Food and Footage

Looks-wise, this is NOT the most exciting piece of candy I’ve ever come across. I mean, I guess it’s really beautiful in a way that appeals to somber, lonely, graphic designers but for the rest of us, it resembles a piece of coal and is in no way obviously edible.

When I was first presented with this little coal brick, I had to make the cheeky cultural observation that, if communism could be personified as candy, this would be it. Capitalism would never yield a product like this unless it was meant to tap into the niche market that superficially glorifies communist aesthetics.

Looking at this weird licorice treat, I imagined a scene like this:

EXT: Courtyard Winter, depressing communist country…

Man in weather-beaten gray coat approaches child in identical weather-beaten gray coat. He pulls a black brick out of his pocket and says, ‘Hey kid, want some candy.’

FADE OUT…

Of course the child in this film would be thrilled by the unexpected sweet surprise, but to an audience of capitalists, it would be a bleak tear-jerker of a scene.

So, with great trepidation, I approached my black block and gnawed the edge. To my surprised delight,  the cube quickly revealed a soft texture and a very pleasant flavor began to form in my mouth. The communist block dissolved into a mild licorice-caramel. Rather than the usual ’stick to your teeth’ chewy texture of caramels, this surprising little sweet was soft and supple, like a nougat. A trip to the kadó website revealed that this treat was known as lakritzfudge (licorice fudge) and that it was a Swedish import. Fudge is a perfect description  for the balance of sweet caramelized sugars and rich licorice flavors. The result is not too sweet and not too strong. I must admit, I really liked the crumbly gray center it revealed. Just goes to show….you can’t judge a candy by its appearance.

Kadó is a shop dedicated to black licorice in Berlin. Lucky for me, this shop is in my neighborhood of Kreuzberg. It is located on the Graefestrasse (a very cute shopping street), tucked within various cafes and second hand furniture shops. Of course in Berlin, and most of Europe, there is only black licorice, so it is known merely as a licorice shop. The first time I went in, I was so overwhelmed by the sheer variety, I ended up buying the only thing that looked familiar to me–black licorice pipes I used to love as a child. They made me feel like Popeye.

Black licorice incites deep passion or disgust in people. I am one of the passionate ones. I always felt a little bit like black licorice, you know; sharp, unyielding, cast aside in favor of sweet and popular flavors. I loved to get, ironically enough, the Red Vines brand black licorice rope and savor the tabaccoey flavor while I did my dreaded math homework. The flavor always struck me as masculine and scholarly (though I know that’s not usually an adjective used to describe comestibles).

Over the years, I’ve had many different licorice loves. I was a Panda girl for awhile because I liked the molasses sweetness and the grainy chewy texture. I liked licorice tea and drank it to try to curb my need for higher caloric licorice treats but inevitably I found myself breaking down and buying a box of Chuckles just so I could savor the sugar-crystal coated licorice square at the back of the pack.

When I finally broke down and bought an assortment of licorice from kadó, I did so with no assistance. I bought based on looks alone. When I popped an innocent looking brown-black gumdrop coated with crystals in my mouth, I was very alarmed to find that it tasted like a salty piece of chewing tobacco. I think I may have spit it out on the street. It was so strong and shocking and sour!

I realized that there were a number of scary salt-bombs in my little paper bag and I ended up hiding them in the back of my cabinet like one might hide a hastily and unwisely purchased pair of shoes in the back of a closet.

The truth is, this salty stuff takes stamina and endurance to get used to. I am not a Finnish child. I didn’t grow up surrounded by this stuff. I grew up with the most sugar-saturated candy in the world! But, I know that I love this stuff and I am determined to build my tolerance so that I may truly enjoy it and never fear a licorice purchase again.

On my third trip to kadó, I explained my predicament to the kind Swedish shop assistant and she was happy to help me build my licorice muscles. She explained that the flavor that seemed so intense to me is known as Salmiak, and that it’s actually ammonium chloride. So, in addition to the licorice root, gum, and sometimes sugar, Salmiak is the main ingredient in most Northern European licorice varieties with percentages varying from less than one to a strong 8%.

My Swedish clerk helped me chose 3 Euro worth of licorice varieties ranging from sweet and mild with no Salmiak, to lower level Salmiak varieties. Over the next few days, I will go on a licorice tasting journey, fastidiously photographing and detailing my reactions to each variety. If you want to play along, I would be happy to hear about your licorice adventures. And if you’re in Berlin, you can check out the kadó website. If you don’t like or care about black licorice, this would be a good time to tune out.

Otherwise:

Happy Licoricing!

On my second morning back in Berlin, I woke happy to see that the sun was shining (the day before had been snowy and monumentally gray).

Settling in for breakfast and listening to RBB on a charmingly shitty wireless radio, I was pleased to be back in the main room of my Kreuzberg flat, back amongst the Lilliputian coffee cups, and back in Danny Devito’s bathrobe (long story).

It was easy to imagine that well, everything would be easy from this point on. I should have known better. About 10 minutes into breakfast, I was confronted by the lack of job prospects I have here.

I had previously found spotty employment as a cook in Berlin, joining in the long-standing immigrant tradition of taking low-paying, strenuous, cash under the table work. But this time I wanted things to be different. With my last year as a twenty-something well underway, I wanted to find meaningful employment.

As a cook, I felt I was reduced to frittering my talent away in hopeless little bistros. I realized that better restaurants did not necessarily mean better pay, or for that matter, better ingredient quality. I slowly fell out of love with idea of owning and running an operation that entailed a lifetime of terrible scheduling, food going rancid and, (if god forbid business was good), certain dehydration, exhaustion and no social life. My plummeting faith in my abilities as a professional cook, lead me to seek work as a writer instead.

Doesn’t that decision strike you as wise and forward thinking? I thought so. I slugged my coffee back, pocketed my ham and cheese sandwich, and was just about to hop the bus to the Writer’s Employment Emporium when I realized that:

it didn’t exist,

I was poor (again),

insurance-less (should be an adjective if it isn’t),

and living in a country where a gift for writing English prose and a bag of chips will get you absolutely nothing.

Pair the English language gift with German fluency and then you’ve got something; translating work, writing synopsis essays for corporations, and a variety of bilingual admin jobs would all be possibilities. Without fluent German my prospects were slim, even babysitting jobs are being advertised with German fluency as a requirement.

I tried to comfort myself by indexing my skills. At best, I realized I could function as a fluency editor; someone who smoothes out the grammar and syntax for a German person writing in English. I have worked in this capacity and was handsomely paid in wine.  But the demand for fluency editing alone, is not very high, and my capacity to find clients without having the ability to understand and talk to people is virtually impossible.

Not only does NOT having job prospects engender financial disaster, it also makes my prospects for getting a visa awfully shaky.

ENTER ANXIETY: STAGE LEFT

I was determined, after a half-hour of staring out the window and tuning out the world (while my brain exploded into fireworks of self pity, fear, and doubt) to forgo the search for a job. It was only my second day back in Berlin, I reasoned, I should cut myself some slack.

I still wanted to write. I had so many ideas for articles. I wanted to write about a new singer-songwriter I discovered. I wanted to write, finally, about my high school love affair with Star Trek celebrity Chris Pine. I wanted to interview one of my favorite bloggers, Holly Becker of hausmaus, and discuss the pleasures and struggles of living abroad in Germany. I wanted to get back to my novel. I wanted to begin some short stories I’d toyed with during the week I spent writing for ex-code in London. In short, I felt full of potential words and optimistic about putting them down.

I set off, this time more realistically to a cafe, to settle in and start writing. But…the internet loomed it’s barred triangular head above my Word screen, and I found myself frantically checking craigslist Berlin to see if any new jobs had been posted. Craigslist, as usual, greeted me with its plethora of fake jobs. Then I started scanning the pages of the Berlin US Embassy website, looking for links to employment opportunities and information about the various visa’s available to US citizens. The websites were red, white, and eeww! I felt simultaneously nauseous and deeply in need of junk food. I tried to calm myself down with candy and a trip to one of my favorite thrift stores near Checkpoint Charlie.

As I stared at the chaotic collection of dishware, clothing, and bric-a-brac, I did feel comforted. I was comforted by the honesty of the display, which seemed like a metaphor for my life.  It was impossible to take it all in at once. To the untrained eye it would appear as nothing more than clutter. But, as I started to relax, I was able to see the treasures buried amongst all the junk. Some color would catch my eye and I would allow myself to be overtaken by it. If I could just relax enough, I knew the clutter would become endurable and I would be able to make sense of things and press forward.