Norway is really awesome

I found that at ~0F/-18C when I was commuting to PNSY by bicycle – it was about seven miles and my hands would be warm right about the time I went through the shipyard gate. Never had studded tires though.

Good tip. Just watched episode one and it had me laughing out loud in many bits.

Swedish bragging only. They don’t have much to brag about, so any little thing will do.

They can have their surstrømming, tasteless low alcohol mellanøl and berry flavoured Akevit. (The real thing is made from potatoes and flavoured with caraway seed only)

But y’all can “brag” about Lutefisk. Screw that pansy-ass ceviche crap, try using Drano instead of lime juice.

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I tried that Lutefisk in Minnesota, lots of Norwegian runaways there. It was OK if you like something that smells like old bait that was been washed really well. They told me how it is made which is basically getting a perfectly good white fish of some sort, soaking all the flavor out of it for days then soaking it in lye and then soaking it again in water so it doesn’t dissolve your digestive tract . You have to put something like mustard on it otherwise it has no taste but smells like a fishmongers fart.

Here is an American explanation and recipe from the most “Norwegian” part of USA, Minnesota:

We use bacon fat with it, not just melted butter. The most used addition is pea stew, or mashed Swedish Turnips.(grown in Norway, of course)
Boiled potatoes is a MUST, as well as beer and Akevit in liberal quantities.

An annual Lutefisk Dinner is held in Singapore every year:


The same applies in other places with large Norwegian “colonies” around the world. (In Singapore abt 2000 families+ singles and students at NTU and NUS)
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YUK. no thanks

I get it. The stuff is a traditional food from back when there was no way to properly preserve food and people were poor. It is not necessary to eat such things now but if it makes you happy have at it. People from the US have similar traditional foods from when people were poorer and could not preserve foods. Delicacies? Mountain oysters, a.ka. hog testicles, chitterlings, better known at chitlins from hog intestines. Pickled pig feet for a main course. As soon as people became more prosperous that ate “high on the hog” as in ham and things that were not previously used to either step in or process feces. Some brave starving soul a couple of hundred years ago grabbed a bug out of a muddy ditch and ate it in Louisiana. Now these mud bugs are served restaurants. One expends more calories eating them than ingested. They have no taste on their own so are boiled in spices . Alcohol seems to make them taste better. To each their own. I make no judgement and will try pretty much anything. Even tried cat one time by accident. Stringy, probably could have used some spices and lye.

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1st chuckle

So is Bacalao, but you only have to soak it in water, not drain cleaner.

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Bacalao is salted dried Cod (or Ling) In Norwegian it is called Klippfisk, since it was originally sun dried on rocks. (Klipper)
Bacalao is the Portuguese name for the same product.:


PS> The picture is from 1920 and in the middle of Aalesund. Today this is the buss terminal and next to the Cruise Terminal.
It is now the most used base fish for Lutefisk. (Watered out in water with lye)

The “real thing” is made from air-dried Cod that is hung up to dry on racks in the crisp cold air of winter in Lofoten, where the Cod come to spawn. This is called Stockfish and is among the oldest commodities traded between countries. It is also what sustained the Vikings on their long voyages:
https://cod.fromnorway.com/norwegian-cod/stockfish/

It is still being produced the traditional way:

And exported in large quantities, incl. to USA.
No need for refrigeration during transport, or even in hot humid climate, like in West Africa.

How I learned to stop worrying about eating giant aquatic cockroaches and learned to love lobster. Although after a summer of touring Maine on a private yacht and being invited to dine out with guests who insisted on ordering lobster, I got sick of it.
How ‘bugs’ went from being considered food for prisoners and the indigent to an expensive delicacy.

Eating lye processed fish whether rinsed or not does not appeal to me nor the first thing I would order off the seafood menu. No malice here, but that just does’nt work for me.

New England lobsters are over priced and over rated. The so called Spanish lobsters in the Caribbean taste better to me, but then I think Parrot fish is tasty too.

Hunting the spiny bugs in the Caribbean and the Bahamas with spear guns is also good sport and a great first step to procuring dinner.

Ahhh, my memory is refreshed again. Was doing a job in Belize for Exxon when a small boat approached selling a sack of small langustra or lobster tails… On my departure I told the pilot about my most excellent purchase, then heard I had been a participant in a crime. He didn’t turn me in and the frozen tails ended up on my table a few weeks later and thousands of miles away. Right damn tasty. Never had Parrot fish.

And all four languages of Spain: Gallego, Spanish (Castellano), Catalan, and Basque.

It is also the name used for a popular Norwegian dish, made with klippfisk. Here is a classical receipt:

In Norwegian, but translate quite well with Google Translaton.

Down here we have the crayfish, a lobster with tiny claws. They are exported to China and during our total lockdown special charter flights were used. The Chinese prefer the crayfish to lobster, and for New Zealanders they are a common food of multimillionaires, unless you catch them yourself. They are still plentiful off the sparcely settled West Coast of the South Island and lower East Coast of the North island but where I live they are now rare. Crayfishermen as Lee Shore mentioned don’t eat them.
With very fresh fish and I mean filleted on a well rinsed bait tray on the stern of the boat, I find that giving the fillet a good dusting of salt, leaving it for about 10 minutes then rinsing it off firms up the fillet.
I’m not sure that there is enough beer in Norway to prepare me for Lutefisk.

Yes enough, even for a Kiwi. But more important is the Akevit. It helps to neutralize all that bacon fat after. (And build up you courage before, if that should be required)