søndag den 10. april 2011

mind blown. only a little more than a month left.

I feel like there's still so much I need to do, so much I need to see and experience. Tivoli opens in a week or so, the beautiful harbors are now sunny and cheery more than one day a month, and I feel like I just figured it all out. Yes, everything. And for that matter, I feel like there is an infinite amount of things I still can and should blog about to share with you all. In about two hours I'm leaving for a handball match that a girl next door is playing in, and in about 30 hours I'm leaving for my spring break !

Let's start with something simple. 
A question I get a lot is, what do the Danes eat? And at first I thought, pretty much the same as Americans. An example of a usual dinner would be a fish, carrot, pea, tomato curry with rice and a salad on the side. Except, having made a couple of meals (tuna casserole, chicken and dumplings) for the family, I've realized that the salad "on the side" is something that is nary taken out of the meal plan. "What salad are you going to make with it?" My host parents ask. I'll figure something out, and take note as the whole family seems to take an equal amount of salad as they do of the main course. And another major difference in Denmark is the bread. Rugbrød, which is somewhat equivalent to american rye bread, is a the staple of many Danish meals. "Smorrebrod" is the classic Danish open-faced sandwich, which is the usual lunch. Liverpatte, another classically Danish spread, is something that if you can believe, I eat on my sandwich every lunch with the family.


I took a picture of it yesterday up close and personal, to try and convey the density of this bread. Some Americans come to Denmark and cannot stand this bread. I've become a fan. And though there are a couple white bread alternatives in stores, you will rarely, if ever, see a Dane choose white bread over rugbrød.  

And here is an example of Rugbrød in the breakfast setting. You slice a piece of delicious cheese off from the huge hunk in the fridge, and then can either spread Danish honey on top of that (left) or maybe you'd rather have some homemade jam made from the plum tree in the Koefoed's yard (right). Either way, your taste buds will be pleased. But I remember my first breakfast with the family, where they brought back some fresh baked buns and danishes from the bakery on a Sunday morning, and I saw them put cheese and then honey on top. I was a little bit squeemish of trying it myself, but then once I did, I've never looked back.


And then of course, there are the Danishes.  
There are stores full of delicious pastries on what seems like every street corner. And if its possible, they taste even better than they look. 

Witnessing these savory treats and wonderful cheeses have left me with a few lingering questions. How are all these Danes still in such good shape? The obesity rate in Denmark for adults is around 10%. Now let's compare this to the US, which is at 31%. What causes this huge divide? They eat pastries. They smother their dry rugbrød with butter. I've begun to realize that the answer is so tantilizingly simple, but something that is so essentially not culturally American. Here in Denmark, they savor. They'll eat a pastry once in a while, not every morning for breakfast. In America we are all about what you can grab on the go, what you can scarf down while you're driving from this place to that place. Eating is not its own activity, its combined with something else because that's what's most time efficient. But in Denmark, you sit down for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. You eat your sandwich with a knife and fork. And in the instance of one girl on the train the other day, you take THIRTY MINUTES to eat a granola bar. I thought I was going out of my mind. But somehow this girl literally took my half an hour train ride to eat one single meal bar. Haha, but I swear I've been up to more than just observing the eating habits of the Danes.  Just some food for thought. And my advice to you? Try to savor. Once you realize that the slowest you can eat a granola bar is 30 seconds versus 30 minutes, you've made the first step. You start to savor things that aren't even food. For me personally, you start to appreciate moments so much that you don't even want to take pictures, because what ruins a savory moment more effectively than taking out a camera to take a picture that can barely compare?

I'm leaving for my two week spring break tomorrow (!) and will be seeing some really amazing people around Europe. I'll be in Amsterdam visiting Lara for a week and then off to visit Laura Blue, Alexi, Jordan, and various Knoxies in Barcelona, I will sacrifice this savoring to take some good pictures to share with you guys. Hope all is well wherever you are.


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