I cheated. Once again…
For this second walking guide to specialty coffee in Kreuzberg, I’m not consistently sticking to specialty coffee shops and cafes in Berlin district Kreuzberg, but’ll introduce you to a coffee place that actually is in Neukoelln.
Or maybe we can agree on Kreuzkoelln, dear reader…? ;-)
The thing is, all of the specialty coffee shops and roasteries I’m featuring in this walking guide are pretty much nestled around Kottbusser Tor and along Adalbertstrasse.
BUT, one of those shops just had to make its way into this second part of my walking guide to specialty coffee in Kreuzberg, too. And this is the brand new location of Kaffeekirsche on Boeckhstrasse 30, right at subway station Schoenleinstrasse.
It just is so beautiful!
Their original location is on Adalbertstrasse and is covered in this walking guide also, of course.
This walking guide to specialty coffee in Kreuzberg Part 2 features the following specialty cafes and coffee shops as well as roasteries:
Both locations of Kaffeekirsche, Bonanza Coffee Roasters, The Visit Coffee Roastery, Companion Coffee inside Voo Store and Nano Kaffee on Dresdner Strasse.
Plus – and, if you know my walking guides already a little bit -, some nice spots to grab a bite to eat in between all the caffeine, as well as co-working space Betahaus offering coffee from Coffee Circle, if you need to do some laptop work.
Let’s dive into this guide, shall we?
First things first: Had breakfast already? If you haven’t had breakfast, yet, before starting this tour, you might want to consider starting this walking tour at the new Kaffeekirsche location and head North for all the other shops on the tour.
Or you can have breakfast at The Visit Coffee Roastery right on Adalbertstrasse. From there, you have great access to all the other places; you’re about to visit.
Both of the coffee shops offer several breakfast and brunch options.
The Visit Coffee Roastery
First things first: To The Visit you go for the location! The café & roastery space is huge and impresses with their bright interior of white metal and lightish wood! It’s a space that you wouldn’t think of exists in the courtyard just off of Adalbertstrasse.
This isn’t their only shop in Berlin, though. The Visit has two more cafes, one in district Schoeneberg and the other one in Mitte. I’ve only been to the café & roastery in Kreuzberg so far, so can’t really tell about the other locations.
The Visit offers their own roasted as espresso based options and filter coffees as well as breakfast and a daily lunch menu. I’ve had one of their salads as well as one of their toasts with salmon and the vegan Laugen bagel, which were super fresh.
If you’re more of a tea drinker, I can highly recommend the Matcha Latte, also available as a vegan option with oat-milk.
The Visit has Free Wifi, which saved my digital nomad life a couple times already. ;-)
Companion Coffee inside Voo Store
Walking onto Adalbertstrasse again, taking a right onto Oranienstrasse and inside of another courtyard – courtyards are a ‘thing’ in Berlin, as you might’ve noticed -, Companion Coffee and Voo Store are welcoming you with its tremendous space.
You walk inside of the shop and it’s like a whole world of all sorts of fine products and designs. Companion Coffee fits so so well inside of the whole store concept, too.
Voo Store is selling magazines, men & women clothes and shoes as well as jewelry and art. Although the store itself is a piece of art, too! The concrete walls and tables as well as the counter are highlighting that.
Companion Coffee – and tea, actually – are following this design concept with their concrete tables, too. Great props for photos as you can see. ;-)
The café is a multi-roaster café and offers several coffees from around Europe. I’ve had a flat white with some super fruity espresso of leading Hungarian micro-roastery Casino Mocca that blew my mind – it tasted just like a milkshake in my cup.
Chris and Shawn, the owners of Companion Coffee, also do a great job with their fine specialty tea that they also sell to other cafes in Berlin. I’ve tried their Sakura tea, which is a very delicate green tea from Japan.
Are you hungry already (or again, if you’ve had breakfast before)?
How about some Sushi or some Vietnamese food at grill restaurant Com A which is just a few minutes on foot from Companion Coffee?
From there, you just have to take the 10 min walk to a place that is full of Berlin history: The Treehouse.
To get there, just walk along Mariannenstrasse and Mariannenplatz until you see a garden with a wooden shed at the end of the street.
This place used to be so-called ‘no-mans-land’ until 1989. It actually belonged to the GDR (German Democratic Republic), but it was too close to the wall no one would use it for building a house or anything on it.
Osman Kalin, turkish emigrant, asked the GDR government, if he could use the property and eventually built the shed with a garden around it. You can read about the whole story here.
For the next stop in Part 2 of my walking guide to specialty coffee in Kreuzberg you walk along Engeldamm and take a left onto Adalbertstrasse. Don’t rush here, though, otherwise you’ll miss it!
The roastery and café space of Bonanza Coffee Roasters almost ‘hides’ itself in a large backyard that also hosts Berlin chocolate manufacturer Hoeflich Schokolade.
Bonanza Coffee Roasters
Specialty coffee is fairly new to the German coffee lover. It all started about 10 years ago. In Berlin. With Bonanza Coffee Heroes. Yes, you can say, Bonanza have been the trailblazers of specialty coffee in Berlin and maybe also in Germany.
I have to admit that I haven’t been to their original location on Oderbergstrasse in Berlin district Prenzlauerberg, but only to their huge roastery & café space in Kreuzberg, which is so inviting, not only for coffee drinkers, but also for Berlin visitors that like to explore Berlin architecture and infrastructure.
Bonanza is roasting their coffees rather light, what I personally like very much. I recently discovered and tasted a wonderful Ethiopian natural coffee from the Sasaba region that I tried as a filter coffee as well as a Flat White. Both blew my mind because of its strawberry notes! In the filter these turned out very fruity & juicy, in the Flat White it felt like a milkshake on my palate.
If you’re looking for a special coffee experience, highly crafted, go there! The roasting space in the back with their 35-kilo roaster only adds to this experience.
Walking out on Adalbertstrasse again you literally only have to cross the street and step into another specialty coffee shop slash roastery slash café: Kaffeekirsche.
Kaffeekirsche
Kaffeekirsche means coffee cherry in German and, if you’re familiar with some botanic around coffee, you might know that coffee is actually a fruit! Normally two of those precious green beans sit inside of a coffee cherry that are roasted to perfection at specialty roasteries like Kaffeekirsche.
They opened as a roastery and café in 2014 on Adalbertstrasse, but just recently added a larger space across the canal, and close to subway station Schoenleinstrasse, to their thriving coffee business.
If you have some more time, take the 15min walk from their original (smaller) location to their new shop! It’s worth the walk! (Check out my ‘Walking guide to Neukoelln Part 2’ for some suggestions on what to do & see at the riverside!)
At both places of Kaffeekirsche they serve their freshly roasted filter and espresso beans – you can try rare filter brewing methods such as Karlsbader Kanne besides Chemex, Aeropress and Kalita.
You definitely have to try their freshly baked sweet treats! The new café location not only has a larger roasting space (have a sneak through the window!), but also a bakery, where they create and bake all those wonderful pastries, cakes as well as their marble cake, which is definitely my favorite! :-)
If you’re up for some workshops and trainings Kaffeekirsche offers barista classes as well.
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- Adalberstrasse location
From Kaffeekirsche on Adalbertstrasse walk along the street and take a right on Oranienstrasse until Oranienplatz – nice views here included as well as ORA.
Now a brasserie, this location used to be an old pharmacy back in the days. You can still tell by the traditional shelves and bottles, jugs and jars. I love that they kept it that way, adds so much to the space.
If you need to do some work during your stay in Kreuzberg, co-working space Betahaus is just a couple minutes on foot walking into Prinzessinnenstrasse from Oranienplatz. If you were wondering already, great coffee is also provided over there by Coffee Circle, Berlin based coffee blog and online shop.
To get to the last stop on this tour, make your way into dead end street Dresdner Strasse from ORA. On the left hand side you’ll find Nano Kaffee.
Nano Kaffee
The last coffee stop in this second part of my walking guide to specialty coffee in Kreuzberg is Nano Kaffee, one of the younger coffee places in Kreuzberg and a community hub for specialty coffee lovers.
Ramin, the owner, started as a multiroaster café offering coffee beans from Berlin local roasters as well as other German specialty roasters.
After being asked several times, when he finally is starting to serve his own (roasted) coffees, Ramin gave in and started a collab with Berlin based specialty roastery Five Elephant and now offers two delicious coffees: One espresso roast with coffee beans from Brazil that I had as a Flat White with super smoothly frothed oat milk from Oatly and a filter roast with beans from Ethiopia that I got to try during my last visit and that tasted super sweet.
Nano Kaffee gathers coffee professionals and coffee lovers alike every year for Berlin Coffee Festival in their popular Brew-ups, where roasters from all over the nation introduce their coffees to like-minded coffee lovers out there.
I’ve yet to attend one of their sensory workshops that have a slightly different approach: You not only get to sniff and taste coffees, but also all sorts of fruits, herbs, nuts and spices to train your nose and palate.
Hungry after five specialty coffee places? I bet you are!
How about some Japanese cuisine? Sounds good? Don’t worry, you don’t have to go far to get some delicious Gyoza, Udon noodles or even Okonomiyaki (my favorite!). Just take a right, when stepping outside of Nano Kaffee, Tsukushiya is the second next building after Nano Kaffee.
Missed Part number 1 of my ‘walking guide to specialty coffee in Kreuzberg’? Head over here for more inspirations on specialty coffee places to go to in Kreuzberg!