Two ice creams, two shmorgasboards

A few months ago, Mona and I watched a couple of JunkFoodGuru videos on new Magnum “Double” flavors. The “Double” line of Magnum is, of course, those frozen cream-style pop confections with a choco-style exterior, followed by a goo-style semisterior, and ice cream in the middle. The “dolphin” or “primate” of the “Double” line is what I call the “Double Gold Chocolate Billionaire,” the actual name of which is “Double Gold Caramel Billionaire.”

This is, supposedly, “Eis mit Keksgeschmack und Eis mit Pekannussgeschmack umhüllt von gesalzener Karamellsauce und goldfarbener Karamellschokolade und knusprigen Keksstückchen.” That is: cookie and pecan flavored ice cream, covered in salted caramel sauce and gold-caramel chocolate, with crispy cookie pieces. Yum yum yum yum yum! It’s really good, what can I say. And it’s better in Germany than in the US, so come here and try it!

But anyway, JunkFoodGuru put us on to two new flavors: Magnum Utopia Double Hazelnut and Magnum Utopia Double Cherry. Mona claims that these are part of the new “marble line.” Is it true? Who can tell. I think they were marbled already… We were so excited about the the hazelnut one that I commented on JFG’s video, and he even responded!

Let’s just say that the utopian aspect of this ice cream was thrice-realized: (1) JFG responded. (2) One of the videos, Double Cherry, was set in Portugal and we are soon going to Portugal. (3) It’s been a long time coming and now we finally get to try the ice creams.

First up: double hazelnut. This was a couple days ago. For lunch, we went to an Afghani place near a movie theater north of Innsbrucker. There was some sort of spinach and dried lime? Not bad. Very good rice (buttery and saffron), and there was a wedding party in the back. A bride entered in a white diaphanous situation. At the counter was a picture of a soldier. We learned that only 1 in 10,000 oysters has a pearl.

The movie was “Black Bag” (should be called “Not Bad”). We filled up on mixed sweet-salty popcorn plus two Allgäuer Büble’s. A few hours later we still weren’t hungry. But then sun came through and we simply had to go outside and it was then that we decided to finally search for this Utopian ice cream. The Spätis nearest to us were closed, but the one by Stadtpark was open. We were only really looking for the hazelnut, but the cherry was there too! (Talk about a “cherry on top”). We came back and made some fried rice with bok choy, fish cakes, leftover rice (from a sort of braised chili chicken), and this really good fermented soy chili sauce with a camel on it from the Vinh Loi on Schlossstrasse.

We ate. Mona claims the Red Sox won. Then, finally: hazelnut time.

What can we say? Not bad. Disappointing. A little anyway. There was some good, slightly bitter hazelnut flavor, but the overall palette was like the Double Gold Amazin’ Gazillionaire but less intense. Really not so bad.

The next day we returned to the Freie Universität for the first time in a while (for Jonah anyway). We got lunch at the Italian: a pizza with artichokes, ham, and mushrooms; a salad with tuna; Campari spritz. Mona destroyed a flower pot. Our companion got Spaghetti a la Casa, which looked delicious and made me a little jealous: Creamy Sauce with Rinderfiletspitzen (what in the angloid community we might refer to as beef tips(?)).

Coffee followed. Apparently a cortado and an espresso machiato are the same thing? Much to consider. We met another friend. He ate a Brötchen with arugula-tomato cream or something. Then Mona and I had to split up for a while. She had, shall we say, an “appointment.” I headed home, but first to Edeka, where I purchased ingredients for the first shmorgasboard promised in the title:

* two types of lox (wild and non-wild)

* Bavarian horseradish

* two types of crackers (Finncrisp and sesame)

* “Westphalian pumpernickel”

* cream cheese, plain

* tomato

* cucumber

I got home and Mona still wasn’t there. I decided to walk around a little and read a book. I brought Slotterdijk’s An den Luftbeben des Terrors but realized I wanted to read the last section in one go, so I went back into Edeka and got a copy of the infamous Berliner Zeitung (one Euro forty Europennies). I read it in the park for a while. Somewhere along the way, I must’ve lost my copy of Slotterdijk, cuz I couldn’t find it today.

This first shmorgasboard was really delicious. Maybe my favorite lox dinner we’ve ever done? And after dinner… came dessert…

First a couple of squares from Ritter Sport Whole Hazelnut (white chocolate with hazelnut and crisp). Then … Cherry Utopia Magnum. From the first bite on it was delightful. Surprisingly, remarkably sour. Tart. It tastes like it looks: purple leaning dark red, swirls of pink and semi-dark chocolate. Definitely the winner of the two, and a new mainstay for our freezer?

The final shmorg was this morning. It was a light shmorg – really just a Brötchenfrühstück. We used the other purchases from the previous evening’s Edeka trip: Camembert spread, Roquefort, green onions. That plus two “knackfrische” Brötchen and an “espresso macchiato” from the organic-ass grocery store around the corner, as well as some Bavarian quince jam that Mona’s dad made – what a breakfast…

Now, night has not yet fallen on Berlin. A “Provincial Chicken” remains to be made. There is one more Utopia Cherry in the freezer. Bon appetit, dear readers. And good evening.

Mona Thierse and Jonah Lubin