Syrian Restaurant and Art Gallery in One – Lawrence in Mitte

Located in the former Jewish quarter, with a direct view of the beautiful New Synagogue, the building, which used to house a pharmacy, belongs to a Jewish community from the USA. But instead of giving the contract for the retail space to one of the big competitors, such as McDonalds or Starbucks, the lucky ones are Frank Alva Buecheler and Bashar Hassoun, who turned this 400 square meter, light-flooded shop into a Syrian restaurant complete with gallery and studio.

Here, newcomers – that’s what Frank calls refugees who want to build a new life in Berlin – can exchange ideas with Berliners and tourists and, gathered together at a table, get to know other cultures, their art and the even more fabulous food. Of course, we didn’t need to be told twice and visited Frank in his restaurant, café, studio, gallery and shop.

When you enter Lawrence, you are immediately fascinated by the space. Incredibly high ceilings, unplastered and brick walls, lots of white and – this is our personal little highlight – benches made of old, beautiful turquoise-blue doors. And since the shop is blessed with huge window fronts, we – as eternal food photographers – don’t have to search long for the perfect spot, but can simply sit anywhere.

We take a look at the menu and, as in most Arabic restaurants, find lots of delicious starters like baba ganoush, hummus, couscous or falafel. Because we don’t want to decide on one, we order a matzah plate with mixed starters. The waiter recommends that we only take the plate for one person. When the starter plate lands on our table, we know why, because it is so lavishly loaded with various pastes and salads that you could easily fill yourself up. We were particularly taken with the baba ganoush, which – unlike in most restaurants – is not too smoky, but tastes wonderfully refreshing and delicious. The Arabic version of Musakaaa – consisting of eggplant, tomatoes, onions, garlic, peppers and lemon – also tastes really fabulous. Despite the oil, the lemony note doesn’t make it heavy at all, but wonderfully fresh and aromatic.

While we consistently indulged in vegetarian magic for the starter, the main course was a bit more carnivorous. In addition to various skewers – from chicken to beef to lamb and turkey – there were eggplants stuffed with minced lamb, zucchini stuffed with beef in a yoghurt sauce and – so that it wasn’t just meat – fried vegetables. We would love to dig into the yoghurt sauce and together with the fried nuts it goes really well with the stuffed zucchini – but we ate it with everything because it’s just too good.

The portions are so generous that we can hardly manage to eat everything. Nevertheless, we couldn’t resist trying the dessert. Personally, Arabic desserts are usually just one thing for me: too sweet. But here it’s different, because the rice pudding with cinnamon made with rose water is really delicious and has a very special flavor thanks to the rose water. The same goes for the Madlu’a, a kind of semolina cake with pistachios and rose water.

If you want to enjoy honest, simple and really delicious Arabic food and experience culture at the same time, you shouldn’t miss this great “cultural center” of a particularly beautiful kind.

Must try:  The Baba Ganousch and the Musakaa.

Veggie: There are many vegan and vegetarian starters and also some main courses

Who are you going with: In the evening with lots of friends so that you can share as many small dishes as possible.

Special features of the shop: The incredibly high ceilings and the beautiful interior – the benches are made from old doors.

Noise factor: During the day it is still quiet, but in the evening it can get quite busy and therefore not necessarily quiet.

Prices: You can get a plate of matzah for 8 euros, which will fill you up more than enough, main courses are between 10 and 17 euros.

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