Posts under "Holidays"

Christmas in Tromsø

Posted by kari 2 Comments
Dec 9 2011

Although I have not had the pleasure to spend Christmas in Tromsø (or any place in Norway), I can imagine what the island must feel like.  Even on nice summer nights, people would pack into the cafés, bars, and restaurants.  It was always very cozy, whether it was a Tuesday evening or a Saturday night.  I think the people that are from northern Norway and especially those that still reside in the arctic, find it natural to be social and close to one another.  Because the winter is so long and dark, people are forced to either find ways to cope with this or be miserable.  Therefore, most make it a priority to see friends and family often to maintain lots of human contact.

Folks around Tromsø start to get ready for Christmas in November where there are little markets that handicraft makers sell their goods at.  This is a good opportunity to get the holiday shopping started.  During the last weekend of November, the lights in the main square are lit.  The second weekend of November brings in a significant amount of inland folk.  Inhabitants expect lots of caroling, lefse making and coffee brewed outdoors.

While Tromsø is not a large city, I very much enjoyed browsing the stores downtown.  There are very nice home décor stores, gift stores, sports and outdoor stores, and of course souvenir shops.  Popular Christmas gifts that visitors purchase in Tromsø to take home include luer (hats) and votter (mittens).  If you go this route, be sure to ask about the felted wool products-these are extra warm and often more durable than the wool most people are used to.  I have a pair of cream colored felted votter that used to be my bestemor´s (grandmother´s), which were passed down to my aunt, and then me.  I believe it was my great-grandmother who knit them, so they are really old, but still super warm and in great shape!

Other great gifts include unique jewelry, sweets such as lefse, and a very lovely gift would be a hand-made blown glass ornament from the world´s northernmost glass-blowing studio!  I still would love to make it to one of these…

Why else might one want to go to Tromsø for Christmas you might ask?  Especially for those of us that already reside in a cold winter climate like MN?!  Several reasons:

-Aurora Borealis. The Northern Lights.  Winter is a great time to see the Northern Lights because there is little to no light at all for months during the winter in the arctic.  Therefore, the Northern Lights are that much more prominent against a dark sky.

-You can go skiing, dog sledding, snow shoeing, etc.  Endless fun winter activities!

And if you stick around until New Year´s, you will see a graceful end to Christmas and a very festive welcoming of the nytt år (new year).

Norwegian Heart Basket Ornaments

Posted by kari 2 Comments
Dec 5 2011

 

I just returned from my company’s head office in the Netherlands.  I was there to preview our 2012 Jul Linje (Christmas 2012 line) of nearly 11,000  beautiful indoor home décor produkter, jul ornamenter(Christmas ornaments), kunstige trær (artificial trees), kranser (wreaths), kunstige blomsterdecoratør (artificial floristry), innendørs og utendørs (indoor and outdoor) LED and Durawise lys (lighting), tent keramiske landsbyer (lit Ceramic villages), and many other juleprodukter.  A couple of our temaer (themes) are heavily inspired with a skandinavisk look and I therefore was reminded of being in Norge right after jul one year, as well as the memorable norske julefeiringer (Norwegian Christmas celebrations) and aktiviteter I was involved in when I was part of the norsk dept. at St. Olaf.  I was also reminded of my family’s julepynt (Christmas decorations) and juletradisjoner (Christmas traditions).

Typical  julepynt in Norge include håndlaget ornamenter (homemade ornaments) made out of all kinds of materials, such as strikk (knit), and papir.  Perhaps the most popular juleornament is the kurv (basket)  made out of various farger (colors).

Here you will find instructions for making your own julekurv to hang on the juletre:

STEP 1)

Take two pieces of colored paper about 8×12 cm and fold them in half (where the scissor is) before rounding the edge on the top. Cut several slots 2/3 of the way up from the bottom on both halves.

STEP 2)

Weave the two sides together as shown. This isn’t as difficult as it seems. Weave the strips through each other by “opening” and closing” them.-

STEP 3)

Make a handle and glue it to the insides of the basket.

STEP 4)

Hang the basket on your Christmas tree and fill it up with nuts and candy !

This website gives extremely detailed instructions and many photos.

I will continue to publish Norwegian jul-related posts throughout the month to cover as much during the month of December regarding jul in Norway:)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Additionally, if you are a busy person with little free time or interest in making your own julepynt, there are plenty of stores to visit (including online) to purchase norske julepynt.

Thanksgiving in Norway

Posted by kari 1 Comment
Nov 17 2011

Perhaps you have spent a lonely Thanksgiving away from your family, maybe even out of the country.  Fear not, if you happen to be in Norway for some reason during Thanksgiving and you are not with your family or other Americans, you can still enjoy a feast close to those we love here in the U.S.  As November is the only month that I have not spent in Norway, I have not been tasked with making Thanksgiving matretter (dishes) and finding friends to enjoy them with in Norway.  I do have several American friends who have spent Thanksgivings in Norway and they always seem to have a good time and enjoy the mat, despite the fact that Norwegian matbutikker (grocery stores) are nothing like the giants here in the U.S.

If you are in a larger city in Norway, you will likely find one or more of the following matbutikker: ICA, Meny, Coop, Rimi, Rema 1000.  While buying mat in Norwegian matbutikker is relatively comparative to the U.S. in terms of cost (relative to other ´costs of living´), matprodukter that are not common in Norway will of course be dyrere (more expensive).  Items that you will be able to find relatively easily are kalkun (turkey) either at a matbutikk or a slakter (butcher), søtpoteter (sweet potatoes), and tranebær (cranberries).  You will have difficulty finding frozen pie crusts for sure, as well as gresskar purée (pumpkin purée) and certain urter (herbs) that you may enjoy in stuffing or some other matrett.

I was looking for stories from Americans who have made Thanksgiving dinners in Norway and I came across this blog.  It´s about a woman who has to make Thanksgiving dinner for her Norwegian husband and family (who have never eaten it before) and she really has no idea what she´s doing, but everything turned out awesome.  And….they had an eating contest-hard to imagine with a small Norwegian family, but very funny.  Check out the blog here.

Although Norwegians do not typically celebrate Thanksgiving, many American families with Scandinavian descent include things like lefse (or maybe lutefisk or fenelår) in their Thanksgiving meal.  My family always has lefse at Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter actually.  It´s just kind of a dessert that ends up on most holiday dining tables.

Happy Thanksgiving whether you are in Norway or anywhere else in the world.

takk-thank you

takknemlig-thankful

Rakfisk Festival, Norway

Posted by kari No Comments
Nov 6 2011

If you had been in Norway this weekend, you might have had the opportunity to experience the annual Rakfisk Festival.  Every year in the town called Fagernes, which is in Valdres in eastern Norway (about 25 miles west of Lillehammer), tens of thousands of people gather to celebrate rakfisk (literally brine cured fish).  The fisk used is typically either ørret (trout) or røye (char).  The fish is salted and then left to brine for 2-3 months, at which point it is eaten rå (raw), perhaps on a piece of flatbrød (flatbread) with rå løk (onions) or purre (leeks), smør (butter) or rømme (sour cream) and poteter.

Rakfisk Festival always occurs in the first weekend of November, right around that time that the days feel really short and the amount of daylight is dwindling.  Every year there is different entertainment, but always loads and loads of fisk.  According to several sources I have consulted, Norwegians consume 500 tons of rakfisk every year.  The official website of Rakfisk Festival can be viewed here.  You can see the full program, which included several musical artists including Viggo Sandvik, Askil Holm, and Vassandgutane.  There is plenty of opportunity to chill out and listen to music or get on the dance floor and boogie.

This year there were 9 individuals and organizations who contributed their rakfisk to the festival:

Rakfiskprodusentene

Lofoss Fisk

Telefon: 91844501
E-post: endre@roengard.no
Nettside: www.lofossfisk.no
Mer om Lofoss Fisk

Noraker Gård

Telefon: 61 36 23 64
E-post: nils@noraker.no
Nettside: www.noraker.no
Mer om Noraker Gård

Wangensten

Telefon: 61362300
E-post: jorn@wangensten.no
Nettside: www.wangensten.no
Mer om Wangensten

Some interesting facts about the festival include:

-40 tons of rakfisk are sold during the festival

-25,000 visitors attend the festival every year

-70% of attendees have experienced the festival before

-70% come with family and friends

-30% have attended at least 5 times

-in addition to rakfisk, hundreds of other booths are set up by local food producers and individuals who produce handicrafts

-the festival costs about 40 million kroner every year

Rakfisk Festival is one of the largest events related to food culture and supporting the production of local food.  It sounds like a whole lot of fun to me.  Norway is the only month that I have not experienced in Norway.  Next time I´m going to Rakfisk festival to eat fermented ørret with a glass of akevitt!

 

 

Lutefisk Season is upon us

Posted by kari 4 Comments
Oct 23 2011

Whether you like it or not, it is Lutefisk season for Norwegians and Norwegian Americas alike!  I must be honest, I have never ordered lutefisk at a restaurant and I have never chosen to eat it.  The St. Olaf (my alma mater) cafeteria serves it every year in early December during the St. Olaf Christmas Festival and I always chose to avoid the cafeteria during that time.  Again, I’m sorry to admit, but the lutefisk that I have been exposed to is vile and makes me lose my appetite.  This is actually quite strange for me as I actually can count the foods I dislike on one hand.  In any case, lutefisk…..I’ll try to promote it in this blog post just because I believe that it can actually be tasty if it is prepared well and paired with delicious accompaniments.

Most of you probably know what lutefisk is-that white jelly-like fish that has been soaked in lye, the same chemical soap is made of.  Lutefisk became popular due to the lye extending it’s shelf life. Soaking the fish in lye preserves the fish, which was an extremely important quality hundreds of years ago.  Although preserving the fish is not important today as it was when sailers were crossing the ocean without modern refrigerators, diners today still enjoy this fall delicacy.

From early October through Christmas Norwegians shell out the dough for good lutefisk.  A fair price for this delicacy at a good restaurant in Norway is in the 350 kroner (about $65 USD).  It isn’t just in traditional Norwegian restaurants that one can find lutefisk on the menu during this time in Norway.  The dish is so popular that even Chinese restaurants serve it!

Lutefisk is traditionally served with a purée of kremet erter (creamed peas), but the adventurous will try it with other accompaniments such as ferske erter (fresh peas), bacon, sennep (mustard), and even geitost (goat cheese), mandelpoteter (almond potatoes), or small gulpoteter (yellow potatoes) particularly in northern Norway.  Lutefisk is usually served with something salty, something rich, and something sweet (like honey for example).

Here is an example of lutefisk on a julemeny (Christmas Menu) in Oslo at Mona Lisa Restaurant:

 

Meny nr.2

Lutefisk med ertestuing, bacon, baconfett, geitost,sennepsaus, tyttebær, fransk sennep, sirup og lefse. Kokte poteter.

Multekrem med kransekake

kr 590,-

Sounds pretty tasty actually.  Lutefisk with mashed peas, bacon, bacon fat, goat cheese, mustard sauce, cranberries, French mustard, sirup and lefse.  Cooked potatoes, cloudberry cream and kransekake (a kind of Norwegian cake) for 590 crowns.

Depending on ones preference, vin, øl, or akevitt pair well with lutefisk.  Akevitt would be the traditional choice, but a god Norwegian lager or a German riesling would pair well.

The below is a simple lutefisk recipe:

 

  1. 1
    Place the lutefisk in a kettle, and add enough cold salt water to completely cover them(some people like to place the lutefisk in cheesecloth and tie the ends itno a bag, before placing in the kettle.).
  2. 2
    Bring gradually to a boil. (Caution: It will be done when brought to a full boil, and if boiled too long the fish will fall into pieces.).
  3. 3
    Remove from the burner, skim off any foam that appears and the let the lutefisk stand for 5-10 minutes.
  4. 4
    Drain well, and serve steaming hot on warmed plates.
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