wanted to do something different, which is why he opened a high cuisine dessert restaurant under the concept of “Progressive Dessert Fine Dining”. Nevertheless, I find that there were already restaurants with this concept like Espai Sucre by Jordi Butrón and Xano Saguer opened in 2000, Room 4 Desserts by Will Goldfarb in New York opened in 2006 and later in Bali, or even Cakes & Bubbles by Albert Adrià in London opened in 2018. A risky concept, just looking at what the 2 or 3 unique examples in the world had to struggle to stand out, which have remained as isolated examples with very few restaurants following in their footsteps.
Coda is a restaurant that, in just over 5 years, achieved its first star in 2019, a second in 2020, and won the “World’s Best Pastry Chef 2022” award by “The World’s 50 Best Restaurants”, an award given since 2014 and won by pastry chefs such as: Jordi Roca (2014), Albert Adrià (2015), Pierre Hermé (2016), Dominique Ansel (inventor of the Cronut, Dominique Ansel Bakery in NY) (2017), Cédric Grolet (2018), Jessica Préalpato (Plaza Athénée*** Alain Ducasse in Paris) (2019), Will Goldfarb (2021), and Pia Salazar (Nuema, Ecuador) (2023), with whom he had just done a “four hands” collaboration. It is curious that out of the whole team, there is only one person formally trained in pastry, their head chef, Austrian Julia A. Leitner, who had worked at the Clove Club in London and has been at Coda since day one. Even the chocolate maker, Milan Schock from Berlin, is a chef and not a pastry chef. A very young team, aged between 20 and 30 years old, composed of Germans, some Austrians, and an Italian.
THE CULINARY OFFERING
According to what I saw on their website on December 31st when I went to make a reservation, they offered a single menu of 15 dishes that typically takes about 4 hours to serve, priced at 244€ from Tuesday to Thursday and 274€ on Fridays, Saturdays, and holidays. To this, one only needed to add the selection each person makes of wines and non-alcoholic beverages.
Once we arrived there on Thursday, March 7th, the menu was priced at 254€ and their most iconic dish, the “caviar popsicle,” was an extra 44€ per person. This means we paid 298€ per person (excluding drinks).
Today, I checked their website again, and they now offer the menu at 264€ from Tuesday to Thursday and at 294€ on Fridays, Saturdays, and holidays, and they still do not mention that the caviar popsicle is an extra.
THE BEVERAGE OFFERING
On one hand, a wine list with a strong presence of German Rieslings, Champagne, and Japanese sake. Also, wines from Austria, France, and a small selection of European red wines. A list featuring all kinds of styles, both conventional and natural, and quite well-priced for a restaurant of this category, although I have always found prices very reasonable in Germany. Additionally, I appreciate that they have it published on the web.
Moreover, included in the price of the menu (although they ended up charging us 40€ per person), they offer a pairing based on small 20 ml glasses accompanying 7 of the 15 dishes on the menu with all kinds of drinks, which can be chosen with or without alcohol. Since it was supposedly included in the price of the menu, we chose one of each to try both.
They also offer the “sommelier’s choice” for 78€, a pairing based on 6 glasses of 50 ml that includes 5 wines (3 German Rieslings, 1 Muscat from Austria, and 1 Blaufränkisch from Austria) and 1 Junmai Daiginjo sake (polished at least 50%) from Fukuoka (Japan). This pairing can be taken in conjunction with the previously mentioned, as it is not served for the dishes themselves, but as a bridge between courses. My goodness! Really, what a headache they go through with the absurd pairings that most of the time are poorly done.
And on top of that, they asked us if we also wanted a bottle of wine in addition to the “pairing” and the “bridge”! Perhaps having the meal with a single good bottle of Champagne is not “progressive” enough for them. I must be old-fashioned and boring…
FINALLY, WE DRANK
An alcoholic and a non-alcoholic pairing (40€ each), which they offer in small 20 ml glasses that accompanied 7 of the 15 dishes on the menu with all kinds of drinks. I discuss this throughout the menu and in the “excess sweetness” section of the conclusions.
And also, a bottle of Riesling Steiner Hund 2014 from Nikolaihof (94€) because it was special, we were excited about it, and to ensure we had something good to drink, as pairings usually do not satisfy us. A Trocken Riesling, coming from the Steiner Hund vineyard, considered one of the top 5 vineyards in Austria and peculiarly located just across the border from Wachau, in the Kremstal valley, without the ability to use the “Smaragd” designation, so it is labeled as Reserve to indicate that it comes from a late harvest grape and is aged for a long period in old wooden foudres ranging from 2,000 to 12,000 liters to be as neutral as possible. A beautiful vineyard, on the magnificent terraces of the Danube, curiously on the south slope, the “wrong” side, to have a north orientation, which with climate change they might start to appreciate. Being the oldest winery in Austria, established in 985 and owned by the Saahs family since 1894, Nikolaihof is one of the major exponents of biodynamic viticulture, which they have followed since 1971.
A dry white wine, without added sugar for chaptalization, slightly metallic, with a characteristic gunpowder aroma, no wood notes, quite heavy/voluminous, and with immense and serene depth. A bottle that showcased the aging potential of these wines.
THE MEAL
Consisted of 16 dishes, which I break down as follows: 3 appetizers, 5 main courses, 2 desserts, and 6 petits fours. Essentially, it was practically a 7-course menu served over about 4 hours.
APPETIZERS
While we were still deciding among the many drink options, they served us the following:
1. Gummy bear.
Golden Beet.
A gummy bear clearly inspired by those from the German candy company Haribo, but made by them, without gelatin, just with golden beet.
They use leftover golden beet trimmings to make a beet juice, which they use to cook more golden beet and then reduce to make a gelatin that they let dry, achieving a very dense and concentrated sweetness naturally in this vegetable. In this juice, they add a bit of white wine vinegar to balance the juice by adding acidity.
On the outside, they “coat” it with a dehydrated and crystallized powder of golden beet made from more leftover trimmings.
A recipe that we could define, obviously in a sarcastic tone, as classic (since it’s over 100 years old), internationally famous (since the bears are sold in over 100 countries and 160 million Gold Bears are made every day worldwide) and as an iconic recipe for an entire generation. Seen in this light, it seems like a great recipe indeed.
A gummy candy, a gumdrop that smelled and tasted of spices, with an undertone of beet and a soft, gummy texture. I imagined that the coating was René’s idea to add extra complexity, but I see that the candy company also makes a version of sugar-coated bears.
Even though I don’t quite remember the original Haribo version, I would say that the main difference lies in the quality of the ingredients and the manufacturing process.
Regarding the ingredients, at Coda they replace the glucose syrup, sugar, gelatin, dextrose, fruit juice from concentrate, citric acid, fruit and plant concentrates, extracts, and wax coating agents of the Haribo version with wonderful and exceptional Golden Beet, a variety considered an heirloom, an agricultural relic locally cultivated and that has, in principle, reached the present without genetic modifications. Therefore, it is golden beet, with golden beet and more golden beet, with a bit of acidity. A dish with 1 (well, 2) ingredients: the golden beet and vinegar.
Regarding the manufacturing, they simply cook the beet and reduce it, obtaining a kind of “pâte de fruits”, a dried gelatin obtained with the natural pectins and fibers of the beet, without needing to add exogenous substances (with the risk of being considered additives) and without adding sugar or any processed texturizers.
However, at the organoleptic level, I would say that the Haribo version is not far from the Coda version, which was just a bit softer. It must also be said that the bear is so small that it’s hard to assess the quality, it’s really what I define as a half-bite.
So, although it was not poorly made or poorly executed, I find that the attempt to transfer the recipe to haute cuisine was not quite successful because, apart from not using ingredients harmful to health, at the level of hedonistic eating pleasure it only meant that the gummy was slightly softer. Moreover, it remains a gummy candy and, both the original version (with 46 g sugar/100g) and the “improved” version (I don’t know the amount of sugar) were sweet.
They explain that the inspiration for the dish dates back to René’s childhood, when he ate Haribo bears. I suppose it was supposed to be a joke and make a comment like: “the best Haribo bear of my life.” But I must not have much of a sense of humor.
A poor start or, perhaps, in the same way that Ernst’s kombu dashi is a summary of the menu, this little rubber thing might also summarize the disaster that was this meal.
2. Beefcake
Sweet potato – Almond.
A baked ball made from baked sweet potato with the skin on, almond flour, and beef bone marrow instead of butter. They recommend eating it in 2 bites.
A small, warm, soft, and dense pastry, with a dough similar to a Santiago cake but without the sponginess. The taste of almond flour was dominant; I didn’t really notice the bone marrow itself, but rather a taste more similar to the fat of aged beef.
By mistake, they served it to us again, but in the vegetarian version with coconut oil instead of bone marrow. I prefer the carnivorous version that at least had the charm of the bone marrow.
3. Brioche
Gouda – Rutabaga.
Although it appears as “brioche” on the menu, I would describe it as a donut or, given its size, more accurately a Donettes. It’s a type of fritter made with rice flour and filled with young Gouda, the famous Dutch cow cheese. At the table, they serve a thick sauce from a small pastry bag, which is a deeply reduced rutabaga (swede) caramel. They recommend eating it with your hands, so it is served with a ginger-scented hand towel, which I found quite unnecessary as it did not dirty the fingers at all.
It was warm. It smelled of frying, and I noticed more the smell of the dough than the caramel, even though it wasn’t fried or baked, but made like a waffle or waffle on a special griddle/pan, the typical one for making waffles but without the characteristic honeycomb pattern, instead shaped like a donut and without any design to give it texture. In the mouth, it tasted of cheese (mild), and the rutabaga flavor was not noticeable. As for the texture, the dough was quite airy, soft (not crispy) and the fact that it was made from rice flour gave it a lightness; the filling had a bit of the creaminess from the little liquid cheese it had, and fortunately, the caramel was not sticky and cloying. A mix of sweet (from the caramel) and salty (from the mild cheese).
Once again, we could say that it is a version of a classic recipe, internationally famous and iconic, introduced to the Spanish market in the early 1960s by the Catalan entrepreneur Andreu Costafreda under the famous brand Panrico (Panificio Rivera Costafreda).
Once again, a product of the food industry brought to a supposedly haute cuisine restaurant that I don’t think would satisfy either Homer Simpson’s palate or that of the most exquisite gourmets. A poor attempt that does not do justice to one of the most emblematic North American desserts.
I like doughnuts and believe there are some really good ones, but this one had no charm. The ones from La Donuteria in the Sant Antoni neighborhood or even those from Dunkin Donuts are leagues better than this.
That concludes what I consider the appetizers: 3 finger foods meant to be eaten by hand and the least sweet dishes on the menu.
THE MAIN PART OF THE MEAL
4. Yellow Tomato
Chickpea – Lemon.
Yellow tomato in different textures. From bottom to top:
- An almond tartlet filled with a type of foamy brandade made from candied yellow tomato.
- An orange disc, which was a yellow tomato sorbet.
- A piece of yellow tomato with white dehydrated tapioca pearls simulating tomato seeds. It was chewy and the tapioca had a fizziness like in bubble tea.
- The top white disc was a meringue made with dehydrated aquafaba foam (the cooking water from chickpeas, an egg white substitute discovered a decade ago, with emulsifying, foaming, binding, gelling, and thickening properties). This way, the texture of the meringue is airier, lighter, less dry, and less crispy than if made in the traditional way with beaten egg whites and baked.
Served cold. The coldness was still bearable in the mouth, but it had no smell. It was predominantly sweet and had little taste intensity. It only had minimal complexity in terms of texture because the different preparations were noticeable: it was chewy, foamy, with two crunches (from the meringue and the tartlet), and even effervescent from the tapioca. I still wonder where the lemon was.
Regarding the DRINKS: both were based on almond milk (which I believe they made themselves) flavored with apricot and coffee.
Alcoholic drink: Almond milk with an eau de vie of apricots from South Tyrol by the German distillery Mühle 4, and coffee eau de vie from Gondo AB by the Austrian distillery FMK (Freimeisterkollektiv), where Josef Farthofer collaborates with Ralf Rüller, a coffee specialist from Berlin, to produce this distillate.
Non-alcoholic drink: Almond milk with apricot juice and a bit of espresso.
On top of both glasses, they sprinkled a bit of coriander seed powder.
In both cases, it was a sweet pairing with a sweet dish.
5. Buttercream
Walnut – Dulse Seaweed – Miso.
From bottom to top: a “walnut biscuit” which for me was more of a “quick bread” or a “scone” rather than a “cookie” or a “cracker,” which is how I usually translate “biscuit.” It’s a fluffy and spongy bread similar to a walnut brioche. On top, there was a crispy and very thin disc made from a reduction of last summer’s preserved plums. Above that, the white cream was a “miso buttercream,” a miso buttercream made by Mimi Ferments from Berlin’s Markus Shimizu. Another crispy plum disc and the “miso buttercream” were repeated. Finally, on top, there were pieces of caramelized walnut and toasted dulse seaweed (Palmaria palmata).
It didn’t smell like much, mostly of the seaweed if anything. These seaweeds, which are naturally sweet and red, once toasted, were crispy and had an umami flavor, similar to nori. The miso buttercream reminded me of liver mousse, especially with the addition of the plum reduction. The walnut brioche base had bits of dried raisins which added even more sweetness.
The combination of umami and sweetness (plums and seaweed) was curious, but again, the dish was too sweet. So much elaboration and effort went into achieving a taste that ended up being overwhelming.
Regarding the DRINKS, the pairings did not complement each other at all.
For the alcoholic option, it was a small taste of a Madeira Verdelho 10 Years from Barbeito (Portugal).
On the other hand, the non-alcoholic option was a taste of Yixing Hong Cha, a black tea from China with a fruity and sweet reduction. This black tea (though considered red tea in Asia) is quite unusual and comes from Jiangsu province on the eastern coast of the country.
At that point, I thought to myself, “Thank God the next dish doesn’t have a pairing!”
6. Lettuce.
Gherkin – Cream Cheese.
Lettuce candied with maple syrup, that is, a leaf of lettuce candied* in maple syrup, stuffed with a fresh cream cheese filling, and topped with a dusting of dehydrated gherkin (pickled cucumber) that had been dehydrated for 24 hours.
*When I say candied, I mean that they had left the lettuce in a vacuum-sealed bag with maple syrup solution and not that they had cooked it in maple syrup over low heat (it was not a “lettuce confit,” but “frosted lettuce”). In other words, they had caramelized two lettuce leaves, leaving them slightly crisped.
First of all, they cut the lettuce leaves into triangles and put them in these vacuum-sealed plastic bags with maple syrup. Then, they removed the lettuce leaves from these bags and placed them in concave molds inside a dehydrator at 65°C for 24 hours, dehydrating a candied preparation.
Since the lettuce was dry and crispy, it smelled more like cabbage than lettuce, more like tea, more umami.
As for the taste, it also had this umami flavor and, additionally, more of a yogurt flavor than fresh cheese.
A crunchy and very fragile bite (it broke easily). The pickled cucumber was not very distinct; it was more like a touch of spices.
The most notable aspect of the dish is the delicate and laborious manual process of forming these concave leaves the size of a Brussels sprout. In the end, it is still lettuce with maple syrup and cheese, a combination that seems like it could be off the menu of an American fast food chain. But of course, in this case, of much higher quality.
It was still slightly sweet, one of the least sweet dishes on the menu.
7. Raclette Waffle
On one side, there’s a portion of cornmeal waffle stuffed with raclette cheese (cow’s milk, pressed paste, from Valais) but, in this case, aged 6 months instead of the traditional 3 or 4.
Served warm, the cheese was stretchy. It had a flat taste, simply of cheese and fried food, reminiscent of the flavor of a raclette, which personally has never excited me, neither raclette nor fondue. It seemed like a generous portion too.
On the other hand, on the plate that was set in front of each of us, there was a bit of yogurt in the center, and around it, some kimchi powder. The idea was to dip the waffle into this yogurt.
The dish smelled of the kimchi powder, was slightly spicy, and the yogurt was just plain yogurt.
The taste was rather dull, the texture simple, and the combination was not successful.
Regarding the DRINKS:
The alcoholic pairing was a pear reduction with “Dill Anis” Akvavit from Copenhagen Distillery and a bit of Kennedy beer, a Berliner Weisse from Schneeeule, at just 3.5% ABV.
The non-alcoholic pairing was an apple juice that must have been reduced because it resembled a sweet Muscat wine.
I preferred the alcoholic pairing, which, thanks to the beer, was slightly more refreshing.
We were offered a glass of Auslese Himmelreich from Prüm as a pairing for the Caviar Popsicle, but we did not go for it; we had enough sugar already.
8. Caviar Popsicle
Oscietra Caviar, Sturia – Jerusalem Artichoke – Pecan.
As I mentioned in “the culinary offering,” this is a dish that, when you arrive at the restaurant, you find out is not included in the price of the menu and is offered for an additional charge of 44€ per person. This bothered me and I found it to be in poor taste.
We could say that it is the most famous dish at Coda, arriving as the eighth dish, in the middle of the menu. A small popsicle-style ice cream made of Jerusalem artichoke and vanilla. Inside, it has a pecan ganache (I’m not sure if the ganache also contains chocolate; if it does, it must be white because the cream was light in color) and, on the outside, it is coated with small black balls of pecan chocolate ice cream mixed with a bit (they say 12 grams) of Oscietra caviar (Acipenser gueldenstaedtii) with about three months of curing from Sturia, a French caviar producer of sturgeons raised at the mouth of the Garonne River (Aquitaine) and processed there.
It didn’t smell like anything and is much smaller than I imagined, about 10 cm.
Moreover, you have to eat it quickly because it melts rapidly and the caviar falls onto the parchment paper it is served on, which also doesn’t facilitate licking up any that falls off.
Neither the taste of Jerusalem artichoke nor pecan was noticeable, and there was so little caviar that even when I tried, I couldn’t really find it. Maybe what I did taste off the plate was when I detected a slight salty taste from the caviar, but it was so subtle that it could have easily passed for spherifications they made themselves.
This dish reminded me of Massimo Bottura’s “Magnum croccante de foie gras,” which he was already making by at least 2010.
The idea of “coating” an ice cream with caviar and charging 44€ might not have seemed bad to me if I had at least found it noticeable.
But as an ice cream, it’s nothing extraordinary, just a nut-flavored ice cream, like hazelnut, topped with a faux caviar, a rather common topping. A good deception and a disappointment. And surely, one of the most expensive ice creams of my life.
It was 9 PM and I had already been wanting to leave for a while.
9. Carrot & Green.
Fingerlime – Ginger.
An orange-colored ball or dome made from a reduction of carrot juice and white chocolate, hardened with liquid nitrogen. Inside, there’s a creamy yogurt foam with pieces of nuts and a citrusy crunch. On top, grated citrus caviar (fingerlime, the elongated citrus that produces little balls/spherifications) and ginger. At the table, they serve, on top, an orange-colored cream, a reduction of carrot juice flavored with orange peel, cinnamon, vanilla, Sichuan pepper, and star anise.
The dish (the crockery) came out of the freezer. The orange shell was terribly cold, painful to the teeth even. Luckily, it melted quickly.
Regarding the DRINKS:
The alcoholic pairing was an almond eau de vie from Franziska Bischof of Die Brennerin distillery (Lower Franconia) with a sea buckthorn eau de vie from Mühle 4 and a bit of infused saffron.
The non-alcoholic pairing was a sea buckthorn juice with orange juice, a bit of verjus, and infused saffron.
At that moment, the smell of artificial smoke that makes me dizzy was felt.
10. Dike Cheese Tart.
Fig – Bone Marrow – Peanut.
A baked tart filled with Deich cheese (Dike in English), a German cheese named after the dikes near the harbors of Frisia, the coastal region of the North Sea stretching across the country from the Netherlands to Denmark. Both the fields where the cows graze and the maturation cellars, carved into rocks, are influenced by sea breezes, which supposedly impart a salty taste to the cheese and allow it to be cured for over a year, which is considerable given the small size of the cheese. At the base, there is a fig jam, which I assume was from last year since it was early March. On top, a tartar of green and black olives, or black ones similar to Kalamatas. At the table, they add a solid peanut mousse flavored with hazelnut butter and bone marrow on top.
The cheese was in a liquid and somewhat warm state. My palate must have been off because I found the fig jam not too sweet! Perhaps it was the olives, which added a bit of saltiness and bitterness. The peanut mousse was also slightly salty; indeed, it was fatty.
Another dish with cheese and, once again, this cheese was also hidden inside a pastry. Possibly the best dish on the menu, even though it is essentially a cheese coulant inspired by deich käse.
Regarding the DRINKS:
Both pairings were based on a reduction of Ruthje tomato water (a type of cherry or vine tomato).
The alcoholic also included Rye Rüdiger Sasse whiskey, a whiskey made with rye from Münster (in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia) from the aforementioned Austrian distillery FMK (Freimeisterkollektiv) by Josef Farthofer.
The non-alcoholic mixed the tomato water with a touch of honey vinegar.
11. Grissini
Pork Rind – Sauerkraut.
Served on a small plate the size of a bread plate and covered with a glass dome full of smoke, they say it’s a perfect dish for making a video. They lift the dome, creating swirls while letting the smoke escape and leaving you quite “perfumed.”
They call it their grissini, but in reality, it’s a freeze-dried pork rind. It resembled neither an egg nor a chestnut in relation to a grissini; it didn’t pass even as a “version of” — I still don’t understand the relation to the breadstick. To me, it reminded me of a Bocabits.
It consisted of two half-rings that were freeze-dried and beechwood-smoked pork rind, and on each half-ring, there were three dots of preserved pear purée, and on top of each of these dots, a pine nut, meaning 6 dots with 6 Sicilian pine nuts. On top, a dusting of dehydrated sauerkraut. They recommend eating it with your hands (I wasn’t planning on using a spoon for the juiciness of the dish anyway). The pork rind is from the Sauenhain farm in Potsdam.
What a smell of artificial smoke! If I could already smell it two dishes earlier, when they had started serving it at other tables and while the dishes were still in the kitchen, imagine now that I had the dish in front of me.
I waited about 3 minutes, but the strong smell persisted. As you know, I can’t stand these smokers or artificial flavorings like the Aladin, but this one was much more penetrating than usual. Finally, I decided to make an effort and ate it. It tasted like gunpowder, like a firecracker. And the texture was crunchier than that of normally freeze-dried products, which always remain a bit soggy.
A finger food that wouldn’t even serve as a “merely correct appetizer” and at Coda was served as the main dish of the menu. We, as customers and in life in general, are passive people who do not look for trouble, but I can’t believe there has never been anyone who has made a fuss complaining about how this menu is a rip-off.
Maybe the charm of the dish is that it has a crispy texture like that of frying, but achieved with the technique of freeze-drying, avoiding oil like the trendy air fryers? Maybe it’s just an interlude and not the final dish of the main part of the menu?
I checked the menu to count how many dishes were left to finish.
At that moment of the meal, you are invited to see the kitchen. In our case, we were very kindly attended by Austrian Julia Leitner, the head chef of the restaurant (who had worked at the Clove Club), and Berliner Milan Schock, in charge of chocolate at Coda. I understand that from here on, the DESSERTS or THE FINAL PART OF THE MEAL would begin.
Under the bean to bar concept, they produce their own chocolate. They showed us their grinder or melanger (from the famous and reputable Dutch brand Nemisto), these machines that have been adopted in the small-scale chocolate industry.
They explained the entire chocolate-making process to us, showing us everything from the cocoa pod, through the cocoa beans (the fermented, dried, and roasted beans, the shells of which are cracked like a nut to obtain the cacao nibs or cocoa granules/shavings). At this point in the chocolate-making process is when they receive the raw material. From there, they heat these cacao nibs in the oven and then introduce them into the grinder, which will transform them into chocolate liquor (the fluid cocoa mass, not liquor in the sense of a distilled spirit) simply with its own blades, with the rotation of the grinding (which keeps the fluid at 50°C by its own movement, without external heat) and without adding any ingredients, as the nibs contain enough fat (cocoa butter) to turn into liquid after 4 days of grinding. They simply add some organic whole cane sugar (brown sugar) from the Philippines because the liquor is very bitter. The result is a chocolate that is 76% cocoa nibs and 24% muscovado sugar (Khandsari), which they gave us to taste in the form of a very thin chocolate sheet. At that time, they were using cocoa from Ecuador (I don’t know if they vary the origin).
Back to the table. Well, to the bar.
12. Cacao & Crispy.
Cherry – Soy Milk.
A ball of 76% cocoa chocolate (similar to the one we just ate in the kitchen), filled with a chocolate mousse. On top, a spiral-shaped sheet made from caramelized organic soy milk from German Teto Tofu, two semi-dehydrated cherries, and a cherry reduction (I assume it’s meant to simulate raisins but achieved artificially with a dehydrator instead of naturally as is done with grapes for making fine wines). At the base, there’s an almond cream made with almond milk and roasted cherry pit shells.
It didn’t smell like anything. The soy milk sheet was crispy and tasted like an ice cream cone. The creamy almond base tasted of what we define as cyanide.
Regarding the DRINKS:
The alcoholic pairing was a 10-year Tawny from Quinta do Infantado infused with Santa Clara coffee from Brazil by Bonanza roasters with a bit of cherry juice. It was horrible. The non-alcoholic pairing seemed like a natural red wine, but due to translation issues, I didn’t fully understand what it was and I was already tired of so many bad pairings.
13. Parsley Root
Black Garlic – Pistachio.
A cream of black garlic forms the base, topped with parsley root ice cream. Above this, caramelized pistachios, crispy parsley root, and a parsley root leaf (which, as you can see in the photo, closely resembles common parsley leaf). At the table, they add a green vinaigrette made with parsley root leaves, oil, and lime around it.
*Parsley root (Petroselinum crispum radicosum) is a variety closely related to common parsley (Petroselinum crispum), but it is cultivated for its white, conical, fleshy root, which looks similar to parsnip.
They confirmed it was from this other variety and not common parsley. However, truly, common parsley also produces the same type of root, which is also edible, so it could very well have been that they simply made these desserts with the parsley root to show that this part is also edible and good, making use of 100% of the product.
The dish had only a slight smell of parsley from the green sauce just added on top. And truly, it seemed like common parsley. The ice cream made with the root, the white disk, was frozen. The creamy base of black garlic was good, but it did not taste like black garlic, its intense and characteristic flavor must have been softened with some ingredient. The pistachios on top were very good, flavorful, and of very high quality, perhaps the product that stood out most for its quality in the entire menu. The chips made from the root were of similar quality to those vegetable chips packets from the supermarket and seemed fried, but must have been freeze-dried or dehydrated as they do not have a fryer. The green sauce was quite acidic, which was appreciated, but seemed more like vinegar acidity (perhaps it contained a bit).
One of the dishes that has been on the menu the longest and was one of the best. However, if the aim is to highlight this part of this product and given the little taste provided by the black garlic cream which added nothing but color, I think it would be more interesting to make the dish 100% with this vegetable, for example, replacing the black garlic with some root reduction and replacing the pistachios with crispy root cubes.
Regarding the DRINKS:
Both pairings were based on a reduction of Robustus 6 dark beer from Riegele Braumanufaktur, a Swabian Bavarian Porter made with Irish yeast and 6 malts (2 of them, chocolate malts). The reduction causes the alcohol to evaporate, making it also suitable for the non-alcoholic pairing.
The non-alcoholic included additionally smoked salt.
The alcoholic featured a bit of 20-year-old Kuro Mirin from Kankyo Shuzo (a historic producer of various fermented products from Aichi Prefecture, Japan), which brought the sweetness of glutinous rice, and a bit of Criollo Cacao eau de vie from the small German distillery of Ina Kirschner, which seemed very much like the cocoa distillate from El Celler de Can Roca.
THE PETITS FOURS
14. Dragées & Chocolate
They tell us that today we will learn a bit more about chocolate, and that it is the first time they will serve white chocolate, which is less valued in haute cuisine because it contains milk powder and a high amount of sugar. They replace the milk powder with curd powder.
5 chocolate confits or pralines:
- Hazelnut and soybeans.
- Almond from Greece, and on the outside, dust of chocolate, vanilla, and coffee.
- Dehydrated taggiasca olive (wrinkled).
- Beetroot (red) with dehydrated white chocolate: it was soft like a firm jelly and tasted of white chocolate.
- Wagyu fat: the taste of the fat was very pronounced and it was soft.
They tell us that we will learn a lot and they talk a lot, but when we taste it, we don’t find anything new or exceptionally well-crafted.
5 confits packaged in jars as if they could be purchased in a store. Who knows, maybe they do sell them.
15. Cacao 78%
Medjool Date, Butter.
A strip, a stick, of chocolate. On the outside, it is made with 78% cocoa chocolate. Inside, it’s filled with a classic dark ganache made with cream, butter, a bit of salt, 100% chocolate, and Medjool dates.
It smelled good. The outside was crispy and the inside was creamy.
THE KITCHEN – THE SPACE
It is especially small, exactly what is visible from the bar plus a small area for the sink; even the dishwasher is at the bar, right at the entrance. They do not have a laboratory or any other space where they prepare any dishes. They have one cold room and a small pantry-storage area. They do not have a gas stove, vitroceramic, or induction cooktop installation; they manage with a few small tabletop induction plates. They also do not have a deep fryer. They have 4 waffle irons (2 with rotating plates and with waffle iron plates and 2 with brioche/donut plates) from Bartscher, which are used with a vegetable oil-based non-stick spray. Additionally, they have a couple of ovens, 1 kamado, 3 dehydrators, 1 freeze dryer, and 1 Nemisto grinder/melanger. They also have blowers, siphons, a hot air gun, and a liquid nitrogen tank.
CONCLUSIONS
THE PRICE EXCESS
Aside from what I’ve described in “the culinary offering” and “the beverage offering,” this is clearly an overrated restaurant. But it’s not just about being overpriced (unlike Pur, Estimar, or Da Vittorio, which serve good but very expensive fish); it’s the lack of a foundation, of cuisine, of level, of quality in the product.
The venue is quite simple and small, with just one unisex restroom, and ultimately, you’re uncomfortably seated on a stool at a bar without tablecloths, and the service is not exquisite nor is there a deployment of waiters. There are also no high-quality products that would justify a higher menu price. In Barcelona, it would be a venue aspiring to charge around 130€ for the menu.
To write the prices correctly in the report, on April 6th, I carefully examined the receipt (in German) and noticed that, in addition to the total, we were also charged a “trinkgeld” of 78€, which turns out to be a tip (15% of the total).
Moreover, the fact that the most iconic dish is an extra charge and this is not mentioned until you arrive there, already indicates some deception, a rip-off, and a lack of transparency. A trickster with the Latin cunning that they so often criticize.
THE EXCESS OF SWEETNESS
First of all, to calibrate levels of sweetness and thresholds of taste perception so that we all understand, I’ll give the following example. Contrary to what every bartender tells me and although it is defined as a bitter, for me, Campari is a drink where sweetness predominates over bitterness. Also, even though I am not currently a regular consumer of pastries, but rather consume them occasionally, I grew up eating and enjoying them, especially traditional ones, clearly preferring them over avant-garde and industrial pastries. Moreover, I would say that it is among the shop windows I cannot pass by without looking; they attract me and I enjoy viewing them.
That said, I do not know the grams of sugar contained in the menu, and they also could not tell me even approximately. However, contrary to what they say, the perception is sweet, and both the dishes and the drinks they propose were dominated by this taste.
Regarding the pairings, it is common that when avoiding alcohol, one falls into sugar; but in this case, the alcoholic pairing was also especially sweet and did not include a single glass of 100% wine, 100% beer, 100% sake, or 100% tea but all were mixtures. As bartenders, I also find that they do not stand out, the most they did was to infuse (I imagine vacuum, hence they define themselves as innovative) some distillate with saffron and coffee but the formula was simple: a base with a high-proof and dry distillate but with the sweetening effect of alcohol (an eau de vie, an akvavit or a whiskey), mixed with a medium-proof and quite sweet drink (like fortified wines such as semi-dry Verdelho from Madeira or sweet Tawny from Porto), a low-proof and dry drink (like beers), and finally, mixed with a non-alcoholic and more or less sweet drink such as almond milk, tea, fruit juices or reductions of these, verjus, mirin, and honey vinegar, resorting to coffee and cocoa to add a touch of bitterness, a very common resource.
Regarding the food, when they avoided sugar, they fell, as usual, into ultra-processed products, an excess of fat (whether animal such as butter or bone marrow, or vegetable through nuts) or they fell into an excess of salt. What is called “out of the frying pan into the fire”.
Just as Ángel León from Aponiente is known as “the chef of the sea” and the taste of fish is masked by a multitude of flavors and preparations, at Coda the low-sugar ingredients (mainly vegetables or fruit juices) are always manipulated to concentrate their sugar and complemented with sweet ingredients. Additionally, as happens in the food industry, at Coda there are “hidden sugars” that, even though they are intrinsic sugars (practically no added sugars and I would assure that there are no sweeteners or additives like polyalcohols), are hidden behind dish titles that only mention the low-sugar ingredients and in their natural state prior to manipulation to convert them into high-sugar ingredients.
In summary, a menu that, necessarily, must generate a spike in blood glucose increasing the glycemic index. A completely unbalanced menu, also nutritionally, practically without fiber and without protein. In this sense, it is lucky there was some fat to balance the blood glucose level.
Earlier I said that “contrary to what they say, the perception is sweet.” Here I was referring to what the restaurant communicates, saying that they create desserts but that they are not always sweet, but are balanced dishes made with techniques more common in the world of pastry than in savory cooking, but where acidity, saltiness, bitterness, and even umami also predominate.
That’s why I even made the effort to think about what the menu would seem like assuming it wasn’t that sweet and it was I who was mistaken or did not taste well. But even if I had a very low threshold for sugar perception and was very sensitive to excess sweetness, it would seem to me a meal with a considerable lack of complexity which I explain next.
THE LACK OF COMPLEXITY
There was not the complexity one would expect from an internationally acclaimed restaurant known for innovative, progressive, modern, and avant-garde cuisine like Coda, whether at the level of product, preparations, culinary technique, aromatic and taste profile, aesthetic appeal, or the quality of ideas.
REGARDING THE PRODUCT, they mention it very generically, without giving importance to the origin, variety, or producer which, from what I have gathered, is quite local, both in food and drinks. However, these products are usually so manipulated that their quality and freshness are practically imperceptible, a point that I also missed along with more seasonal products, showing a lack of seasonality, and the menu has been the same for a year, both in summer and winter (as was the case at Aponiente, too).
All are familiar and not very varied products. Known as: Gouda, chocolate, coffee, saffron, beetroot, yellow tomato, pear, fig, plum, sweet potato, figs, almond, pecan nut, pistachio, walnut, sauerkraut, kimchi, mirin, bone marrow… And not varied: fruits, vegetables, and cheeses. There was no mention of any seafood products (except caviar and seaweed), no variety of native cereal or legume (serving only German soy), no meat products (I recall those meat-stuffed ensaimadas or the Moroccan pastilla from Santi Santamaria) and there were no minimally unknown products.
What is appreciated is that, initially, they do not use products from Sosa or any similar company, which surprises me especially being sponsors of The World’s 50 Best. They also do not use white (refined) sugar, but a very special brown sugar only for the chocolate. To achieve sweetness, they use: fruit, vegetable, maple syrup, honey, and the whole organic cane sugar from the Philippines for the chocolate.
REGARDING THE PREPARATIONS, all the dishes follow the same pattern, through repeated preparations such as:
- Powders: of yellow beetroot, coriander seeds, gherkin, kimchi, chocolate…
- Creams: yogurt, miso butter (not made by them but by Mimi Ferments), various cheeses, pecan ganache and chocolate ganache, the orange cream made with carrot from the dome dish, the almond cream in the base of the “Cacao & Crispy” dish, black garlic cream…
- Ice creams: of yellow tomato, chocolate, Jerusalem artichoke, parsley root, carrot, and white chocolate…
- The more solid part tends to be a dough, softer or crisper and of varying density, but always flour-based (the beefcake, the brioche/donut, the waffle, the nut biscuit…) making the meal even heavier and more burdensome. Moreover, these doughs are made with well-known and not innovative techniques, without even the grace of copying or paying attention to the quantity of doughs, techniques, and crunchiness that are being done at Disfrutar or doughs like Ricard Camarena‘s bread-croissant not far away.
All of them (the powders, creams, ice creams, and doughs) are layered one on top of the other with an apparent lack of sense.
CONTINUING WITH THE PREPARATIONS, these are absurdly over-manipulated.
Despite being complex preparations (requiring many steps, processes, labor, knowledge and mastery of many techniques, and a lot of time), the result is not complex dishes but rather a futile effort that neither enhances taste nor adds pleasure to eating them. That is, no matter how much effort goes into the preparation, if it is not perceived in the result or does not improve it, it is a vain effort that only serves to make the final product more expensive. This is a common issue in many high-end restaurants.
REGARDING THE TECHNIQUES, I did not find any innovative or unique techniques.
Using aquafaba as an emulsifier, siphon foams, making ice cream with liquid nitrogen, artificially smoking with Aladin… There are no preparations made with distillation, osmosis, spherifications, or anything that they ferment or cure themselves. They simply make some preserves, like the plum and pear ones. I would like to think that they make their own sauerkraut.
A kitchen based on dehydrating products, whether through the heat of an oven, the air of a dehydrator, the freezing and subsequent sublimation through a freeze-dryer, or the evaporation of water reducing sauces to the point of caramelization…
A kitchen based on preservation techniques where the freshness of the product is not prioritized.
REGARDING THE TASTE PROFILE, the flavors are very basic.
Overwhelming, monotonic, flat, lacking any depth, childish, without any temperature play (no hot dishes), no minimally engaging combination, no stimulating textures.
There are no moments where acidity or bitterness dominate without the presence of sweetness.
At no point in the menu did I say, “Mmmh, that’s delicious!”
A restaurant for satisfying undemanding, inexperienced palates, easily pleased with sweetness and fat, offering four basic crunch elements as a form of false complexity and easily contented with familiar, pleasant flavors like cheese (always mild cheeses, cream cheese, Gouda, raclette, Düke…) and fruits.
A cuisine that also neglects aromatics, offering dishes that are practically odorless, when scent is one of the most enticing pleasures of this industry: I think of the scent of anise and fennel from doughnuts; the smell of brioche, bread, and yeast from the ovens; the aroma of buttercream mixed with the scent of almond from a Sara cake; the smell of chocolate and cocoa from those glass display cases you can enter, filled with chocolates.
REGARDING THE AESTHETIC LEVEL, everything is cylindrical, circular, and spherical. Not even the plating is eye-catching, with varied colors, spectacle, or served with much grace. There are no blown sugar candies (like those from Mey Hofmann), no sugar clouds or desserts that play with volumes and shapes (I think of Easter cakes, and figures from Escribà…). Nor is there a beautiful dessert cart, neither classic nor modern, just a very small, dark, and unimpressive cart for the four confits of the petits fours. No naïve or evocative points of circuses, fairs, and the magical and festive atmosphere that surrounds the world of pastry.
If I hadn’t analyzed what I ate a few days later, I would have the feeling of having eaten the same dish 10 times.
REGARDING THE QUALITY OF IDEAS, I also feel that there is a lack of depth. Here are some examples:
- A gummy bear, a nod to an ultra-processed food, much like El Bulli began doing in the 90s.
- A childhood memory as the starting point for creating a dish.
- A Donnetes filled with cheese instead of chocolate but still sweet due to the caramel on top.
- A waffle with cheese.
- A cheese coulant.
- A popsicle with caviar, essentially a Frigo Magnum (Unilever).
- Making ice cream with liquid nitrogen.
- Artificially smoked Bocabits.
- Using rice flour instead of wheat to lighten a dough.
- Using almond and corn flour to avoid gluten.
- Using bone marrow instead of butter.
- Practically vegan patisserie.
- Chocolate candies as petits fours, also packaged.
- Even though I don’t like them, there’s not even any imitation: no dessert based on a savory recipe transformed into a sweet one like El Bulli did, nor based on a sweet wine (like Josep Roca’s contributions), nor on a perfume (like Jordi Roca’s creations), nor any simple trick like Raül Balam’s planets or Messi’s Goal or “Ooops I dropped the lemon tart” by Bottura or the “Pistola, chut de chocolate” by Arzak, no balloons, no ball pit, no trompe l’oeil, no bubble, no smoke… Nothing that would provoke even a slight smile, which desserts lend themselves to, being the most festive and relaxed moment of the meal.
- There are no typical German desserts (I wouldn’t classify Haribo gummy bears here), with the fantastic and well-known apfelstrudel, delicious Black Forest cake, Quarkbällchen cheese doughnuts, lebkuchen honey and ginger cookies, or Baumkuchen, the marvelous tree cake we all know from Horcher. It wouldn’t require much depth, but I would have appreciated a nod to regional or native recipes. I’m sure there are plenty of excellent recipes that could be showcased, even if they were revamped to pass as avant-garde.
In summary, closing the chapter on the lack of complexity, it’s a restaurant poor in spirit and with very little culinary richness. In fact, they don’t even have stoves. A menu based on ephemeral dishes that leave no memorable impact and are insubstantial. I find that there are many bakeries, even traditional ones in small towns, where they make better, fresh, daily creations, pastries that also have many textures. A xuixo, glasses, a sara, an angel hair doughnut… these also offer a multitude of tactile sensations. How many individual pastries costing less than 4€ have made me happier than this entire menu!
THE ABSENCE OF THE CHEF
The lack of the chef was noticeable. He wasn’t in the restaurant, but rather in Milan, at a gastronomic congress giving lectures instead of welcoming the customers who traveled 2,000 kilometers to meet him like us. You can say whatever you want, that chefs don’t need to be there for the business to run, that they cook the same whether they’re there or not… But for me, a great restaurant always has a great maître d’, a great head chef, a family member, or some visible figure with enough stature to welcome and host the people who visit them. In this regard, the savoir-faire was also nowhere to be seen, resembling just another soulless and personality-lacking hospitality venue, born and abandoned.
LACK OF KNOWLEDGE
The waiters don’t seem to know much, neither about cooking, nor about wines, nor about cocktails. They all do everything and many questions were either not known or not answered.
I regret not having been able to find any greatness or even a style of its own and I am surprised, making me doubt my own judgment, that I have not found any article from any journalist nor even any customer complaining about what is served in this €300 menu.
Just as I forced myself to look for faults at Bagá, in this case I’ve made an effort to find virtues, but aside from the friendliness of the service and the better or worse wine list, I can’t think of any. They make their own chocolate, which is commendable. But well, I also did not find it extraordinarily good, it is not a Lindt but perhaps I like an Aynouse from Xavier Rodríguez of Agramunt more.
A cuisine not so different from what the food industry offers. What Haribo says on its website seems exactly like the text so many communication agencies create for a lot of restaurants. And in the end, let’s not forget that both Haribo and Coda sell the same thing: joy, flavor, and fun.
I don’t know why René Frank named it Coda. For me, a coda is the tail, the final part of a piece or, in his case, the twilight of a senseless cuisine that leads nowhere.
As the great Joan Capri said: Hug me! Hug me because you and I will never see each other again.
