The Cooking of Scandinavia/Recipes [antikvár]

Introduction: Quisine ^uilt on ^H^ure's (Simplest ^oods 11 has been said ttiat the only thing we Scandinavians will own up to, in the name of fellowship among our countries, is the Vikings. True enough, the Vikings are part of the common cultural heritage of Scandinavia, but they are by no means the only part. Ever since the earliest setdements in these lands, food and customs have intermingled among the countries and, blended with influences from foreign shores, have created a cuisine and a culture that take second rank to none. In 1247, when Cardinal William of Sabina made the long trip to Norway to crown Haakon Haakonsson, the papal legate told the court that he had been warned against making the journey to the barren lands of the North, where there would be little bread, the drinks would be limited to water and milk, and the people would behave like animals. Instead, the cardinal informed his delighted hosts, he had found a great assembly of people of excellent manners and an abundance of fine food and drink. Even at that early date, the cardinal stood before people who knew how to set store by food and drink after the European fashion. On a map of the world, the greater part of Scandinavia looks like a group of frozen, forbidding clumps of earth and mountain, and its history is as rough as its terrain. This corner of the globe has known a stormy past, but out of it has come a remarkable unity. We have today something singular, a kind of interdependence and mutual trust not common on this planet. Clear boundary lines between the countries are difficult to define. As far as food is concerned, we share a special culinary tradition. Something remarkable has occurred: an inter-Nordic kitchen has appeared—and we share the delights of it among ourselves. We feel at ease at one another's tables. Through the ages we have had a varied diet, but it has always been down to earth, plain and simple. It has sprung out of nature itself, and bears traces of the rhythm of the seasons. The underlying principle is simplicity, and the guiding thread—as Dale Brown points out in this volume—is the natural taste that soil, climate, mountain and lake have produced. Thus, our dishes are uncomplicated, varied and in harmony with nature. While it is true that this inter-Nordic kitchen shares in the European tradition, as does the American kitchen, some of the dishes and culinary customs that are presented in this book may at first seem strange to people