In the last two years, Kensington Market has become a hotspot for popups making the jump to open a restaurant. Blackbird Baking, Seven Lives, Dirtybird led the way for the latest, counter service restaurant that is doing something unique to Toronto: their take on Berlin street food. Otto’s Berlin Döner opened last week in the space that once housed the Kensington Bistro and, before that, the original La Palette.
Otto's 22 seat restaurant at 256 Augusta in Kensington Market.
Otto’s team consists of Nancy Chen, Konrad Droeske, Matt Eckensweiler, Tom Masmejean, and chef Steve Nguyen. The first four have prior experience working in Toronto’s club industry. “We were bringing artists from around the world to our shows in Toronto at Mansion and our festival, Foundry” Droeske told me. “Thomas and Matt have a production company called Artefact which works closely with Electric Island and many other music projects around the city. Nancy does strategy and ideation at Mosaic”.
In 2013 the four went on a music journey and travelled through Berlin. It was here that they fell in love with the döner, the German-Turkish hybrid that immigrants had injected into the country’s fast food paradigm. A variety of sliced meats are slowcooked on a vertical rotisserie and then served inside Turkish-German flatbread called fladenbrot. “Since then, we wondered why such a delicious street food didn't exist in our city,” Droeske explains.
Otto's features a variety of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages including yerba mate sodas from Montreal and house-made slushies.
“Everything was designed and built in house,” said Chen as she placed a pint of German beer on the table. The 22-seat restaurant with another dozen seats on the patio puts Berlin and Istanbul street food front and center with a simple menu of Döner (layered meat sandwiches topped with a yogurt herb sauce and garlic aioli at $7.95, $6.95 for vegetarian), Döner teller ($9.95, without flatbread), and Currywurst (sausage with a house curry/ketchup sauce, $7.95).
Their intention to offer late night eats (Otto’s stays opened until 3:30 a.m. on the weekends), made having a good drink list a must-do. Right now, there’s a dozen local and German beers on the menu along with cider. “We started with a list of every German beer available in Ontario, then taste tested our way through all of them. We then rounded out our selection with our favorite local beers through another extensive round of taste testing,” Konrad Droeske said.
There’s also a rotating selection of slushies (with the option to add alcohol).
The centerpiece of the restaurant is a mural by local Kensington artist Jenn Ilett
During my visit yesterday, I overheard two different dining parties exclaim that the meals they were enjoying were better then their inspired counterparts in Berlin. “This is the best currywurst ever, the sausage is so chunky,” said one diner to the other as he scooped up a spoonful of currywurst sauce and poured it onto a disc of sausage.
The group got their hands on chef Steve Nguyen who has worked at Terroni and more notably at Auberge du Pommier. Nguyen and Masmejean then ate their way through Istanbul and Berlin, visiting dozens of döner and currywurst shops to learn about the different styles and layering methods. Nguyen’s resulting menu complements both cultures, he makes all the dips and sauces in house, and doesn’t hold back on the flavours.
The restaurant's signature dish: meat doners served with flatbread.
Otto’s offers a few varieties of döner: chicken, veal & lamb, halloumi, and gemuse (their vegetarian option). You can mix and match, gemuse with chicken is a popular mashup so far. The döners can be enjoyed with the flatbread, or without in a box with salad, fries, couscous or a combination.
“The flatbread is the most important part of the döner,” Droeske said as he tore into a piece of fladenbrot. “We couldn’t find what we wanted in Toronto, so we had a Persian bakery in North York custom make it for us.”
The house currywurst features custom-made sausages from Oliffe and a special house curry sauce.
Since opening a week ago, the currywurst has become an instant hit. Droeske and crew contacted the Gundy brothers at Oliffe to create the restaurant’s sausage mix that goes into the currywurst. Compared to the currywursts normally found in Berlin (smoother, pureed meat that has a more processed texture), its chunkier, and punches with flavor. It’s then topped with Nguyen’s house currywurst sauce.
Vegetarians can opt for halloumi instead of meat, served either with flatbread or in a box with veggies and couscous.
If you're not into meats, the halloumi Döner and Döner teller substitutes lightly fired chunks of halloumi instead.
Otto’s opens every day (from Wednesday through Sunday) at 11:30 a.m. They close at 11 p.m. on Wednesday, 2 a.m. on Thursday, 3:30 a.m. on Friday and Saturday and 9 p.m. on Sunday.
Otto's Berlin Döner, 256 Augusta Ave., 647-347-7713
