Food Festival 2019
The largest food festival in the Nordic region took place in the City of Smiles during the weekend of September 6th – 8th, 2019.
GastroFun was, of course, present, and this is our unreserved and incomplete account of an extremely educational and sensory weekend at Tangkrogen in Aarhus, where we discovered that we Danes love food in almost all forms and shades – and that one should not seek shelter under a sunshade during a cloudburst.
Hungry for knowledge – and food!
Food Festival should be visited on an empty stomach and with an open mind. If you are a food enthusiast to any degree, this festival is an absolute must-see.
Every year, several leading chefs and producers from near and far, and from both home and abroad, visit the Aarhus food festival, which is built around a multitude of workshops, lectures, and, not least, tastings.
Here, the food industry shares both new and long-standing experiences and indescribable joy of food as they attempt to challenge and focus on our taste buds in new and exciting ways. We get to taste everything from juicy Wagyu, with an impressive marbling of fat, to crispy seaweed chips and vegan burgers.
Photo credit for this and the top image: Raisfoto
Many gastronomic experiences – and a single cloudburst
We head towards Tangkrogen on Friday afternoon. After a week with quite unstable weather, we are somewhat excited to see what the weather gods have in store for us and the other eager festival-goers.
The cloudburst hits the moment we arrive, and we run for cover under the large sunshades in the Gourmet Corner to the left of the entrance. However, the sails cannot hold the large amount of water, causing them to overflow, and suddenly one of us is drenched by a very unexotic waterfall.
We’re off to a start! Hungry for food and knowledge, we explore the festival’s many areas and stalls.
Exploring
The area Madeksperimentariet has several stands with exciting and innovative companies and entrepreneurs who are here to give us consumers insight into the future food industry and the latest research in food.
Here we visit Aarhus University, where we taste a very delicious and juicy pork chop from Danish pigs fed with seaweed.
Moreover, we are seated at one of the stand’s round tables, where we, as test subjects, taste chocolate while listening to music. Whether it is the music that is supposed to influence the taste experience or vice versa unfortunately escapes us in the hurry.
At Planteriget, there is a real opportunity to explore new and innovative uses of nature’s green and colorful offerings.
Here it is possible to try fermenting cabbage, and we venture into tasting various forms of juice.
In particular, a single apple juice stands out clearly in our memory: the apple flavor is so strong that the experience is best described as drinking liquid apple – it is almost overwhelming!
Food Festival offers a bit of everything for those with a sweet tooth, and in the area, Korn Og Søde Sager, we certainly satisfy our sugar cravings with ice cream, snacks, and chocolate.
Like many other Danes, we love chocolate, especially the darker kind. Therefore, it is interesting to be presented with a wide chocolate selection: Dark chocolate is suddenly not just dark chocolate, and we taste everything from bitter dark to mild dark, as well as both milk and ruby chocolate.
In Danmarks Spisekamre, we watch the butchering of a venison leg, after which we taste it seared with a dash of a lovely, powerful sauce. If you are interested in a guide on how to carve your own venison leg from roe deer, you should read here.
In the same area, we hear from The Green Museum in Djursland about their fight to preserve original vegetable varieties, including cabbage, and at another stand, we are enriched with good tips on using apple juice and grated apples to speed up the fermentation process in a sourdough.
We are currently experimenting with our own sourdough, so we soak up the experts’ good advice.
At Djurslands Fælleskøkken, we are – somewhat reluctantly – allowed to try snacks/breads made from hemp, and we can best describe the taste as being… different!
We move on and encounter Nordiske Dråber, home to various distilleries, breweries, and wine producers, among others.
The area is built around a beautiful wigwam where it is possible to buy tokens: these tokens grant access to taste the impressive selection at the stands within all alcohol genres imaginable, and we spot none other than Stauning Whiskey. There is also a wide selection of gin, mead, wine, and several specialty beers.
Still hungry for experiences and inputs, we move quite fittingly directly into The Sea. Here, fish are displayed at children’s height, and because many of us have no idea what fish actually look like before they end up in cans or refrigerated shelves, this is a brilliant conversation starter and an opportunity to involve the little ones.
It is possible to buy “humdogs,” a reimagined hotdog with lobster, and we indulge in delightful peel-yourself shrimp and langoustines along with a truly fabulous bisque!
The area also has an entire scout area at the opposite end where you get a fantastic insight into how scouts cook over a campfire in the wild.
Food Festival caters to almost every imaginable preference, and in Health and Sustainability, it is possible to indulge in protein waffles, vegan oat drinks, and meat alternatives with beans, lentils, and wheat protein.
We taste a burger made from raw plant-based mince, and here we actually find that the texture of the “patty” is quite reasonable and meat-like.
At Edgy Veggie, we are presented with “kebab meat” made from wheat protein, and we must admit that there is still a bit to go before we are completely convinced – though their chili sin carne is not so bad after all.
Since vegetable fritters with lentil flour are something we have experimented with, we are eager to taste the lentil fritters at Linser For Livet. They taste excellent, and we must acknowledge that they surpass our own lentil fritters by far.
The folks at Linser For Livet, however, give us some brilliant tips on using lentil flour in waffles – we will soon share these with you.
We have now tasted several meat alternatives, and we must admit that the producers are certainly moving in the direction of something that begins to resemble reasonable meat substitutes. However, there is still a way to go before we are fully convinced: For instance, the taste often lacks depth and a genuine umami flavor, as there is typically over-salting to compensate for the lack of depth.
World Of Food is a culinary journey to exciting kitchens, food cultures, and street food universes from around the world!
At the Italian and organic bakery, Il Fornaio, we get the chance to get our hands in the dough and create a genuine Italian and vegetarian sourdough pizza with ricotta cream, crème fraîche, and thin slices of roasted potatoes.
They tell us about the many taste and health benefits of baking with sourdough: Sourdough gives more depth to the flavor of the bread, and lactic acid bacteria make it easier for the body to absorb the nutrients from the food.
We learn about the different types of flour and which ones are particularly suitable for pizza baking, and we familiarize ourselves for the first time with the two Italian “denominations” within pizza baking: the Roman and the Neapolitan.
We also visit the Truffle Enthusiast to taste real truffles. Here, our taste buds are immediately sent to heaven with a nearly sinful truffle pesto and small snacks with gouda cheese, Parma ham, and freshly grated truffle on top, and the truffle adventure is rounded off with crispy truffle chips and a praline with white chocolate and – of course – truffle.
Bubbies Hawaii offers exciting variations of mochi ice cream, which are small round “packages” of ice cream wrapped in sweetened rice dough. We have only tasted them in Toronto before, but the concept actually originates from Japan. It is still quite new here and definitely worth trying!
Finally, we arrive at the paradise for meat lovers: From Animal to Table. The very long queues for tastings testify to the fact that we Danes still have an extraordinary fondness for meat, which naturally delights the die-hard meat enthusiast among us.
At Dyrbar, we estimate that the waiting time for tastings is somewhere between 15-20 minutes, and it continues like this all weekend. When we finally take a bite of their fried kidney taps and the extremely interesting – and to us previously unknown – tomahawk from pigs, we are absolutely thrilled.
The founder of Dyrbar, Rune Stokholm Kruse, also serves us a very interesting and special cut, which they call “the tie,” and here we can only say: WOW. Even the youngest among us gobbles up the meat, and she is otherwise somewhat reserved about meat that is not served either in a casing or in the form of mince.
At Steak Out, we are fortunate enough to taste an insanely delicious steak cut from something as fantastic as Wagyu A5 Mbs.9. It can still be tasted in the saliva, even here two days later!
On Saturday, we have signed up for the Chef Scene workshop, “Røde’s Summer Cod with Lots of Flavors!”, with Claus Røde Christensen, and we have been looking forward to this unique opportunity to cook with one of the country’s top chefs.
We place ourselves at a station in the front row, and everyone pairs up two by two. Claus Christensen steps onto the stage, and we are now set to fillet a whole cod.
Things are moving at a brisk pace. We must also acknowledge that we are falling slightly behind, but not even dreadfully dull knives – nor the somewhat less pedagogical format – can put a stop to the many laughs and fun.
Several times along the way, calls of “We can’t see anything!” are heard from the participants, but the mood remains high and the atmosphere excellent!
Afterwards, we enjoy our fried summer cod with steamed mussels and a glass of Riesling, and we agree that it would have been interesting to experience more of Chef Scene’s workshops: Including the workshop with Michelin chef, Paul Cunningham, who would have created magic with delicious toast, as well as Francis Cardenaus’ workshop, “Vegetable Joy”. The latter is, by the way, the man and meat enthusiast behind MASH, who has now cast his great love for vegetables.
Food Festival absolutely exudes experiences and activities for the whole family, and Arla Food Fest is the festival’s ultimately family-friendly area. Here, there are, among other things, obstacle courses, which are too wet to try after the big rain shower, as well as milk bars and workshops.
The youngest among us has great fun petting cows and entering the pen with calves, and this is a perfect opportunity to tell her about the journey of milk from the barn to the fridge.
The tastings of the “popped cheese” are a huge hit!
DM in Hotdog
Of course, we can’t overlook the annual DM in hotdog, where perceptions of what a hotdog is and can be are truly challenged.
We see several more or less traditional variants, but at least as many controversial and innovative suggestions for Denmark’s best hotdog and the direction in which the Danish street food classic is heading.
Many participants choose to serve their hotdog in brioche bread, and a single restaurant from Aarhus, Hærværk, offers a meat-free variant that is crowned as the most innovative hotdog.
Dyvig Badehotel ends up selling the most hotdogs to the spectators, thus winning the title of Hotdog King of the Year.
Particularly interesting, however, is that the Michelin-starred restaurant from Vejle, Memu, presents a hotdog without either mustard or ketchup and also takes the overall victory! Congratulations to Memu.
It was a true pleasure to witness star chefs from all over the country approach the task with body and soul, and despite it being a competition, the event was undoubtedly a delightful break from the daily routine for the busy chefs: The atmosphere was informal and humorous, and a couple of participants even dressed up in funny costumes.
Home again
We leave this year’s Food Festival with a wonderful – and pleasantly filled – feeling in our stomachs. The weekend has been one long confirmation of the joy of food that undoubtedly prevails among the Danes, and we can certainly say that all our senses are well satisfied after this eventful weekend, which has offered plenty of fresh air, baking sun – and a tad of rain.
See you next year!