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gourmetgourmet travellertraveller ‘Nordic Cuisine’ has become the talk of the culinary world, with its proponents in the Danish capital taking a haul of international food awards in recent months. Michael Raffael discovers a buzz inside the kitchens, delis and microbreweries of Copenhagen PHOTOGRAPHY BY SARAH COGHILL PROBABLY THE BEST .... 68 FOODC & TRAVEOPENHAGENL PREVIOUS PAGES: AAMANNS TAKEAWAY SMØRREBRØD; STREET GRAFFITI. THIS PAGE, FROM TOP: BEETROOT AND BEEF WITH travel strap SMOKED MARROW AT AOC, AND JARS WITH TISSUES SCENTED WITH DISHES FROM THE MENU (BELOW); INSIDE NIMB BRASSERIE; A ‘christiania’ BICYCLE; SHRIMP WITH CRISP PARMESAN, AND SHRIMP WITH SAMPHIRE AT AOC; WELCOME TO NIMB. OPPOSITE, CLOCKWISE FROM TOP RIGHT: Nimb’s SALTED MACKEREL WITH CUCUMBER, RHUBARB SAGO AND CHICKWEED; THE PALADS CINEMA; SALTED TURBOT WITH PICKLED RADISH AND SEA TROUT EGGS AND THE INTERIOR AT NIMB; fiskebaren’s TWIST ON RHUBARB AND CUSTARD; PHOTOGRAPHS OF JAEGERSBORGGADE RESIDENTS The cultural topography of Copenhagen is never flat. An organic hotel is round the corner from a knocking shop. Roses thrive unvandalised outside terraces daubed with graffiti. Only bicycles and those astride them can claim to own the streets idnight is long-gone and Ruby bar is shaking and stirring: Five parts genever, two parts Cherry Heering, two parts This is a rustic land with a strong agricultural basis – even before the Romans, Celtic tribes M lime juice, two parts sugar syrup, a dash of Angostura bitters and a twist of orange. Shake with ice cubes and strain into cultivated grapes This is a rustic land with a strong agricultural basis – This is a rustic land a martini glass – a ‘Copenhagen’ cocktail. Assorted blondes recline on Ruby’s sofas in the cobbled indoor garden. Suits, resting on a with a strong agricultural basis – even before the Romans, Celtic tribes cultivated grapes Chesterfield, smooth away the furrows of the day’s deals. A guy in This is a rustic land with a strong agricultural basis – shorts orders another round. Owner Rasmus Lomborg’s mother- in-law drops in for a nightcap, or to catch up with his ravishing Edinburgh-born spouse who’s behind the bar. It’s Copenhagen’s coolest spot. Like the city itself, it accepts all-comers mindless of age, sex, beauty or dress sense. The cultural topography of this capital is never quite flat. Fiskebaren, a fish restaurant, stands in the heart of the meatpacking district. Axel, an organic hotel, is round the corner from a knocking- shop. Laundromat combines clothes-washing à la Dot Cotton with funky-café status. Climbing roses and boxes of culinary herbs thrive, unvandalised, outside terraced rows and blocks of flats. Gangland graffiti daub walls beside them. Only bicycles and those astride them can claim to own the streets. Their baskets packed with babies, puppies, double basses, they move between traffic- lights in purposeful waves. The city’s most famous restaurant, Noma – recently crowned number one restaurant in the world – also throws up a surprises. René Redzepi, its acclaimed chef, is Albanian on his father’s side. The cradle of ‘Nordic Cuisine’, Noma has swapped musk ox for Danish bacon and Icelandic ladled buttermilk for Lurpak packets. Vinegars and juices replace the vinous sauces of haute cuisine and weed-tips and resinous leaves the basil and chervil of classic repertoire. 74 FOOD & TRAVEL FOOD & TRAVEL 71 gourmet traveller Redzepi can still just about toss Frisbees in a local park with a wall. The signage to shops echoes the New Age community of his mates without being recognised. Not so Claus Meyer. Danish Christiania. Christian Puglisi picked it for his bistro and takeaway, heads turn when he comes into a room. Entrepreneur, vinegar Manfred’s – no waiters, two main courses, a counter and a few maker, TV chef, badminton champion tables. He remembers watching customers and one-time au pair, he’s the not-so-grey from Noma’s open-plan kitchen where he eminence behind Noma. He put together worked as sous chef. ‘It had taken them the team, found the star player. Before it 12 months to book and finally it was their opened, Meyer says, the concept didn’t night and you could see the expectation exist: ‘Nobody wanted it. Nobody knew in their faces; it was like they were looking what it was. The notion didn’t exist. If at an altar.’ people loaded some meaning into it [the Puglisi plays with the same northern name’s an acronym for Nordic food], they raw materials, but switches the mood thought of rotten fish, fermented meat, from gastro-piety to rock ’n’ roll. His whale or seal.’ second restaurant, Relæ, opening across From the outset Meyer recognised the road, will only have space for three a fundamental difference between his chefs. There’s no way, he says, it will ever goals and his chef’s. Redzepi learnt his become exclusive. craft at El Bulli and The French Laundry. ABOVE: ENTRANCE TO TIVOLI GARDENS. BELOW: THE DOME OF Claus Meyer has opened his own chain He wanted to measure himself against FREDRIKSKIRKEN; INTERACTIVE WALL AT COPENHAGEN MUSEUM of deli-diners, bought himself a fruit farm on them. Meyer’s agenda was much broader. the island of Lilleø, in Smålandsfarvandet, ‘For me Noma has always been a tool, an instrument to change south-west of Copenhagen, and taken up cider vinegar making. food culture,’ he explains. After eight years, his first batch of apple balsamic is ready for Jægersborggade is a residential street in Nørrebro, just outside the tasting. His estate also includes a small vineyard that he shares city centre, that’s run as a kind of collective. At the corner, photos of with Anders Selmer, the owner of Fiskebaren. its inhabitants standing in the doorways to their apartments plaster The wine, Arwen (a blend of solaris, sauvignon Except for its Friday-night rock concerts, Tivoli Gardens has hardly changed in decades. Children still lick candy floss and ice cream cornets. The original 1914 helterskelter can still evoke a scream or two. Pickled herring is there too, even if it has to compete with a sushi bar CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: NYHAVN HARBOUR; A SNIFTER AT TOLD & SNAPS; DIZZYING VIEWS AT TIVOLI GARDENS; POURING BEER AT NØRREBRO TRAVEL INFORMATION Currency is the Danish krone (£11=1 DKK). Denmark follows booking information and upcoming events and attractions. central European time, one hour ahead of GMT. With warm It offers a Copenhagen Card which you can use to gain free entry summers and cold winters, Denmark is warmest during the to 60 museums and attractions and free public transport around months of July and August, when temperatures reach around the city from around £25 for 24 hours. 20°C, and averages 2°C in February, its coldest month. VisitDenmark (020 7259 5955; visitdenmark.com) Everything you need for planning a trip to Denmark. GETTING THERE Norwegian Airlines (020 8099 7254; norwegian.com) operates FURTHER READING direct daily flights from Gatwick to Copenhagen. Noma: Time & Place in Nordic Cuisine by René Redzepi SAS (flysas.com) operates direct daily flights from London (Phaidon Publishing, £29.95) provides an in-depth look at Heathrow, Birmingham and Aberdeen to Copenhagen. contemporary Nordic Cuisine in more than 90 beautifully photographed recipes. RESOURCES Danish Food and Cooking by John Nielson and Judith H. Dern Wonderful Copenhagen (00 45 3325 7400; visitcopenhagen. (Anness Publishing, £15.99) A guide to Danish cuisine, with 65 com) The official tourist board for Copenhagen provides maps, traditional recipes. 72 FOOD & TRAVEL gourmet traveller LEFT: THE city’s PREFERRED MODE OF TRANSPORT, AND CAPTURED IN A MURAL IN CENTRAL COPENHAGEN OPPOSITE, CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: BIRCH- SMOKED HAM WITH ELDERBERRY MARMALADE AT AOC; SHRIMPS WITH CUCUMBER GEL AT FISKEBAREN, AND THE RESTaurant’s INTERIOR LICORICE ROOT FOR SALE IN TIVOLI GARDENS; AAMANNS COOKBOOKS blanc, silvaner and riesling), matches Fiskebaren’s native Limfjord parmesan. Pleated beetroot folios sprinkled with smoked bone oysters to perfection. In the meatpacking district, a low-slung marrow mask an undersized grilled steak. squadron of 1930s warehouses, it dishes up the fish and shellfish Copenhagen isn’t that much bigger than Bristol and it has, or that until recently was shipped to France. Tiny Rømø shrimps served had, 13 Michelin-starred restaurants. AOC is one of them. Another, in a Kilner jar on a cucumber jelly with quenelles of smoked cheese Paustian, has just closed, though it may reopen. Others may be on and herbed crème fraîche taste as good as they look. The cod-like the brink. It raises, ironically, the question of sustainability. In summer, torsk, halibut and plaice dazzle with their freshness. the populist eateries of Nyhaven, the town’s iconic wharf, pile food For pudding there’s rhubarb and custard, but not as we know it; high for tourists and locals alike untroubled by aesthetic or ecological the fruit is a granita, and the cream is flavoured with tonka beans aims and do very nicely. The habitués of Laundromat spill out onto and crunchy knobs of caramelised white chocolate. the pavement, wrapping themselves in tartan rugs when north Danes say that if you want to speak Danish you have to be able winds blow, happy to tuck into their bacon and egg brunch or BLT. to say Rødgrød med fløde, which translates as ‘red pudding with So long as the average lunch hour is more like half an hour, cream’. Think mashed strawberries with cream and you get the Copenhagen isn’t likely to ditch its enduring passion for the open picture. In his delis, Claus Meyer adds blackcurrants and blueberry sandwich, smørrebrød. Its basis is a treacle-brown rye bread juice. Others prefer raspberries.