The first of my recent culinary adventures is centered around the Christmas party that the SIMLab held in one of the hotel restaurants in downtown Trondheim. All the people involved in the SIMLab attended, and we had our own personal banquet room, so it was a classy affair. We had a traditional dinner, which was prefaced by the Christmas carol "Deilig er jorden" that everyone sang along to. I initially translated it as "Delicious is the Earth", but was corrected that it was "Glorious is the Earth".
Following the carol, we sat down to the traditional Norwegian dish of lutefisk. For those unfamiliar with this dish, it is dried codfish prepared in potash lye. I can only describe it as fish-flavored gelatin. when the lutefisk is made, they take a section of dried cod and by applying lye, which is a very basic, and dissolves much of the proteins within the fish to give it a jelly-like texture. While it sounds completely unappealing to most people, I liked it. I wouldn't have it more than once a year, however. I also noticed that based on what part of the fish you were served, the texture was widely varied from jelly-like to what we would consider to be a normal fish texture.
It had a rather mild fish flavor, and while the texture was a bit off-putting, nothing about it tasted bad. As I was told by Tore, my professor, it is eaten not really for what it tastes like, but for what you put on top of it. There were four types of mustard that you could have it with, as well as brunost, a brown goat cheese. Also available was a maple syrup that was as thick as honey. That's right, maple syrup and fish. I was hesitant at first, but had to try it, and while a bit strange it tasted good. By far the ultimate in topping for lutefisk was large chunks of bacon and copious amounts of bacon grease. This was consumed in enormous amounts and the waiters were constantly bringing us more. Later into the night, after most have had a few drinks, a cry of "Bacon! Bacon! Bacon!" was started (by two professors, no less) when we ran out and wanted more.
Lutefisk is a very strange dish, and I find it hard to believe that anyone would want to rub ashes all over dried fish and then try and eat it just to see what it tastes like. At dinner I heard two legends. One explained that it came from Bergen, where a large store of dried cod was kept in a house. The house caught fire, and the roof burned away as it began to rain, which put out the fire. The fish was unharmed apart from being covered in ashes and soaked in rainwater. A shortage of food prevented the fish from being discarded, so it was stored again. When they returned to the fish at a later time, they realized that it had changed dramatically, and was now lutefisk. People were starving, so the people tried it and found they could eat it, and so lutefisk was born.
The other account I heard was that it was used as a way to fend off the vikings. First villages attempted to give vikings spoiled fish to eat. The vikings, being vikings, had no trouble tolerating the fish, and so the villagers tried to make the fish even more toxic by adding lye to the fish in hopes of poisoning the vikings. The vikings, being vikings, were able to stomach the fish without problem, declaring this special kind of food a delicacy. And so lutefisk was born...
There were several side dishes. One was green mashed peas, which tasted like an incredibly solid split pea soup. Bacon and bacon grease were added. Another was boiled potatoes. In the absence of salt and butter, bacon and bacon grease were added. Lefse, something I am familiar with, was also available. This did not have bacon added, but the brunost was quite good with it.
Also served with dinner was the Norwegian spirit, aquavit. It's a yellowish-brown liquor distilled from potatoes. While aquavit is a Scandinavian liquor, Norwegian aquavit is special because it is placed in oak casts and travels by sea to cross over the equator and return home. The casks give the liquor its color, and supposedly the motion of the sea as the ship rocks back and forth contributes to the flavor of aquavit. It has an herbal flavor, tasting mostly of caraway seed. I was also instructed by my professor in the proper way to enjoy aquavit, because there were two ways. The first is to sip the aquavit and then chase it with beer. Tore told me that you only do this if you're weak, because it ruins the aftertaste of the aquavit. The only proper way to enjoy it is to have a sip of beer, followed by the aquavit, or just the aquavit without the beer, and make sure that you enjoy the full flavor of the alcohol before continuing on with food or a drink of something else.
After dinner we all retreated to a different room full of very comfortable chairs and talked while enjoying coffee and cognac. It was a highly enjoyable evening.
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The next adventure with food I embarked on occurred tonight, when I cooked whale for dinner. Here is a picture of the raw whale that i cut before frying it in butter with onions:
In addition to the whale, I served canned green peas in butter as well as baked potatoes. These potatoes were amazing. After peeling the potatoes I sliced them most of the way through and stuffed each of these slices with onions, slathered the whole thing in cheese and butter and baked it until the potatoes were just right. With the drippings from the whale I made a gravy that we had with everything. Here is the delicious spread:
As far as how the whale tasted, it was like a fishy-tasting beef. This probably does not sound very appetizing, but it was quite good. It was a mix of a fish flavor, a slightly sour taste with hints of the gaminess of moose or lamb. The the more well-done pieces of whale tasted fishier while the medium-rare slices tasted more like beef. Adding pepper made it taste more of beef as well. I didn't have any frame of reference before trying it, but it was quite tender, more than I expected. For dessert, we had more of the kanelbuller.
I don't know what the next meal I will set as my goal, but I was talking with Henning and he suggested anglerfish. It's apparently a very rich-tasting fish and not uncommon to have here in Norway. It's supposedly comparable to lobster in both taste and texture. Intriguing. While the cut of meat will undoubtedly be expensive, it is all in the name of science, so I have no choice but to pursue the unknown!
Sadly it is raining again. I'm wishing it were colder so that it would snow again. Tomorrow is supposed to be a balmy 41 degrees F. I'll keep hoping for a dramatic drop in temperature.
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