for the love of herring

Well I can't say I'm the most tolerant of cold weather, but the Dane in me has certainly revealed herself in my new-found love of pickled, salted and cured fish. Sue thought I should test my Danish roots with something very traditional but risky to my foreign tongue—  cured herring and dark bread with capers and a curry mayonnaise. We discussed at length whether I should order the herring or play it safe with a chicken salad, but I was in Denmark, and if the Danes eat pickled or marinated herring, then I too, would eat pickled or marinated herring.

"Are you sure?" She asked with a raised brow. "You might not like it!"
I was warned, but something inside me told me I would love it— so I ordered the mysterious fish dish anyway.



What can I say? I devoured every single bit with great joy, and began plotting ways of recreating it back in Istanbul. I couldn't wait to tell my grandad that I love herring too.

outside the wall

boundless minds

The Middelfart Sindssygehospital was founded in 1888, and officially closed its doors to patients in 1999. I want to say the hospital reopened as a museum in 2008, but I could be wrong— the site is in Danish. I had thought of photographing the museum as it was displayed to visitors, but I decided I'd rather try to capture a sense of the minds that could not be contained within its walls, by showing you their artwork, which I found profoundly moving.

the art of hygge

Hygge is one of those wonderfully untranslatable words to be found in every language. Roughly pronounced "hoo-guh," hygge is Danish for something closest to "cosy"— but it's beyond cosy. From what I've come to understand, it's both a state of mind and being. Soft sweaters, candles, hearty food, the warmth of friendship and those long, meaningful conversations held over fragrant cups of tea— anything that makes your soul hum. My friend Sue, in a generous and thoughtful effort to introduce me to hygge, and the experience of something my grandad would have loved, cooked us a delicious meal of something I cannot pronounce for the life of me. Rounds of ground beef wrapped in bacon and pan-fried with caramelised onions, a massive tart pickle and buttery baby potatoes lavished with the oh so traditional Danish brown gravy. Sue explained how gravy must absolutely be a dark brown; apparently this matters so much to the Danes that there is an actual food dye to make your gravy the perfect shade of brown. All this home-cooked hygge deliciousness was washed down with a velvety walnut beer.

For some reason, I felt I wanted to cry—everything was so much my grandad. With the exception of a few random plates of spaghetti, dinners with my grandad consisted of a meat, buttery potatoes, a brown sauce or gravy and some kind of vegetable. Sue's meal took me back to my grandparent's kitchen, which always smelled of bread and butter and sweet pipe smoke. I was a little girl at the table, my feet unable to touch the floor, I was a teenager, I was an adult— my grandad grinning at me after some joke, my grandad swearing in Danish at the news on the TV.



Morning brought mist, deer, and the smell of bacon and toast. Before my train to Esbjerg, Sue wanted to show me the Middelfart Sindssygehospital, a unique museum that had once been a psychiatric institution. As the mist fell back to the earth, the sky was a rare blue. We wrapped ourselves up in our wooly scarves and set out on our way.

the doors

bowing into the earth

the lovely town with the unfortunate name

Ladies and Gentlemen: Middelfart.

epic sandwiches

Do you see how big this sandwich is? I don't know if I managed to accurately capture the enormity of this masterpiece with a photo, so let me attempt to convey it with words. Between two unassuming slices of toasted, fluffy bread, a jungle of green grew upward, and within this jungle of green, three mastodonic slabs of pork with crispy fried and salted rinds were skewered into place, smothered in a curry mayonnaise. Pickles and slivers of apple cascaded down onto the plate, some leaping off onto the table, while a pile of artfully roasted baby potatoes glistened in the corner. A pool of curry mayo was provided for emergency purposes, as the whole tower leaned threateningly to the right. I was awestruck. This was perhaps, the Everest of sandwiches.

Still full the following day on the way to my grandad's hometown of Esbjerg, I stopped in the charmingly named town of Middelfart, to see my friend Sue— and it was lunchtime.



This must be how the Danes stay warm!