You’ll slip inside a scene straight from Blade Runner, just for a second, while you look for an entrance to the mirrored and graffiti-covered facade of 893 Ryōtei. Find it though, and you’ll enter the newest kingdom created by legendary Berlin restaurateur Duc Ngo (famous for iconic eateries like Kuchi, Cocolo Ramen, and Madame Ngo). Brace yourself for a night of Asian fusion cooking in the shape of a Japanese-inspired menu with the occasional Nikkei addition, extraordinary sushi, and plenty of sake — all with West Berlin’s coolest people sitting at the table next to you.  

This restaurant comes courtesy young Thai chef Dalad Kambhu, who started it together with artist Rikrit Tiravanija and the group behind some of Berlin’s most iconic food institutions, including Grill Royal, Pauly Saal, and Dóttir. Out of her sleek Schöneberg venue, Khambu cooks her refined take on contemporary Thai cuisine, which manifests in a seasonal eight-course menu using local ingredients where it makes sense (think kohlrabi instead of papaya, and pike perch caught just outside the city). Enjoy the food with a nice bottle from the small but very fine wine list.

This ultra sleek dining project by the Contemporary Food Lab group was submerged at the very end of the Schöneberg district’s most beautiful courtyard before it single-handedly turned Potsdamer Straße into one of Berlin’s “cool” areas again. Sit down for dinner here and have chef Sophia Rudolph take you on a gastronomic journey across all the continents in her casual take on fine dining. Enjoy great service, superb bottles from the classical wine list, then head over to the restaurant’s Tiger Bar next door for after-hour drinks.  

This cult-status craft beer bar from Denmark opened its doors in early 2017 in Mitte and has quickly established itself as the new go-to place for Berlin’s craft beer aficionados. With 24 beers on tap and a much talked-about selection of Mikkeller beers brewed especially for Berlin (try its version of the Berliner sour beer, Weiße), this bar definitely takes the Berlin craft beer scene to the next level.  

Hidden on a quiet backstreet and tucked away behind a tiny sign, Shiori brings a piece of Japanese elegance to Berlin. Every night at 7:30 p.m. sharp, 10 diners are seated around a bar and then served a 12-course omakase that’s highly seasonal and focuses on regional produce wherever it makes sense. The result is an intimate and refreshing dining experience that notoriously creating bonds between diners and staff. Shiori truly seeks its counterpart in Berlin.

The rowdy Neukölln bar is now is back better than ever after a fire shut the original project down. By day, Geist im Glas serves one of the best brunches money can buy. Dive in here on a weekend for owner Aishah’s legendary fluffy pancakes with bourbon maple syrup and salty dulce de leche or the best huevos rancheros in town, and wash it all down with magical pitchers of mimosas and bloody marys. By night, it’s a sexy place to sip good whiskey, drink creative cocktails, have a laugh and maybe even get kissed.

This iconic restaurant was once a part of Berlin’s legendary Bar 25 nightclub, which sadly had to close its doors in 2010. Newly reopened as part of the Holzmarkt, a project with art, music, and food for the city’s aging creative scene, Katerschmaus is now standing in the very same spot where clubbers famously went to lose track of time and space. It’s now a venue best enjoyed in the daytime — more specifically, sunny days, as the venue stretches elegantly along the banks of the river Spree. The food is non-fussy and modern vegetable-focused cuisine, with the occasional appearance of German classics on the lunch menu.

This wickedly cool dessert bar asks you to add another layer to your Berlin night by putting yourself in the hands of one of Germany’s best pastry chefs and his faithful disciples of cunning cocktail masters. Chef René Frank spent the past few years at the three-Michelin-starred“La Vie in Osnabrück, but these days he invites Berlin’s night crawlers to take a seat at one of the concrete tables shaping his minimalistic, dark bar. Try any one of his elaborate dessert creations (which all use zero added sugar), stunningly well-paired with a cocktail from the bar — in itself one of the best in Berlin.

This Thai street-food project serves up a meal that’s everything but subtle, cooked on a battery of open fire pits. The Khwan signature dish is the best example, a smoked and grilled chicken (best drizzled with the accompanying sweet and sour chili sauce) that hits your taste buds like a raging Thai boxer on steroids. This project is rowdy and fun and if you’re lucky, you’ll catch it at street food markets like Bite Club or during its weekend pop-up inside a warehouse hidden within Friedrichshain’s industrial RAW complex — just follow the smoke.