Scandinavian Cuisine Heats Up

Whether it’s Spanish tapas, equally Spanish molecular gastronomy, Italian food, or the increasingly popular hummus, yogurt and other specialties of the eastern Mediterranean, Europe’s sun-drenched south has a strong and enduring appeal for us.

But there are rumblings in the north, and it’s not just Icelandic volcanoes.

Scandinavian cuisine is starting to get noticed.

Noma, a restaurant in Denmark’s capital, Copenhagen, was recently named the best restaurant in the world by the British trade magazine Restaurant, and that city now has 13 Michelin stars.

The inaugural issue of Swallow, a New York-based biannual food and travel publication targeting elitist foodies, focused on Scandinavian cuisine.

And in January, Quadrille Publishing released a book titled "The Nordic Diet." The book espouses the healthful qualities of the food of the Nordic countries, which include Scandinavia — Denmark, Norway and Sweden — plus Finland and Iceland. That means oily fish such as herring and salmon, berries, whole grains, vegetables and lean red meat such as reindeer.

This new Nordic wave has been building for a while. Back in 2004, Noma co-owner Claus Meyer assembled a group of Scandinavian chefs and promulgated, in proper self-important European fashion, a “Manifesto of the New Nordic Kitchen.”

Basically, it encourages seasonal cooking with a focus on products that thrive in the Nordic countries, keeping in mind health and animal welfare.

Even little Iceland started promoting Nordic cuisine back in 2002 with its annual Reykjavik Food & Fun Festival, for which chefs from all over the world fly in to Iceland’s capital each February to participate in a cooking competition, ride snowmobiles on glaciers and eat delicacies ranging from a yogurt-like substance called skyr to fermented shark.

This new Scandinavian wave hasn’t exactly crashed on the shores of the United States, but we have felt a ripple or two here.

In New York, Aquavit, probably the most high-profile Scandinavian restaurant in the country, recently brought a new chef on board, officially severing its ties with Marcus Samuelsson, the country’s most high-profile Scandinavian chef.

Aquavit’s new chef, Marcus Jernmark, who used to cook for the Swedish Consulate in New York, follows the dining scene in Scandinavia and has brought its influence to bear at his restaurant. He has gently removed some of the non-Scandinavian influences introduced by Samuelsson and is shoring up the food with a new Scandinavian foundation. He has introduced items such as venison tartare, hay-smoked sweetbreads and a Swedish vegetable stew called ?ngamat.

During the restaurant’s annual spring herring festival, Jernmark dressed the fish in such seasonal items as ramps and rhubarb.

With Jernmark running the kitchen, Aquavit recently got a two-star review from The New York Times. That’s technically a demotion for the restaurant, which had three stars, but the review was highly complimentary of the food; critic Sam Sifton mostly took restaurant management to task for not updating the decor.

It’s too early to announce a new wave of gravlax and lingonberry liqueurs sweeping the nation, but every trend starts out small.