What to eat in Hamburg

What to eat in Hamburg: a Fischbrötchen from the hand by the water, Labskaus from the ship's table, a Franzbrötchen with coffee, and Alsterwasser rather than a radler. It is a port's cooking — fish is eaten standing, and the best-known dishes grew out of what kept on board.

A roll, fish, onion and remoulade — that is the whole recipe, and it costs €3–5: less at a neighbourhood fishmonger, more at a kiosk in the port. Matjes is young herring in brine and the most classic choice; cod is fried and eaten hot; Bismarckhering is pickled and the sharpest. It is eaten standing, at a kiosk on the Landungsbrücken or at the fish market, and never with a knife and fork. If the fish hangs out of the sides, that is how it should be.

Labskaus looks worse than it is

The dish was invented on ships: salt beef, potato and beetroot mashed together, with a fried egg, a pickled cucumber and a rollmop on top. The beetroot turns it pink, and that puts off almost everyone seeing it for the first time.

2 daysThe fish market at seven, then ferry 62 — the whole day by the hour:Hamburg in 2 days →

What to order

• Franzbrötchen — a sweet cinnamon-and-butter pastry, flattened and sticky in the middle. It is a Hamburg thing, eaten with coffee in the morning.
• Aalsuppe — a soup whose name says 'eel' although by the usual reading the name comes from Low German allens — everything left over; the eel was added later.
• Rote Grütze — a cold red-fruit dessert with vanilla sauce.
• Alsterwasser — beer with lemonade, named after the lake in the middle of the city. The same drink is a radler in the south, and here that is a subject for argument.

Where and when

• The fish market on Sunday — Fischbrötchen from the stalls outside, breakfast in the auction hall.
• The Landungsbrücken — Fischbrötchen kiosks along the water, all day. You do not sit here but eat standing, beside the ships.
• The Portuguese quarter — between the port and the Michel, around Ditmar-Koel-Straße. Portuguese workers came in the sixties to work in the port; today there are some forty places here, mostly Portuguese and Spanish, and pastelarias selling pastéis de nata.

Where to stayWhich quarter puts these places on your doorstep:Where to stay in Hamburg →