Profile | Berlin ‘dessert’ dinner restaurant chef Rene Frank on why 2-Michelin-star Coda ‘needs to be expensive’

René Frank wanted an haute cuisine dessert experience that was accessible when he opened Coda in Berlin but realised it would be valued only if he raised prices

The 2022 World’s Best Pastry Chef talks about applying pastry techniques to savoury ingredients, his Asian influences, and deciding to serve a 15-course menu

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René Frank at Coda. The award-winning pastry chef opened his Berlin restaurant to do things differently, by exploring what happens when you make what is usually served as the conclusion to dinner the actual meal. In the process he earned two Michelin stars, and learned lessons. Photo: Claudia Goedke

Victoria Burrows

Published: 4:15pm, 2 Jun 2024Updated: 2:25pm, 7 Jun 2024

René Frank always wanted his own restaurant to be different.

After more than a decade of working in three-Michelin-star restaurants around the world, including as head pastry chef at La Vie in Osnabrück, Germany, he was ready for a change.

“I was tired of Michelin-star restaurants, with everyone, especially in Germany, looking at what everyone else is doing, trying to copy ideas and styles,” he says. “I was tired of running after trends.”

What he dreamed of was a simple, casual place that would break down the haute cuisine dessert experience and make it accessible for all. At the time he had no idea how difficult that would prove to be.

Coda’s chef and co-owner René Frank in Berlin. Photo: Rene Frank

Getting Coda, which he opened in 2016 in Berlin’s now-trendy Neukölln district, to the point of success it is now at took much trial and error – plus, ironically, a Michelin star, with many of the fine-dining trappings that tend to go with one.

Coda now has two Michelin stars, and in 2022 Frank was named World’s Best Pastry Chef by 50 Best Restaurants.