Last Call at the Fjord Port

Glimpses of Norway

Before we leave Norway behind and welcome students back to ACS, I thought I'd post one last look of some iconic images:

This building is in the restored village of Otternes, and a colorful example of the sodden roofs we saw.

On our final day, when we were beginning to think that rainbows avoided the fickle fjord weather, we saw this while taking the train back to Oslo.

Betsy on our ferry tour of Naeroyfjord, a UNESCO World Heritage Site

Houses in Myrdal, at the top of the valley leading into the fjord.

Sometimes the weather made for some striking contrasts. This was not taken with black and white film.

The tiny town of Undredal is famous for two things, its stave church (above right), which is the smallest functioning church in Norway, and its cheese.

A last glimpse of the Borgund Stave Church

The Norwegian Bakery: Cardamom Buns

Cardamom Raisin Rolls in a Norwegian Bakery

More Examples of Norwegian Baking

My Version, a Norwegian Bread baked in Bulgaria by a Minnesotan

Taking my first bite of a Norwegian raisin bun on an Oslo park bench, the last taste I expected was cardamom. I'm not sure why, since the spice figures heavily in the only Norwegian bread I've ever made - Holiday Julekage. But that surprising undercurrent of flavor tasted of Christmas to me, and I found I enjoyed a bit of Christmas on an August night. It made me feel at home. 

When I got back to Bulgaria, I decided to try baking the buns myself. So, just in case you'd like to try them too, here is the recipe which I adapted from the Cooking Books Blog.

Ingredients:

4.2 Cups All-Purpose Flour

1 Pkg Active Dry Yeast

1.5 Cups Milk

1 Cup Raisins (you could also use candied fruit, chocolate, chopped up marzipan, apricots...)

1/2 Cup Sugar

1 Tsp Cardamom (you might up this to 2 tsp, especially if your cardamom isn't too fresh)

1 egg white, beaten, to glaze over the rolls before baking

1. Mix flour, yeast, sugar and cardamom with a whisk.

2. Melt the butter in a pan over low heat on the stove, then add the milk for a minute or two until it is warm to your finger (but not hot). 

3. Stir the milk and butter into the dry ingredients and mix.

4. Turn dough out onto a floured counter and knead for about 2 minutes, kneading in the raisins along the way. 

5. Put dough into a greased bowl, spin, turn over, then cover with a cloth and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size. (I turn the oven on to 350 degrees for a minute, then off, and then put it in there, a trick I learned from my mom). It will probably take the dough between 30 and 60 minutes to double.

(Preheat the oven to 400 degrees fahrenheit / 200 degrees celsius)

6. Punch the dough down once or twice and knead a couple of times, then cut into sixteen pieces. 

7. Form each piece into a bun by rubbing it into the palm of one hand with the other. You should push hard at first and then ease up, forming a nice rounded ball. 

8. Place the buns on two cookie sheets that you butter or spray or line with parchment paper.

9. Split an egg, keeping only the egg white in a small bowl. Beat it for about a minute with a fork until it looks frothy. Use a basting brush to brush egg white on the top of each roll. This will make it look golden and shiny when it is baked. 

10. Bake for 10-15 minutes, ideally rotating the baking sheets and switching the top and bottom halfway. 

Enjoy! 

A Few of the Top .0000001 Waterfalls in Fjord Country

They frost the fjord cliffs, gush under the railroad tunnels, stream through the fog, slide across rainbows, disappear gently into thin air. They are the waterfalls of fjord country; blink and you might miss one. 

Borgund Hike

After touring the Stave Church at Borgund, we embarked on a two-hour hike into the valley behind it. Well, it was supposed to be a two-hour hike. It actually took us over three, as we continually stopped to marvel at our surroundings and snap photos. Mossy glens led up to an old road painstakingly built up the valley in the early twentieth century, which then snaked down to a cascade. Mushrooms of every size and color brightened our path, as we climbed by old homesteads that still seemed to be working, evidenced by the long grass drying on racks in the sun. We finally descended back to the church through idyllic countryside, walking through sun-dappled path with sheep bahh-ing on either side of us. By the time we got back to the church, we had missed the early bus, so hitched a ride with a friendly Czech couple going our direction.

A new postcard line for Norway?

So throughout our time in Norway, I was always looking for postcards. And I found several, bought several. But I had that perfect combination of kronar and a driving desire for postcards, and I didn't get many. Why? 

They need to revamp their postcard line in Fjord country. There is a huge surplus of cards featuring cruise ships marring beautiful fjords and brave skin-baring swimmers blocking cliffside views. 

So here I present some other options, and may the tourist board of that stunning country get around to modernizing their outgoing postal line some day soon...

Aurlandsdalen

After the man at the tourist information office recommended that, given the rainy weather, we not take the Aurlandsdalen hike, Betsy gamely asked, "You mean because it's wet dangerous or wet annoying?" When he said annoying, we bought bus tickets. And the rainbow we saw en route was just part of the compensation for defying his advice. Countless waterfalls, restored farmsteads, plump raspberries practically the whole way begging to be picked, and tiny hamlets nestled into the hill above a 2000 foot drop made this a memorable hike. It was 14 miles, almost all downhill, as we followed a tumbling river from Osterbo to Vassbygdi. And it was, to borrow Ithaca's pun, gorgeous.

Fjord Views

Fjords, sometimes swathed in low-lying clouds, sometimes so still you can see every line of the cliffs above reflected in their mirror, are every bit as cold as they say. We hiked along them, rode buses around them, cruised through the center of them, hiked to the cliffs above them so we could stare down at their beauty from another angle. I like to think of the fjords of Norway as the proud grandfathers of the slightly more approachable Minnesota lakes.