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Tasty selection of smørrebrød in Nyhavn

I admit it – Danish open-faced sandwiches may not seem like a subject that merits a blog dedicated solely in their honour – but as the son of an ex-pat Dane in Canada, I felt like it was my responsibility to explore and ultimately explain this unique cultural phenomenon to those who have never experienced the myriad combinations of toppings that are elegantly presented atop thick slices of dark Danish rye bread (rugbrød) and washed down with a crisp, cold lager beer or schnapps.

Ah...Copenhagen!

If you’ve been to Copenhagen, however, you may very well have noticed window displays of row after row of meticulously arranged savoury treats and wondered what they are. You may even have figured out that Danish open-faced sandwiches (or smørrebrød as they are known to the Danes) play an important role in daily Danish life: they are ordered at lunchtime at takeout counters, hurriedly prepared at home for children’s lunch boxes, and served in fancy restaurants.

The marvel of Danish smørrebrød first grabbed my attention as a young boy, when I would travel to Copenhagen for family vacations. With each visit, upon our arrival, my uncles would meet my father (their brother) and the rest of us at the airport waving Danish flags as is customary and together we’d head to the closest cafe for a coffee and weinerbrød (more about that later). After coffee, we would then head straight for the nearest IRMA grocery store in order to load up on provisions for the big Welcoming Feast. The shopping spree was played like a game. You could select to buy whatever you wanted, as long as it met one criteria, it had to cost under 25 Danish Kroner (about 5 dollars).

So with that rule in place, filet mignon and caviar were clearly out of the question! But this was not a problem, for there were virtually limitless varieties of open-faced sandwich toppings that fit the bill. So with unfettered abandon, I would dash about the shop, delighted by the re-discovery of open-faced favourites I had forgotten since the last trip.

My dad and I in 1971

Of course, my father, as a Dane, was raised on smørrebrød without ever having thought twice about what he was eating. The fact that he lived in Canada where smørrebrød ingredients were scarce, only served to aggrandize the sandwiches in his mind. He shared his passion with my brother and I – explaining the intricacies of what meat could be combined with what topping. I was perplexed by all the combinations, and struggled to remember them all. Some of the traditions seemed grounded in good sense – like one should never mix pickled herring with liver paté - but others caused frustration. It was inexplicable to me that ham and cheese were not to be eaten together according to smørrebrød protocol, but those were the rules, and Danes were sticklers for doing things the right way.

Danes: Not afraid to show their colours!

Despite the fact that I always felt a mild sense of trepidation when preparing smørrebrød in the presence of my Danish family – for fear of embarrassingly combining the wrong ingredients - I looked forward to our Danish trips in order to indulge in what were then my personal favourites: Ham with Italiensksalat (a creamy salad of peas, carrots, and asparagus) and paté with spiced pickled beets. Today my tastes have evolved towards the fishier options, but I still love those old meaty classics.

In the same way that North Americans understand the meaning of ham & cheese, pastrami on rye, or grilled cheese, Danes instantly recognize rejemad, rullepølse, or even dyrlængens natmad and can buy all the necessary ingredients for those open-faced sandwiches in Copenhagen shops as easily as I can buy a cream cheese for my bagels in New York. But try to find a decent agurkersalat outside of Denmark. Sure, you will occasionally find specialized European-style delis that offer a small array of Danish products, but if you needed anything special, you needed to make it yourself.

Early do-it-yourself experiment

And this is exactly what I did after graduating from university – made it myself. At first, I stuck to ingredients that I could figure out myself. Working collaboratively with my father, we would improvise on certain recipes, never quite getting it right, but refining it over time until we had a passable italiensksalat for our ham. We’d buy German pumpernickel bread, as it was the closest thing we could find to Danish rye bread. We’d pickle our own beets, but eat them along with French Paté. It was good, but it wasn’t perfect. And we wanted perfect!

So I began to look for smørrebrød cookbooks that had authentic Danish recipes, but, to my consternation, I discovered that there were none in English. My only option was to decipher the cryptic instructions in Danish language cookbooks. This job was difficult and time-consuming, and at times, infuriating, because they frequently referenced prepared ingredients, ingredients that no Dane would even consider making, simply because it is readily available and high-quality in most Danish shops. Like Parisians would never bake their own baguettes to eat with their Camembert, Danes would never cure their own saltkød. But that is exactly what I needed to do if I wanted to eat dyrlængens natmad more than once every 2 or 3 years – which I do.

Old school Danish cookbook

So, I had to dig deeper. Somebody in Denmark had to know how to make the things that other Danes took for granted. And over time, I unravelled the mysteries, and gathered them into a collection of recipes that I could call on as needed.

And that is the origin of this blog.

If you are half-Danish like I am, the recipes here may evoke memories of your childhood and encourage you to embrace your Danish heritage, while hopefully sharing it with others. Similarly, if you are a "Danophile", I hope that this collection of musings on Danish open-faced culture will entertain you and inspire you to explore making your own smørrebrød wherever you may live. On the other hand, if you know nothing of this wonderful cultural phenomenon, I hope this blog will help demystify it. You may never need to make the complicated and esoteric ingredients contained within these pages, but I hope you are encouraged to try real, home-made Danish open-faced sandwiches and maybe even add them to the repertoire of food you think of eating in your day to day life.