Nordic noms: 6 mouth-watering foods from Finland
The usual way of introducing people to Finnish cuisine is to list culinary extremes. We talk about mouth-burning salmiakki or the suspiciously poop-like Easter surprise mämmi. We laugh when people attempt to swallow these delicacies with a grim look or run around looking for a bin to shamefully spit out the beloved local delights.
We also share a laugh with other Europeans who make fun of our food. Do not do that. Despite a large selection of extreme foods that serve as an endless source of jokes, we have many simple and approachable foods that melt taste buds in a good way.
Here are six Finnish foods you can serve to food lovers from all over the world with guaranteed success.
Finnish Strawberries
By the end of June you can usually find Finnish strawberries in shops and markets. People often tell children berries and fruit taste better than candy. This is a lie except when discussing strawberries grown under the Nordic sun. Eat them fresh and add nothing. It is bliss.
Finnish New Potatoes
The phenomenon is the same as with strawberries. The Nordic summer is short but summer foods have an incomparable taste. Boil them with dill, add a big lump of butter on top and enjoy.
Karjalanpiirakka (Karelian pie)
This tiny pie is usually made of rye and wheat flour and filled with rice porridge. You can eat it cold or hot, as is or with egg butter spread on top. You often find karjalanpiirakka at a Finnish family party, but it is also a common snack for busy urbanites on the go.
Pulla
Pulla is made of wheat flour and the dough is yeast-based. It is a sweet white bun bread. Pulla comes in many forms. Favourites include voipulla, flavoured with butter and sugar, and kanelipulla, flavoured with cinnamon, sugar and butter. Eat it fresh from the oven with a glass of cold milk.
Pike-perch
Buying pike-perch in a shop is expensive. The best option is to find a fisherman or catch and prepare it yourself. If not, the taste is still worth the shop price occasionally. Fry it in a pan with butter or add delicate spices, cream and white wine. This is a five-star meal.
[CTA_PLACE_HOLDER]
Wild salmon is the best fish you ever can taste!
Actually I’d rather have smoked baltic herring or smoked vendace. I guess there’s been too much salmon around.
Traditional Finnish blueberry pie (mustikkapiirakka pullapohjalla)! I am yet to meet the person who doesn’t ask for a second or third piece :)
I saw a billboard in Finland said “sugar we miss you”. The picture was of strawberries that weren’t very sweet because of the short growing season. The salmon , fresh and smoked, was always fresh and good
Im a swede living in Norway. Both the swedes and the norwegians claim to have the best strawberries in the world. I’ve been to Helsinki in the summer. Both the swedes and the norwegians are wrong.
Sorry, but the picture is not pulla, it is korvapuusti and those two are not the same.
Same base for each. Pulla is plain buns or braided loaves. Korvapuusti or boxed ear is the dough basted with salted butter, brown sugar, cinamon, folded, and cut and pinched. Techically it is still pulla.
When my grandmother made pulla (she called it nisu) it was flavored with cardamom.
MY GRANDMOTHER MADE IT AS WELL AND CALLED IT NISU….EITHER WAY THE BEST OF THE BEST
Brita cake is always a hit, and pannukakku with ice cream and blueberry sauce pleases hungry kids, young and younger!
When in Finland ; I have Karjalan Piirakka every morning! Yum
What about viili?….maybe with strawberries
Finnish strawberries are the best on planet Earth.
What about “kalakukko” (correctly spelled/written?), i.e. fresh-water-fish (trout?) in baked bread.
How could smoked rain deer not be included.
Salmiakki does not burn in your mouth, are you silly?
Those strawberries in the image are not finnish. I don’t know if only a finn can tell the difference – but I can tell from the look that those must taste terrible.
Well I’ve eaten similar looking from my mother’s stawberryfield, but usually you cannot buy this size well ripened from market or shops as the big one’s don’t travel well if they are proberly ripe. My mom has bigger whan than these and they taste sweet. Usually little darker in colour though.
Liquorice ice cream is the best ever. it’s the first thing in our shopping basket when we go to Finland on holiday. Only 1 month left till we’re there. I can almost taste it already.
Lanttulaatikko (turnip casserole) and maksalaatikko (liver casserole). I make lanttulaatikko every Christmas. Liver casserole is hard to make, because there is no ground liver here. I’ve had no luck grinding it myself.
Wat about Sienikeitto and freshly fried muuikku ?
Yep! I have eaten South African blueberries & strawberries here, but very expensive, not free like in our garden back home in Finland! Dried blueberry powder from Finland is not just the same!
Finnish yogurt. With mansikka hillo (strawberry jam) And, Finnish Ice Cream.
Finnish ANYTHING!
How about Lutefisk and lefsa. My Finnish grandfather
loved this. Lutefisk or poor mans lobster is cod that had been dried in lye, by the immigrants of the early 1900’s coming to America. Cooked in hot water it was a gelatinous and stinky. Then he wanted a white gravy on it with peas. The lefsa looks like a tortilla but made of potatoes. Good with butter. And lingonberry sauce.
Swedes and Norwegians like it also.