Berlin's most bizarre dinners: The Cracky Dining project combines enjoyment with madness
The evening is intended to be as unpredictable as possible. "We'll pick you up on a day of your choosing at a location of your choosing," the Cracky founders mysteriously state in a message. There's no indication of where they're going or what exactly is planned.
The preliminary research also turns out to be rather uninformative: an Instagram account with only a few posts and a website where the project laconically confirms its own existence with a reference to the imprint. There's also an online shop offering an oil tanker, a house, and an off-road vehicle.
Of course, this isn't meant seriously—or is it? With Cracky Dining, you can never be sure. Behind it lies a concept for monthly dinner clubs and fine dining experiences, for truly special evenings that deliberately distance themselves from all conformity—detached from anything the guests have ever experienced before.
In any case, after the ride in a pink stretch limousine, which is waiting for us in front of the editorial office at the agreed time, we find ourselves in Neukölln . An emotionless, mute man wearing a bow tie leads us through the vast space of the vacant C&A store on Karl-Marx-Straße, which has since been rented out as the Cank event space. The disused escalators take us up to the second floor. We walk toward a table with an abacus on it, along with magazines and cigars.
What follows resembles a scene from a movie: Two chairs at the table turn toward us, and on them two men stare at us silently. Scruffy stuffed cats sit on their laps, and while we're still wondering if they're Cracky founders Julian Seitlinger and Adrian Parpat, two other men in white robes approach the scene. They wave palm leaves at the two men on the swivel chairs, who bear a suspicious resemblance to them – and the confusion is complete.
It's about involving guests in an adventure in which they themselves are the adventurers.
In fact, the two men in white are Seitlinger and Parpat—the other two are doubles cast specifically for this evening, for this opening scene. Throughout the entire conversation, the doubles remain seated, smoking cigars, reading magazines, or staring at us.
Julian Seitlinger, who initially studied philosophy, politics, and economics before finding his way into the world of culinary arts, and Adrian Parpat, who was active in the arts and culture scene from an early age and initially worked in the financial sector before ultimately moving to Italy, founded Cracky Dining around two years ago.
The two met while studying at the Università di Scienze Gastronomiche in Pollenzo – an institution founded in 2004 by the founder of the international Slow Food movement. "There, surrounded by people who shared a passion for good food, the idea for a joint project took shape," the founders say. It was intended to be about evenings where friends and strangers could come together to enjoy food and share stories.
Back in Berlin, they unanimously agreed: "You can really eat very well here." Nevertheless, they felt the restaurant landscape was too controlled and overly ambitious. So the two complemented the Berlin scene with their monthly dinner clubs – small events for up to twelve guests who discover Cracky primarily through recommendations rather than targeted marketing.
The dinner club format quickly evolved; Seitlinger and Parpat have even outfitted events for major companies. Recently, they say, still fanning their doppelgangers, they presented an interactive food performance at an international art exhibition in Vienna – a further step toward the culinary art happening that is always the focus of Cracky dinners.
We want to let the experience and the food speak for themselves; with us, everything happens by hearsay.
There's no rigid concept for the various events, neither in terms of cuisine nor creative design. "It's about letting people share in something breathtaking, experiencing something they wouldn't otherwise experience, involving them in an adventure in which they themselves are the adventurers," explains Parpat. "We want people to feel free at our tables."
Incidentally, registering for the dinner club or booking Cracky for an event isn't done via the website; that only works by calling the phone number listed there. And the fact that there are so few posts on social media is also a very conscious decision: "You can advertise a lot, take great photos, and light everything well, but ultimately, we want the experience and the food to speak for themselves. With us, everything happens by word of mouth," says Seitlinger.
The two recount a New Year's Eve party they hosted for a client: In the client's empty penthouse, they and a friendly artist collective had interactive spaces and sculptures built, including a four-meter-tall ChatGPT monster that interacted with the guests. "The takeover of world domination by artificial intelligence" – nothing less was to be the theme for that evening.
They are currently working on an event to be held in a seven-story high-rise in Istanbul. The two founders want to "build a hellish techno club in the basement." On the floors above, they plan to recreate the circles of hell from "Dante's Inferno"; each floor represents its own circle with thematically appropriate dishes and performances. A twelve-course menu will be distributed across the floors until the guests land in the basement—"and the devil himself serves them dessert."
To ensure the success of such projects, the two collaborate with a large network of freelancers—from chefs and designers to artists and carpenters. They never seem to run out of ideas; Seitlinger and Parpat talk about an endless list of loose phrases and concrete ideas, concepts and details they still want to implement.
There's one thing the two never want to do, however: open a restaurant. They find it too static, too normal. "And normality is the death of creativity," says Adrian Parpat.
Berliner-zeitung
