Hokey Pokey, Ice Cream, Prenzlauer Berg
May 27, 2012 12 Comments
You need to have a compelling reason top open an ice cream shop in Berlin.
I say this because ice cream is the number two most popular thing to eat here after sausages. You can’t find a cluster of restaurants without an ice cream shop. Everyone does it, young old, suited, barefoot, they are all licking away. There is no shame in ordering a spaghetti ice (vanilla ice cream pressed through a potato ricer and topped with a strawberry sauce to mimic tomato sauce and white sprinkles to suggest Parmesan) no matter what your age.Ice cream in Berlin is cheap. One scoop is usually around €1 (although two years ago, I remember it being €0.60 at the shop across the street). The bright, crayola box flavours are often wacky; black vanilla, sweet woodruff or the mouth puckering German darling, from everything to face creams to health tonics to….ice cream - sea buckthorn. At €1 a scoop, I am game to try most of them, cast off my shoes and waggle my toes happily at the simplicity of it all.Whenever I am in Prenzlauerberg for a meal (A Magica tonight) I often skip dessert and go for a decidedly fancier scoop with a lot of American / British flavours like Rocky Road, Banana Peanut Butter and the one for which the shop is named: Hokey Pokey. But also a lot of superb single flavours - Sicilian pistachio, Indian Mango, Hazelnut and so on.The ice cream at Hokey Pokey is as good as that of Vanille & Marille in Kreuzberg but oddly without the long line and more places to sit. Incidentally, I heard a rumor that the team behind Hokey Pokey was somehow related to or had done time at Vanille & Marille. (Lovely post on Vanille & Marille from The Wednesday Chef on her Berlin on a Platter website here).
Hokey Pokey
Stargarder Strasse 73
10437, Prenzlauer Berg
T. 0176 80103080
www.hokey-pokey.de
Hokey Pokey, a New Zealand classic! Even though it’s winter here, we’ve been eating a lot of icecream, last night was gingernut (as in the biscuits (cookies) do you know them?) icecream with apple crumble, a winning combination, the first time together, but not the last. Once in Japan I had squid ink icecream and also beer icecream, neither of which I recommend particularly.
I do know Anzac biscuits as a matter of fact. Anna Hansen (New Zealander) , who went on to open The Modern Pantry, used to make them for Melrose and Morgan. Yum.
as i leave around the corner, i pass the place very often, but never tried it. now i have to…
Yes you do!
Is that Mango L. is holding? it looks lovely. And I can’t believe how long her hair is getting…time flies.
It is. My mango. She would never eat mango. She always chooses chocolate. Except for once when she got strawberry, mega syntax error.
I think he mentioned he worked as a pâtissier in the Ritz? I make excuses to go to Prenzlauer Berg (almost an hour’s journey now!) just to eat the ice cream here. I wish I were joking! A divine vanilla on a hot day last week, crackly with seeds…
I’ve tried quite a few of their flavours now and they are excellent. I am always surprised I don’t see more people on the benches outside? Don’t they know how good that ice cream is?
I definitely have to go here - another place added to an ever-growing list!
Yep, you do!
I love Hockey Pockey! It’s so close to where I live that I am a regular. You must have been lucky though because usually, you do have to wait in line. The patissier behind it gave an excellent sorbet-making-course at Goldhahn & Sampson a couple of weeks ago! It was a fun evening, I especially loved the chocolat sorbet me made!
Gah! I still haven’t done a course at Goldhahn & Sampson. That would have been perfect, I even have an ice cream machine…