Potatoes are not my favorite, but they sure are a staple here in Germany. There are even potato based restaurants in Berlin like the Kartoffelkeller. We haven't been there, but even I am interested in seeing what the restaurant is like. So when it is potato picking season, what better than to have a Potato Festival? There is one on a farm in Dahlem, a section in southwest Berlin. As festivals are generally fun, we went to check it out.
I learned how they pick potatoes. A tractor goes and pulls up the plants from under the ground. Then the potatoes can easily picked up off the ground. There were lots of kids waiting for the tractor to come past so they could scoop up a bunch of them. People were walking away with huge bags of potatoes.
I also learned that there are a ton of different types of potatoes, besides white, blue, purple, and sweet. The sad thing was that they didn't have any that you could taste. It would have been interesting to find out what the differences were.
We had some excellent kartoffelpuffers, which is similar to a potato pancake, but different than any I've had in the US. These I actually like to eat, even. We also had Federweisser, which is a fall drink of freshly fermented grape juice. It tasted a bit like a apple cider (the non-alcoholic American kind). Sadly we have bought some since at the store and it is not half as good as the glass we had at this festival.There are so many festivals in Berlin. They are fun and rarely disappoint.
