Flavors of Finland by Expedia is an interactive map that introduces 31 local dishes from Finland. By clicking a dish you can see the recipe to try the delicacy yourself. Below are some sample recipes from the site.
Dried Reindeer Meat
This one is easy to make but takes patience. Clean. Cut. Sprinkle a bit of salt and let dry. Wait for 2-3 weeks before serving. Best to wait until after xmas so santa can deliver his presents
Reindeer meat
Salt
Clean and cut the meat to about 3 cm thick, uniform pieces. Place a layer in a dish to be salted, and sprinkle coarse sea salt on top. Repeat with salt and meat in layers until the meat has run out, then cover with cling film. Let the meat salt overnight. Then, soak the meat in water for an hour and a half, so that the surface of the meat has no remaining solid salt. Leave to dry for about 2-3 weeks. The meat should be a little red inside so that it is not thoroughly dried.
Blood Pancake
Sounds grim but is actually delicious. Blood pancakes are made of blood, flour, onion, egg and spices. Fried blood pancakes are best served with lingonberries.
Dough
300 ml of blood (frozen)
300 ml of water
60 g barley flour
60 g rye flour
half an onion
1 egg
25 g margarine
1 tsp salt
1 tsp marjoram
1/4 tsp white pepper
For frying
25 g margarine
1. Stir together the blood and water. Whisk in flour and leave the dough to swell for 20 minutes. Peel and chop the onion. Add the onion, egg, butter and spices to the pancake batter.
2. Bake on a frying pan into small blood pancakes. Serve immediately with lingonberry sauce and mashed potatoes.
Breadcheese and Cloudberries
Breadcheese, or the Finnish squeaky cheese is a fresh cheese made out of cow’s milk. Traditionally the cheese should be cooked on open fire but normal kitchen oven can be used as well. Breadcheese tastes heavenly with cloudberries.
12 litres of milk
4 tsp of cheese rennet
2-3 tsp of salt
1. Warm the milk to 38° C, and then add the rennet. Let the milk curdle in the container until the curd surface is hard. Warm the curd again in the same saucepan, stirring carefully, until the whey begins to separate at about 40° C. Pour the whey out, squeezing out as much as possible. Move the mix on to a special cheese roastboard and press the curd into a round, flatbread shape.
2. Bake the cheese over an open fire until dark spots appear on the surface. Turn the cheese and bake the other side. Allow the cheese to cool on the board, and for the whey to drain off. Sprinkle the surface of the cheese with salt on both sides and rub it in with a spatula. Serve in the traditional way with cloudberry jam for dessert.
Crucified Whitebait
It’s not as weird as it sounds. Whitebait is a whitefish that you can get from many Finnish lakes. In Satakunta region whitebait is cooked on fire by nailing an openly cut fish on a wooden board with wooden sticks.
Whitebait
Salt
Pepper
Wooden board and wooden sticks
1. Cut the white fish open along the back of the skin, right next to the spine. Do the same trick on the other side of the spine. Cut the spine with scissors across the neck and the tail and gently pluck it out. Remove the pin-bones. Rub the fish with fine sea salt, a pinch of pepper and leave to marinade for half an hour.
2. While the fish marinades, light a fire. Once the fire is burning well, it’s time to crucify the whitefish. Place the fish on a plank skin side down with the head facing down and secure it with either nails or wooden sticks. Support the plank by any suitable means to the ground near the fire. Cooking time depends on the size of the fish but on average it requires about 30 minutes. When the fish is cooked, remove the nails, add a little butter in small lumps and serve directly on the wooden plank.
Holebread
1 piece of pre-ferment
1 litre of water
550 g of rye flour
1 tbsp salt
600 g rye flour
1. Crumble the pre-ferment into lukewarm water. Add 220 g of rye flour to produce a soupy mixture. Let the pre-ferment wake up and acidify at room temperature overnight.
2. Next day, whisk the salt and some more of the rye flour into the water-pre-ferment mixture and turn it into a somewhat loose dough and let it continue to turn. Whisk every now and again and add the flour in small batches. The dough is ready for baking when it bubbles, and is clearly increased in size. Knead the dough and form 4-5 round loafs with round holes in the middle. Prick the loaves and bake them in the oven at 200° C for approximately 40 minutes.
Inkoo’s Porridge
Porridge is normally made out of grain but not in Inkoo. The Inkoo porridge is cooked from mashed potatoes and served with a fair spoonful of butter.
1 kg of floury potatoes
Water
0.5 litre milk
60 g wheat or barley flour
Salt
Cook the potatoes in unsalted water. Pour the water out, keeping it to one side. Mash the potatoes well. Add the milk and some of the collected potato water. Continue to add more liquids so that the mixture becomes soup thin. Bring to the boil and add the flour so that you get a pulpy mixture. Cook until flour is absorbed. Season with salt and enjoy with butter.
Lapskoussi
Lapskoussi is a dish made of beef and vegetables. They are mixed together and cooked to form a lumpy paste. Lapskoussi is best served with gherkin and pickled beetroot.
500-700 g of beef
300-400 g pork
2 bay leaves
10 allspice
10 white pepper
2 large onions
4 carrots
1 swede (rutabaga)
1 kg of potatoes
Butter
Salt
1. Put the meat into a saucepan and pour in enough water so that the meat is well covered. Add the bay leaves and peppercorns, 1 chopped onion, 2 chopped carrots and half of the chopped swede. Cook at a low heat for at least 4 hours. Strain, save the broth and throw away the vegetables. Tear meat into small shreds.
2. Put the broth to boil with the rest of the vegetables and potatoes, and cook until soft. Mash the cooked vegetables and meat. Season the mixture with salt and add a fair piece of butter. Serve with gherkin and pickled beetroot.
Posso
Posso is a donut that is baked in a form of a pig’s head and filled with apple jam. In the city of Kotka people are really proud of their traditional pastry.
Dough
500 ml water
50 g yeast
100 g of butter
100 g sugar
10 g salt
700 g wheat flour
2 eggs
Filling
Ovenproof apple marmalade
For frying
Oil
1. Dissolve the yeast into lukewarm milk. Add the salt, sugar and eggs. Add the flour gradually to the dough, kneading all the time. Melt the butter and add it to the dough. Knead again, until the dough comes easily off the edges of the bowl. Cover the dough with a cloth and leave to rise for about 30 minutes.
2. Once risen, knead the dough again. Roll out the dough into a sheet and cut 8-10 cm diameter pieces out of dough. Mould the dough pieces into rectangular shapes and add marmalade to the centre. Close the dough in half, folding the edges. If desired, swirl the edges into “trotters” or “ears” between your fingers. Put the ready-made doughnuts on an oil-greased baking sheet. Leave to rise for 25-30 minutes.
3. Fry in oil for 2 to 3 minutes per side. Lift the doughnuts out and leave to drain, then roll them in sugar.
Rönttönen
It is definitely easier to cook than to pronounce. Rönttönen is delicious rye pastry filled with lingonberries and served with hot melted butter on the top.
Dough
150 ml water
5 g of fresh yeast
0.5 tsp salt
120 g rye flour
60 g flour
2 tbsp butter
Filling
1 kg of floury potatoes
250 g lingonberries
60 g sugar
1 tsp salt
60 g rye flour
Dissolve the yeast in warm water. Mix the ingredients together by hand or with a food processor. Wrap the dough in foil and leave to rest in the refrigerator for about an hour. Boil the potatoes until soft, then puree and place in an oven-proof dish. Cover the dish with foil and place in a 65° C oven and mix in between so that the potato sweetens, and leave to cook slowly for 2-3 hours. Allow to cool. Mix the lingonberries, sugar and salt into the mashed potato. Roll out the dough into circular bases. Place the filling in the middle and crinkle the edges. Bake at 250° C for approximately 15 minutes. Finish with hot melted butter.
Sultsina
The less known cousin dish of the popular Karelian pie originates from Karelia region in eastern Finland. Sultsina is a cross between a crepe and flatbread. It is made out of rye dough and filled with rice porridge. Sultsinas are best enjoyed straight from the oven with melted butter on the top.
Rye dough
200 ml water
1 tsp salt
250 g rye flour
30 g plain flour
Filling
200 ml water
120 g pudding rice
1 litre milk
1 tsp salt
50 g butter
For top greasing
50 ml water
50 g butter
1. To make the filling, boil the water. Mix in the rice and boil on a medium heat for 5 minutes. Pour in the milk and boil for a further 40 minutes. Add salt and cool it down.
2. Make the pancakes by mixing the water, salt and flour. Knead the dough. Roll into a long cylinder and cut into 25 pieces. Roll pieces out into flat round pancakes. Fry on a hot pan for few minutes on both sides. Grease both sides with the melted butter and water mix. Add a spoonful of the porridge into the pancake and fold both sides into the middle.