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If you are up North then
there is more than a ferry to loose
You are not the only one she leaves
and you will not be the last
If you are up North then
If you are up North then

Vacation. Nothing makes me more stressed out than going on vacation. The time when all pieces should fall into place and only the good times should roll.

Vacation up North. To the land where you need a ferry to travel. Where there is no difference between night and summer day. Where the dinner meant for 4 suddenly is for 8. Where there is always time, and a visitor is offered plenty of coffee and cakes.

To the North of Norway. Where autumn is orange not because of the leaves, but because of the cloudberries in the mires. Where the beaches are so sandy you could forget this is Norway, not Mexico or the Maldives, if you look beyond the red boathouses, the mountains and the cold water.

Where nature is magnificent but the weather is moody. Where mountains and beaches are wrapped in fog and storm. Where there is gratitude for the smallest glimpse of summer and 15 degree Celsius (60 Fahrenheit) is bikinisummer, worthy of sunbathing and smiles.

You never know what kind of weather awaits you when you are traveling to the North of Norway. My last summer vacation up North, the average temperature dropped to 8 degree Celsius (46 Fahrenheit). In July. The summer before was stormy, we mostly stayed indoors, my son was sick and we had a massive family quarrel.

No sun in December, this is the law in this part of the country
Night devours the day and she is always hungry
The stars have gone, they are selling themselves in stores
The sky has no borealis, and you cannot see the Polaris

If you are up North then
Just let the darkness roll
Because one night the curtain will open up
and there will be a divine Light
If you are up North then
If you are up North then

This year’s vacation started with me traveling north with chickenpox (in its last phase, doctor said it was ok to travel). The 20th of July is a magical date on the island where I come from. At that time the first cloudberries ripen, but in return the midnight sun is starting to fade away.

I came to the island of my childhood just in time to see the first cloudberries mature. It was so hot most days I could pick cloudberries on the mires in my running shoes. Simultaneously the local strawberries were also ripe and my mother had green rhubarb in the freezer for me.

We made beautiful and traditional food I associate with my childhood and the island I left when I was sixteen. Rice porridge topped with sour cream porridge. Tart rhubarb pudding with cream. Waffles with cloudberries. Reindeer stew. Pan-fried coalfish with potatoes. Always potatoes accompanying dinner. And black pudding.

The two general stores on the island are not like other stores. They always keep in stock shaved reindeer meet and frozen blood. It was the first time I bought one. A bucket with blood, labeled ”for consumption”. My mother taught me how to make my childhood favourite, black pudding with raisins, and suddenly I was there. A kid in my mother’s kitchen, munching black pudding.

We sunbathed at Silsand most days. Silsand is one of the sandy beaches on the island, lying where the road almost ends. From here there is view all the way to the town of Harstad and its wooden houses. Just a stones’ trow away lies ”End of the rock (”Bergenden”), the place to stay if you want to gaze at the midnight sun casting its spell on the distant Senja mountains, turning them blue, pink, orange and in the end, deep red.

To Silsand we brought along homemade frozen yogurt ice cream with mountains of raspberries, a dessert I made several times up there. It was up North my little two year old son had his first real berry meal consisting of nordic strawberries. And it was here he learned to throw stones in the ocean, not the sea.

Back in Oslo again. The chickenpox has been replaced with insect bites. My camera is filled with almost 500 pictures. My son is rid of his fear of bathing in the sea, and he has gotten to know for real his family living up North. He has almost turned into a Northener. He has learned to say ”Oh my God” and has driven an all-terrain vehicle.

You do not reach land before the wind has turned
What you give is just not returned
But you are not alone, there are many of us out there
Our boats crossing paths in darkness on an open fjord

If you are up North then
The winter darkness is behind you
Spring has pushed you through
You are soon on the other side
If you are up North then
If you are up North then.  

Rhubarb pudding with cream

This is the Norwegian counterpart to the more known Danish berry pudding. Cooked berries and fruit thickened with potato starch is an old tradition in Scandinavia, and something I remember from my childhood.

about 500 g / 18 oz peeled rhubarb
about 100 gr / 4 oz sugar
100 ml water
2 tbsp potato starch (or maizena)
heavy cream to serve

1. Cut the stalks into pieces. Place in a pan with the sugar. Let the rhubarb rest for at least an hour – the sugar will produce rhubarb juice.
2. Add the water and bring to boil on low heat for 10 minutes. Adjust the taste with more sugar if you find it too sour.
3. Stir the potato starch in a little water and pour into the pan while stirring with a whisk. It is important you pour it gradually until the pudding has the consistency of thin porridge. (The pudding will thicken more as it becomes cold).
4. Pour in a serving bowl, sprinkle with a little sugar and allow to cool. Serve with heavy cream.

Frozen yogurt with berries (makes 4–5)

In the summer I would rather spend my time outside than in the kitchen. So this is frozen yogurt ice cream the easiest way, made without ice cream machine. This is unpretentious food for the beach, for the hammock, for the balcony, for summer.

400 ml thick Greek yogurt (preferably full-fat)
125 g / 4 oz raspberries or strawberries
3–6 tbsp sugar (depending on how sweet you like it)

With a fork smash 100 g of the berries together with the sugar. Add the yogurt and stir a little. I like to keep it rippled. Place in the fridge at least an hour. After an hour it is more like cold cream, not ice cream. If you want ice cream scoops, freeze for 2–3 hours while you stir once in a while, particularly the edges. (Do not freeze more as it turns into granita rather than ice cream). Top with the rest of the berries divided into two and three.

Travel more?

Athens, Greek salad and holiday memories
Jambalaya and greetings from New Orleans
Tips to London and Paris, which one is the best food city?

A taste of North Norway?

Almond meringue tart with butter cream (suksessterte)
Nordic BLT with scrambled eggs
Scandinavian waffles with cardamom
Creamy rice porridge with orange sauce
Rhubarb tart 1938
Black pudding with syrup

The lyrics in this post is “E du nord” by Kari Bremnes, my translation from Norwegian to English.

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Danish berry pudding with cream.

Danish berry pudding with cream (rødgrød med fløde) is probably the most famous of all Scandinavian desserts. It surely is the national dessert of Denmark.

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A multitude of berries cooked with water or fruit juice thickened with potato starch resulting in a “red porridge” (rødgrød) and served with heavy cream. The national dessert of Denmark has been a staple since the late 19th century and together with ris a la mande they constitute the Danish contribution to the World heritage of desserts. Norway has no tradition of berry pudding, but we have a similar “fruit porridge” which consists of cooked and thickened rhubarb, also served with cream. These are desserts with an emotional ingredient: They remind you of childhood, the good childhood. Or how we want to remember childhood.

The scent of sunshine, vacation and freedom. Because it is hard to forget the enduring scent of boiled berries. They remind me of childhood the same way gravy from a roasted duck and pork roast do on Christmas Eve.

Thomas Herman, Danish star chef

Berry pudding is not the fanciest of desserts. It is the dessert most grandmothers made long time before creme brulé and chocolate fondant were household desserts. It is traditionally served with heavy cream, never whipped cream. The other defining trait is the use of an array of berries. It is made with at least three kinds of berries. According to the Housewife’s handbook dating back to 1903 redcurrants are important because they “yield the loveliest colour, but it is tastier with a mix of redcurrants, raspberries and blackcurrants.”

In some versions the berries are cooked until porridge. In other versions the berries are just dropped in the sauce at the end. The latter is the version I adhere to. I make the berry pudding in two phases: First I cook a flavourful syrup based on redcurrants, blackcurrants or cherries. When the cooking is finished I add strawberries and raspberries. Serve it either warm or cold, but if you serve it cold drizzle a little sugar to avoid the dessert developing a “skin” on top.

Because it is mid-July I use the berries in season: Redcurrants for colour and tartness, raspberries and strawberries for sour sweetness, making it into a dessert celebrating summer and its endless bounty.

Danish berry pudding with cream (makes 4–5)

100 g currants (red or black)
200 ml water
50 g sugar
150 g raspberries
300 g strawberries
2 tbsp maizena
50 g blanched almonds
heavy cream to serve

1. Add redcurrants (or blackcurrants), water and sugar in a pan and let simmer for 10 minutes.
2. Wash and hull the strawberries. Divide small ones into two and big ones into three.
3. Stir the maizena in a little water and pour into the pan while stirring with a whisk. It is important you pour the maizena gradually until the pudding has the consistency of thin porridge. (The pudding will thicken more as it becomes cold).
4. Remove the pudding from the heat and add the strawberries and raspberries. Serve with heavy cream in a jug.

More Danish dishes?

Rice pudding with cherries (ris a la mande)
Pork apples (æbleflæsk)
Apple trifle (pige med slør)
The open sandwich has returned from the past

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Strawberries with meringue and wild strawberries.

A handful of wild strawberries embracing garden strawberries. A doll-up of meringue. The loveliest strawberry dessert.

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Right now strawberries are on everybody’s lips. People have strawberry moustaches, and newspapers tell stories about strawberry “cocktails” you do not want to encounter. The lovely but disputed strawberries colour the Norwegian summer red with its peak in July. What is the best way to enjoy the jewels of summer? Is it Eton Mess? With panna cotta? Or the Wimbledon way with cream, which also is the preferred manner in Norway?

According to my lovely better half, there are two ways to enjoy strawberries: Au naturel or with raw meringue. I remember the first time I made lemon meringue pie. I was so disappointed. I thought the meringue should be like a pavlova – chewy and crisp, not like a mess of fluffy uncooked marshmallows. A meringue with a thin shelter of grilled crust, otherwise almost raw. I did not understand this was exactly the point.

Later on I tried an even rawer version. At the Oslo restaurant St. Lars, I had strawberries in a bay-scented syrup with fluffy, raw meringue. This time I got it.

The bitterness of the bay leaf may not be your first choice of spice to pair with strawberries, but it works well. However, here I opt for a much more local ingredient that grows in the garden right outside my window. My garden is a typical Oslo garden with patches of green in the shades of low apartment buildings. Here a few patches have escaped the tidiness of the lawn, bringing to life wild strawberries, tiny and almost hidden by weed and grass. In Norway they are called markjordbær, ground strawberries, because they grow so close to the ground.

I flavour the syrup with the wild strawberries to let their delicate flavour embrace the garden strawberries. If you are not lucky to have a patch of wild strawberries, use a bay leaf instead or go natural. Either way, the combination of strawberries and raw meringue enhances the strawberry flavour more than cream does. And if you are lactose-intolerant it sure is a good option.

P.S. If you do not want to use raw egg whites, leave the meringue for 15 minutes in the oven at 325F.

Strawberries with meringue and wild strawberries (makes 4)

Strawberries:
150 ml water
1 tbsp sugar
1–2 punnets strawberries (washed, hulled and halved)
a handful of wild strawberries (or a bay leaf)

Meringue:
2 egg whites at room temperature
100 g sugar

1. Put water and sugar in a small pan. If you go for the bay leaf syrup, add the bay leaf and boil on low heat until reduced a third, about 15 minutes. Allow to cool and add the strawberries. If you make the version with wild strawberries, let them marinate in the finished and cold syrup for 15 minutes before you add the strawberries.

2. In a clean bowl, whip the egg whites with an electric beater for at minute before adding the sugar, a spoon at a time until the mixture is thick and glossy. Best used within an hour or two.

3. Serve the berries with a doll-up of meringue and drizzle with some of the syrup.

More recipes with wonderful strawberries?

Strawberry panna cotta
Strawberry milkshake
Eton Mess, my English summer flirt

Music: Hard way home, Brandi Carlile

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Heart-shaped Scandinavian waffles.

They are heart-shaped like in a Chris Isaak song. They are the epitome of Nordic hospitality and warmth. Waffles have a special place in the heart of Scandinavians.

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Waffles are eaten in all of the Scandinavian countries, but they have a special place in Norway. Waffles are just as important to Norwegians as the croissant is to the French. Waffles are ever-present in Norway, they are sold at cafés and made at home. Like another iconic Nordic dish, meatballs, they represent a sense of belonging. The taste of home.

You may sit under a palm tree in Palermo. Stay at a bed and breakfast in Brooklyn. Barter in a medina in the Middle East. The scent of waffles sends us home. Nowhere is this truer than in the Norwegian Church Abroad, Sjømannskirken.

Seaman waffles

The Norwegian Church Abroad was established in 1834 to serve as church for Norwegian seamen. Today 31 churches are spread around the world from Dubai to San Francisco. They are popular for Norwegian couples that want to get married abroad, but most of all they are social and spiritual havens open to all Norwegians; you can come by just to read Norwegian newspapers or have a cup of coffee and a waffle. Waffles and the Norwegian Church Abroad are tied together like a sailor’s knot. Each church abroad has their own particular waffle recipe, and during their yearly campaign “Hjertevarme” they hand out thousands of heart-shaped waffles as a symbol of generosity.

The most common way to eat waffles in Norway is with brown cheese or with sour cream and jam.

Volunteer waffles

Dugnad is one of the few Norwegian words that have seeped into the English language. And waffles and dugnad are intertwined. Numerous young volunteers have sold waffles to raise money for their school trips or for humanitarian causes. As in the story about Gimsøy secondary school, where the pupils during two hours managed to raise 80 000 kroner (13 500 dollars) to the Red Cross in the Philippines in the wake of typhoon Haiyan in 2013. The sum was a result of door-to-door donations and the sale of cakes and waffles.

Scandinavian waffles

Compared to American of Belgian waffles Scandinavian waffles are thinner and heart-shaped. They are not served as a dessert with whipped cream but rather as a meal in itself or served with afternoon coffee. They are usually sweet, not savory although there is a Norwegian counterpart to chicken and waffles, where they accompany a sausage. Scandinavian waffles are also delicious left-over food because they can be made with a wide array of milk products ranging from milk, butter milk, yoghurt, cream or sour cream. My mother always makes waffles when she has some old cream or sour cream to be used.

Waffles can also be eaten as tacos.

Singing waffles

Come on in and have some waffles, my mother would yell from the kitchen window. I would stop my work, usually painting the house or doing gardening work, rush in and wolf down hot waffles straight out of the waffle iron. One of the many adorable things about waffles, is their informal ease. You do not need clean hands, nice clothes or a chair to savour them. The best waffles should be eaten straight away and addresses only your appetite. Such waffles makes me sing.

Hospitable waffles

But do sit down with your waffles – and enjoy the taste of hospitable waffles. Waffles are commonly eaten with butter and brown cheese or a dollop of sour cream and jam. Scandinavian waffles do not require any yeast and can be whipped together in a hurry, making them easy to offer to guests. And in rural Norway, guests just come by. Where I come from in the North of Norway neighbours and friends knock on the door several times a day. One neighbour comes by to exchange the latest woman’s magazines. Another comes by just because he is a neighbour and it is a lovely day. In a culture where there is a lack of cafés, the café moves to your home. And in these homes the smell of coffee and freshly cooked waffles is the smell of hospitality.

Waffle break with cloudberries – best break there is.

Outdoor waffles

Norway is one of the most sparsely populated countries in Europe. In a population of 5,1 mill roughly 20 percent live in cities with more than 50 000 inhabitants. The rest live in rural areas or small towns with less than 25 000 inhabitants. My country is a country with plenty of space and wilderness. Even in the capital Oslo, the wilderness is just a 20-minute ride from downtown while in most other parts of Norway the forest starts where your garden ends. Dotted all over the Oslo Forest, like lighthouses, are wooden cafés. They pride themselves on whipping up the best waffles you can get in the forest.

One of my finest waffle moments was in the outdoor, after a trek. My brother cooked waffles over open fire using my mother’s old non-electric waffle iron. Eating the waffles with the view to the birch woods, the slender fjord and the snow-capped mountains looming above made these simple waffles a meal to cherish.

Scandinavian waffles is the smell of hospitality.

Scandinavian waffles (makes about 8)

If you do not have a Nordic heart-shaped waffle iron, use a Belgian waffle iron.

300 ml oats
300 ml water
3 eggs
150 g / 5,2 oz cottage cheese (sour cream or Greek yogurt)
100 g / 3,5 oz melted butter
1 tbsp sugar
2 tsp ground cardamom
a pinch of salt
1 tsp baking powder
200 ml flour (gluten-free is fine)
about 200 ml full fat milk

1. Let the oats soak in water for 1 hour.
2. Mix the rest of the ingredients and blitz with a handheld blender. Let the batter rest for a 30 minutes to thicken it. The batter should not be as thick as an American pancake batter, but have the texture as a thick French crêpe batter.
3. Fry until golden brown in a waffle iron.

Hungry for more Nordic dishes and stories?

Rhubarb pudding and North of Norway
Everyday fishsoup with fishballs
Nordic apple trifle
Wild autumn stew with chanterelles
Danish berry pudding with cream

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Yellow pea soup with bacon and carrots.

What has pea soup to do with London and the sea? Why is pea soup served with pancakes? And which pea is the distant cousin of the yellow pea?

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When I was as kid I rode on my little red bike to the local store to buy caramels for a penny each. Back in the 1970s you could buy big packages with candy for 50 pence. Today you can hardly buy anything for 50 pence in Norway. So when I recently had a look at the price of the package of peas I was buying, I was shocked. I could not remember the last time I only paid 50 pence for something, except a tiny piece of chocolate.

Dried peas are still astonishingly cheap. They are budget food, yet highly nutritious containing both iron and proteins. For the price of 50 pence you are able to buy half a kilo dried peas and make a hearty dinner for at least six people. I want to make yellow pea soup to honour the humble pea that has provided so much and asked for so little. The only thing the pea asks for is a little bit of your time. You have to start the day in advance.

One of the things I find interesting about food is how many similar dishes there are around the world

A dish we eat in one country and probably consider as defining and typical to our local cuisine, often has a relative across the globe, building an edible bridge across cultures. It might be a simple thing as rice porridge, an archetypical Nordic dish served with a sprinkle of sugar, cinnamon and a knob of butter. A similar dish is called kheer or payasam in South Asia, in England and the USA rice pudding, arroz doce in Portugal, arroz con leche in Mexico and m’halbi in Algeria, to mention a few examples. Eating rice pudding or porridge is both local and global.

Another universal dish is pea soup. Eating peas and pea soup is literally eating history. Peas are one of the first types of food humans cultivated and consumed. They were cultivated as early as 6000 B.C. Later on pea soup was sold as street food in ancient Greece about 500 B.C., at the time democracy was invented. Because dried peas were so easily stored and nutritious, they were perfect food for sailors who spent months at sea. This shipversion of pea soup is called pease pudding and is more like a stew, almost like hummus. Pease pudding was accompanied by salt pork, another ingredient able to survive the hardships at sea. According to Wikipedia this was the origins of pea and ham soup.

I remember from my childhood a dish called sailor’s diet (skipskost or sjømannskost) that my father ate

He was also a sailor, and sailor’s diet has been a staple at sea in Norway for many years. It consists of peas cooked until they start to disintegrate into a kind of porridge and served with salty pork. The salty pork made the dish, I vaguely remember, salty as the sea itself. So it seems pease pudding sailed from Britain to Norway – or maybe it was the other way around. Today sailor’s diet has almost disappeared as a dish in Norway, while pea soup is still viable. In England pease pudding is still eaten, particularly in the north.

Pea soup or split pea soup is common in countries such as Canada, Germany, England and the Nordic countries. The name behind the English pea soup has quite a riveting story. It is called London particular, named after the smog engulfing the city of London for centuries. The smog, thick as pea soup, was caused in particular by coal pollution and reached its deadliest zenith during four cold days in December, 1952. It brought London to a standstill. All public transport stopped. People had to leave their vehicles because they could not see the road. And it caused the death of 4000 people.

If you omit the meat, pea soup is one of few vegetarian dishes in Norway

Peas are rich proteins. Protein consists of different types of amino acids, and your body needs a wide array of these acids. Protein from animals such as meat or eggs contain all amino acids, hence they are called complete proteins. Protein from vegetable sources (except soy), on the other hand, are called incomplete proteins because they lack some amino acids. In order to achieve a complete nutritious meal, you should combine the pea soup with bread or pancakes.

Yellow pea soup is a Nordic dish, yet it is also common in many other countries

This yellow pea soup is a result of a coincidence. I wanted to make pea soup, but found an half-empty package with yellow peas. And when you make pea soup, you should really make a big batch. So I reached for the chickpeas. Chickpeas are far from the Nordic kitchen, but they revealed themselves to be quite akin to their northern counterpart.

Whether the soup is Canadian, English, German or Nordic, there seems to be one common denominator: The combination of dried peas (yellow or green) with salty pork. There is one thing, however, which makes the Nordic soup different. We eat the soup with pancakes. In Sweden pancakes are devoured after the soup, in Norway they are served alongside.

Yellow pea soup (makes 6 or more)

250 g / 8,8 oz yellow dried yellow peas
250 g / 8,8 oz dried chickpeas
cooking oil
a little piece of bacon (optional)
1 big onion, finely chopped
about 1,75 l water or vegetable stock
2 large carrots, cut in cubes
2 stick celery, cut in cubes
1 leek, in slices
salt and pepper
parsley

1. The day before soak the peas in plenty of water. The next day rinse the peas well.
2. Cut the bacon in chunks. Fry the bacon and the onion with the oil on medium heat for about 10 minutes until the onions are soft.
3. Add the carrots, celery and leek and continue frying another 10 minutes.
4. Add water and peas, put the lid (almost) on and simmer for about 1,5 hours until the peas are tender and start to fall apart.
5. I like to use a potato masher and mash some of the peas to thicken the soup.
6. Adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper and garnish with parsley.

See also

Norwegian pancakes waiting for summer
Nordic rice pudding with stardust

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Success tart (suksessterte) is a much-loved cake from Norway.

Suksessterte is one of the most cherished cakes in Norway.

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Success tart (literally success tart in Norwegian) is one of the cakes I grew up with. To me it symbolizes the North of Norway just as much as fresh fish does. My mother always made it and I took the cake for granted long after my childhood. I had to grow up and move 1400 kilometres away before I understood what a treasure my mother baked, Christmas after Christmas, year after year to us kids.

Success tart consists of layers of almond meringue with a yellow cream made of egg yolks, sugar, cream and butter. The cream is like a vanilla custard with butter. It is not only the taste that makes this delicious cake desired. Success tart is one of those extraordinary cakes that freezes well and is gluten-free and low carb. Because it freezes so well I called it ”ice cake” as a kid. I do not know many who has not fallen in love with success tart. It is, as a friend of mine once said, ”sinfully good”.

Thank you mum. Thanks for all the success tarts you have made through the years.

My mum! Nobody makes success tart like she does.

Note: You cannot use almond flour because it is too finely ground. Use a blender or food processor to grind the almonds.

Norwegian success tart

Cream:
5 egg yolks
100 ml / 3,4 oz heavy cream
80 g / 3 oz sugar
150 g / 5,3 oz cold butter in cubes

Almond meringue:
5 egg whites
250 g / 8,8 oz ground almonds
225 g / 8 oz icing sugar

Topping:
Grated dark chocolate

How to make the cream:
1. Place all ingredients (except the butter) in a heavy-bottomed pan on low heat while you constantly stir with a (flat) whisk until it thickens. The process will take about 15-30 minutes. The rule is the same as when making vanilla custard: Do not let if boil, then the eggs will curdle. The sauce is finished when it just starts to bubble!

2. Remove the pan from the heat and add the butter, a tablespoon at a time while you stir with the whisk.

3. When all the butter is incorporated into the cream, place the pan in cold water. If you want to do it like my mother then whip the cream by hand for about 10-15 minutes until fluffy. If not, use an electric whisk and whisk for about 5 minutes. Place in the refrigerator.

How to make the almond meringue:
1. Preheat the oven to 175C/350F. Line a baking tray with parchment paper. The baking tray should be about 30 x 40 cm (12 x 15 inches).

2. Grind the almonds using a food processor. Mix the almonds with icing sugar.

3. Whisk the egg whites until stiff, about 2 minutes. Fold in the almond flour and icing sugar.

4. With a spatula, spoon the meringue on the parchment paper. It should form the shape of a rectangle. Bake for about 20-30 minutes until golden brown on the outside.

5. Right after you take the almond meringue out of the oven and the meringue is still on the baking tray: Place a baking grid on top of the baking tray and turn upside down. Now you are able to remove the baking tray and the paper. While the meringue is lying on the grid, divide the cake into two even-sized rectangles. Allow to cool.

How to assemble the cake:
Place one of the meringues as a base. Spoon half the cream on top. Place the other meringue on top and spoon the rest of the cream. Finish with grated chocolate. When serving, cut into small squares.

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Nordic BLT with dry-cured lamb.

This is a Nordic version of the classic American sandwich, the BLT. I serve it with dry-cured lamb and scrambled eggs.

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Almost every time I am alone at home I make scrambled eggs with dry-cured lamb, a Norwegian speciality. Dry-cured lamb (fenalår) is the Norwegian counterpart to Spanish serrano ham or the Italian Parma ham, but there are two big differences: While Serrano and Parma come from the pig, Norwegian fenalår is made from lamb and is much more salty. Sheep has always been an important livestock in Norway giving us wool for winter clothes and many kinds of meat.

In Norway dry-cured lamb used to be common around Christmas

I remember a whole leg of dry-cured lamb hanging in our pantry at Christmas. It was delicious with scrambled eggs, on open sandwiches or served with sour cream porridge. Usually Norwegians eat the dry-cured lamb as it is, but here I fry it in the pan, like a sort of sheep bacon! Sounds strange? Definitely, but it is delicious still. At least when your are used to it. My girlfriend is not, and she hates it. But I think this lovely sandwich will persuade her.

I serve the salty lamb with oven baked tomatoes, chives and scrambled eggs for a kind of Nordic BLT sandwich. The first time I tried the classic BLT was in San Diego in 2001 on my first trip to the US. The BLT made a huge impression on me with its endless layers of bacon and crunchy lettuce. The city of San Diego, however, was boring but I had two culinary highlights there. One being the BLT, the other one a Brownie ice cream.

Nordic BLT with salty dry-cured lamb. Fulfilling, delicious and a tad strange.

Green green grass of home

In my Nordic version of the BLT the bacon is replaced with dry-cured lamb. If you cannot find it use Parma or Serrano. The lettuce is replaced with chives as a symbol of the never-ending summer of North of Norway where the sun never sets and the grass grows like weed. The Norwegian name of chives is gressløk, translated into ”grass onion”, because it looks like grass. Instead of raw tomatoes I bake small tomatoes in the oven for a sweeter flavour.

In the sandwich the chives is a symbol of the never-ending summer of North of Norway where the sun never sets.

Nordic BLT sandwich (makes 2 generous portions)

10 small tomatoes on the vine
10 slices of dry-cured lamb (or Parma, Serrano or bacon)
frying oil
4 eggs
2 tbsp butter
chives
pepper
bread

1. Preheat the oven 175C/350F and bake the tomatoes for 30 minutes.
2. Fry the dry-cured lamb in a little oil until crunchy. Place on kitchen paper to absorb the excess oil.
3. Wipe away the fat in the frying pan, add the butter and turn the temperature to low. Whisk the eggs with a fork in a little bowl with a tablespoon water. Cook the eggs on low heat for about 15 minutes to make it creamy while you continuously stir with a spatula.
4. Place half of the dry-cured lamb on a piece of bread, add half of the eggs and top with a generous amount of pepper and chives. Finish with half the tomatoes and another piece of bread.

More Nordic sandwiches?

Skagentoast on Independence Day
The open sandwich is back from the past
Danish pork apples (Æbleflæsk)

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Rice pudding, Scandinavia’s favorite Christmas dessert.

Sprinkle stardust on your rice pudding and serve Scandinavia’s favorite Christmas dessert.

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Rice pudding is an old Scandinavian dessert dating back to the latter part of the 19th century in Denmark. Scandinavia has always had a love affair with porridge, so the leap was not very big from porridge to dessert. Rice pudding is made in Norway, Sweden and Denmark for Christmas. The dessert consists of rice porridge mixed with vanilla and whipped cream and served with a red sauce. Adding whipped cream makes the rice pudding very creamy. All three countries put a whole almond in the rice pudding, and the one who finds it receives a gift, often a pig made of marzipan.

When it comes to the sauce, the three Nordic countries choose their separate roads. Norwegians are quite down to earth and serve a red sauce based on berry juice thickened with potato flour. Swedes often serve their pudding with oranges and candied peel. The Danes elevate the dessert to a meal to remember. They embrace a sauce made of cherries called kirsebærsovs.

The easiest way to make the cherry sauce is to use a glass of preserved cherries. I always preserve cherries in the autumn in a flavoured syrup made with cinnamon stick and lemon peel. On Christmas Eve the only thing I have to do is thicken it with maizenna and add lemon juice to balance the sweetness. This way you are making slow fast food that has had several months to develop its wonderful flavour. But if you have no preserved cherries in your pantry, you can always use frozen cherries (as I have done in the recipe below).

Rice pudding is leftover food. At our house we eat rice porridge on the day before Christmas Eve. The next day the porridge is transformed into the most delicious dessert. This desserts gets even better the next day, so go ahead and make porridge the day before.

Rice pudding is called ris a la mande in Denmark, ris a la Malta in Sweden and riskrem in Norway.

Rice pudding (makes 6–7)

1 portion of creamy rice porridge (you find the recipe here)
300 ml heavy cream
1 tbsp sugar

1. Make the rice porridge. Place in a bowl. Allow to cool rapidly in cold water.
2. Remove the vanilla pod. Whip the cream with the sugar and add the porridge. Mix well. Place in the refrigerator (for some hours or until the next day).

Red cherry sauce

300 g / 11 oz cherries (frozen is fine)
75 g / 3 oz sugar
250 ml water
1 stick cinnamon
1 star anise
a little squeeze of lemon or orange juice
1–2 tbsp corn starch (maizena)

1. Add cherries, sugar, water and the spices to a pan. Bring to boil for about 30 minutes on low heat. I like to keep the berries whole, hence I pick them out after 15 minutes.
2. Adjust the taste with some lemon- or orange juice. Thicken the sauce with maizena while the sauce is still boiling. Add the maizena (gradually to control the thickness) while you are stirring.
3. Add the cherries to the sauce and allow to cool. The sauce is even better the day after. Remove the star anise before you serve it.

Stardust (almond brittle/croquant)

75 g / 3 oz sugar
125 g / 4 oz chopped almonds

1. Put a piece of parchment paper on a big chopping board. Heat a frying pan on medium heat.
2. Place the sugar in the pan and shake the pan to distribute the sugar evenly. The sugar will after a while start to melt into caramel. Do not stir the sugar. Be patient. Watch out, as the caramel easily burns. You might experience that the sugar melts faster in some areas, if so, shake the pan to move the sugar about.
3. When the sugar has turned into mediumbrown caramel, add the chopped almonds. Remove the pan from the heat and place the brittle on the parchment paper.
4. Finely chop the brittle and keep in a jar. It can be stored for several months.

Serve the rice pudding with almond brittle on top and the cherry sauce on the side.

More dishes for Christmas?

Creamy rice porridge
Heavenly fruit salad with clementines
Nordic cinnamon cookies
Traditional Norwegian Christmas and gingerbread nuts
English fruitcake

The post Danish rice pudding appeared first on Nordic Diner.

Cinnamon biscuits (Berits brune pinner).

In my handwritten book from 1991 where I kept my best baking and dessert recipes, I have written down my mother’s recipe for cinnamon biscuits.

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In Norway they are called Berits brune pinner (Berits’ brown sticks). Their delicious flavour is due to brown sugar, dark syrup and a generous amount of cinnamon. What would baking be without cinnamon? What is an American pie without cinnamon? What would a cinnamon roll taste like without cinnamon? What would Norwegian rice porridge be without cinnamon?

Cinnamon is probably the most cherished of all spices. Cinnamon biscuits are one of the easiest Norwegian Christmas biscuits. There is no rolling-pin or cookie cutters involved. So make the biscuits and sit down with a little glass of mulled wine or do something quaint like writing a letter to someone you love or take them with you and visit someone who is lonely at Christmas.

Cinnamon cookies all dressed up for Christmas with powdered sugar and cranberries.

Christmas cinnamon biscuits (makes 2 trays):

This recipe is also suitable gluten-free. Just substitute the flour. Also, I substitute 25 % of the brown sugar with palm sugar because it is low glycemic and has a nice caramel flavour.

200 g / 7 oz softened butter
150 g / 5 oz dark brown sugar
50 g / 1,7 oz organic palm sugar
1 tbsp golden syrup
1 egg and 1 egg yolk (free-range)
2 tbsp ground cinnamon
about 300 g / 10 oz flour
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

To decorate:
1 egg white
1 big handful of finely chopped almonds

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4. Line two baking trays with parchment paper.
2. Cream together the butter and sugar. Add the syrup and stir.
3. Add the egg and the egg yolk and stir well.
4. Sift together the flour, bicarbonate of soda and cinnamon and blend. Knead until it comes together as a dough.
5. Divide the dough into four parts. On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough into sausages thick as a woman’s finger. Lift each finger onto the baking tray and press it down with a knife.
6. Glaze the dough with generous amounts of egg white. This will also ensure that the almonds stick to the dough. Scatter the almonds on top.
7. Bake for about 10-12 minutes until golden-brown. While still hot, cut them into sticks. Traditionally they should be cut diagonally.

More Nordic dishes for Christmas?

Heavenly fruit salad with clementines
Mulled wine with honey and orange
Rice pudding with berry sauce and stardust
Black pudding with sirup
Wild autumn stew with chanterelles

The post Christmas cinnamon biscuits appeared first on Nordic Diner.

Fruit salad with clementines, oranges, apples, walnuts and cranberries.

I love Christmas, and I welcome it by making a bittersweet and heavenly fruit salad with clementines.

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The scent of clementines is Christmas to me

My mother always put clementine peel on the stove filling our home with our own incense. Clementines were a staple in our fruit basket at this time of the year and at Christmas tree parties (juletrefest), where the kids always received paper cones with clementines and candy.

In Norway a common dessert is a fruit salad called heavenly stew (himmelsk lapskaus). This dessert, with its small pieces of fruit, raisins and nuts, is the sweet counterpart to lapskaus – a traditional Norwegian stew consisting of diced vegetables and meat.

I make the fruit salad with apples, walnuts and the flavours and colours I associate with Christmas: clementines, oranges and cranberries.

Instead of plain syrup I use the juice from the citrus and reduces it into a syrup with a beautiful yellow colour. In order to make the syrup you need to segment the oranges. The syrup is flavoured with the bitterness of the orange zest and the tart sweetness of the cranberries. If you want to make the fruit salad more luxurious, it is never a failure to add half a vanilla bean.

Altogether the fruit salad challenges your senses – it is tart, sweet and bitter. Just like childhood.

Fruit salad is often called himmelsk lapskaus (heavenly stew) in Norwegian.

Heavenly fruit salad with clementines (makes 3-4)

3 organic oranges
3 big apples
4 clementines
juice of 1/4 lime
2 tbsp sugar
½ vanilla bean (optional)
a handful dried cranberries
a handful walnuts

1. If you have a zester, make zest of two of the oranges. If not, peel one of the oranges (making sure you avoid the pit) and slice the peel thinly. Bring the zest to boil in a little water, and drain. Repeat three times. This process reduces the bitterness of the zest.

2. Segment the oranges, leaving the juice in a little pan and the segments in a bowl. The process of segmenting is more closely described in another post.

3. Squeeze the juice of one of the clementines and add to the pan with the orange juice. Peel the other clementines and cut big segments into two (like a butterfly).

4. Bring to boil the citrus juice (lime, clementine and oranges), zest and sugar. Add the seeds of the vanilla bean (optional). Boil until thickened into a thin sirup, about 10 minutes.

5. While the citrus syrup is boiling, peel and cut the apples into thin wedges. Place in the bowl with the citrus fruit.

6. When the syrup is done, add the cranberries and allow to cool.

7. Place the fruit on a plate (or serve in small jam jars) and add the syrup and walnuts. In Norway it seems like most people serve the salad with whipped cream or custard, but I think the best choice is vanilla ice cream.

More Nordic dishes?

Creamy rice porridge Suzette
Nordic apple trifle
Piece of cupcake

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