Have you been to Luxa on Torstraße at Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz? You need to go, if only for the hot sauce. The hot sauce, people. The hot sauce. It is good enough to eat with a spoon. It is good enough to make you sit around at home and contemplate why this hot sauce is so darn good and what could make it so. Sometimes I think about going to Luxa and asking them for a hot sauce sandwich. Heaven on a plate, trust me.
It's obsession-worthy, especially when paired with their yogurt sauce (that I'll bet you thought was tahini in the photo above, right?). That yogurt sauce, all sour and cool, paired with the hot sauce, which is deeply tomatoey and fruity - but not sweet - and spicy and incredibly fresh-tasting and just, well, perfect - it's enough to make you never want to eat another meat sandwich in Berlin again.
Luxa is run by Kurds (I'm assuming Turkish ones) and it sells schawarma and falafel and an array of Middle Eastern sweets that look, well, sweet. They're not the friendliest food vendors in this city, but I don't even really care. Because of that hot sauce. That hot sauce! It makes up for a multitude of sins.
Luxa
Torstraße 56
10119 Berlin
0171 187 1110
I used to go to Luxa all the time because it's right near where I live but someone recommended the Rosenthaler Buffet and now I can never go back to Luxa. The stuff at Rosenthaler is so fresh I can barely walk past Luxa without gagging now - it's that weird smell. If you have to eat the hot sauce my advice is never get a take-away to eat at home. You won't get rid of the smell for days!
Posted by: Natalie | October 26, 2011 at 04:59 AM
Another to add to the list, thanks Luisa!
Posted by: Liz | October 26, 2011 at 05:03 AM
Take a wander up to El Rief at U Eberswalder. Their hot sauce is also amazing, sour and bitey and thick! Plus, their falafel. Every single person I have taken there declares it the best felafel ever eaten.
Posted by: Kim | October 26, 2011 at 05:14 PM
I really like the food at Luxa but the smell! I used to work in one of the posher shops in the vicinity and whenever I had lunch at Luxa I would smell like stale oil all day.
But nevertheless, good hot sauce, let alone HOT sauce, is hard to come by in Berlin. Thanks Luxa!
Posted by: William | October 31, 2011 at 01:41 PM
Natalie and William - now I'm intrigued! I'd never noticed the smell before, but now I feel like I have to make a pilgrimage to sniff around! :)
Liz - you're welcome!
Kim - I've been to El Rief a few times, never had the falafel. Love their built-in benches.
Posted by: Luisa | October 31, 2011 at 02:33 PM