Finnish

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Karjalanpiirakka (Rye Pastry with Rice Porridge)

A Finnish pastry: rye rolled out to the thickness of paper, topped with cooked rice porridge, crimped by hand around the rim and baked in fifteen minutes at close to 300°C. It has held EU protected status since 2011. The other rye shell on this site, kalakukko, is built to hold liquid in over a six-hour bake; this one is baked crisp and then brushed with butter and water and covered so that it goes soft again on purpose. The same dough, the opposite oven.

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Kalakukko (Fish and Pork Baked in a Rye Crust)

The dish of Savonia in Finland: small freshwater fish, bones and all, sealed with pork belly inside a rye crust and baked for six hours. Pastry is meant to come out of the oven crisp; this crust is the opposite. It is there to be a pot, and to hold the fish’s own liquid in for six hours. What those six hours do is the point of the dish: the bones of a small fish go soft enough to eat. Leaving them in is design rather than laziness.

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Lohikeitto (Creamy Salmon Soup)

A Finnish salmon soup: potato and carrot simmered in stock made from the salmon frame, finished with cream, then the salmon cooked off the heat by residual warmth alone. Whole allspice and a generous handful of dill at the end are what make it Nordic — and not boiling the salmon is the whole technique.