In 2004, chefs from the Scandinavian countries of Norway, Sweden and Denmark assembled alongside other Nordic chefs from Finland, Iceland, the Faroe Islands, Greenland, and Åland. After days gathered around what surely must have been an immaculately crafted solid oak table, bathed in natural light pouring in from floor to ceiling windows and set in the middle of a minimalist, yet tasteful, room of bare concrete walls, they emerged with The New Nordic Food Manifesto. The manifesto outlines ten aims of what food from the Nordic regions should be. One states that food should be reflective of the seasons, made with ingredients that are able to be sourced locally while another seeks to provide basic standards for animal welfare and responsible fishing. Noma’s live prawns topped with black ants, could be seen as an extreme example of an aim for purity, freshness and simplicity.
Gravlax, smørrebrød and IKEA meatballs aside, it’s likely that when we think of Scandinavian food, it looks something like the manifesto envisioned: conscious and graceful food, using few ingredients and cooked well. As a young budget traveller many moons ago, my idea of Scandinavian dishes used to be cheap newsagents hotdogs, the ones that pirouette in their own swill for hours before being decanted into a sweet, bleached bun and lathered with sauce from a hand pump.
Simply Scandinavian is thankfully lacking in hotdog recipes and instead, presents the fresh, seasonal and straightforward food Scandinavian cookery is synonymous with. It’s the latest in a line of Scandinavian cookbooks from chef and food writer Trine Hahnemann, with others focusing on comfort food, baking and entirely vegetable-based recipes.
It’s an easy book to drop into, not requiring any special ingredients than what you might already have lurking in the fridge. They’re predominantly vegetable-based and with chapters arranged by a “what do you fancy?” approach like Daily Comfort Food, Feeling Green or Light Dinners it makes selecting what to cook even more accessible.
Most recipes require little investment of time or energy. A meal of Chilled Pea Soup, a creamy Curry with Grapes accompanied by a Black and White Salad of lentils and rice came together within the hour. Most take less than thirty minutes, like a Roast Tomato Soup, featuring a tickle of coriander seeds or the Hot Smoked Salmon, Spinach and Fennel Salad.
There are some that require more involvement, the Roast Pork Loin or most dishes in the slightly misleading ‘Baking on a Whim’ chapter which to me suggests cinnamon rolls in a jiffy but tends to entail a fair amount of effort. Some are definitely whimmy, a Creamy Filo Vegetable Pie can be made in under an hour as can the Beautiful Cauliflower Trees on Filo, whereas the Buttery Leek Tart takes a little over. Rhubarb Sticky Buns are a morning’s work though happen to be entirely worth the effort and everything you’d want from a title like that.
Simple food is hard to get right both for cooks and, I imagine, cookbook authors. In a dish with few parts, so much will rely on the quality of those ingredients and the skill to prepare them well, especially with a cuisine like this, which doesn’t rely heavily on strong flavoured ingredients or spices. And while I don’t judge a book by its cover, I do judge it on how straightforward it claims to be on that cover. Can I make multiple dishes from it simultaneously? Does it inspire me to cook well when time is short? Is it easy to adapt to ingredients I have available?
Resoundingly, yes. The writing is clear, concise and easy to follow and dietary adaptations are made with simple instructions though for my tastes, some dishes would be better with a little more complication. I’d sacrifice the ease of some recipes if it meant not having to eat raw asparagus or cauliflower again.
Simply Scandinavian is ultimately a collection of intentionally unshowy recipes featuring fresh food that’s occasionally hearty, often delicate and almost always as easy as a cycle around Copenhagen.
Cuisine: Scandinavian
Suitable For: Beginners/Confident home cooks
Cookbook Review Rating: four stars
Buy this book: Simply Scandinavian
£27, Quadrille Publishing Ltd
Review written by Nick Dodd a Leeds-based pianist, teacher and writer. Contact him at www.yorkshirepiano.co.uk
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