Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
7
7
Places to Eat in . . . Copenhagen, Denmark
Long known as the “fun capital of Scandinavia,” Copenhagen has always been a
place where people take joy in food. But a culinary explosion in the past few years
has made dining out the hippest game in town, and the wave of new restaurants is
exciting architecturally as well as gastronomically.
Set in an antique, stone-sided warehouse in Christianshavn,
Noma
(Strand-
gade 93;
&
45/32/96-32-97;
www.noma.dk) champions the cuisine of the cold North
Atlantic (the name of the place is short for
nordatlantiskl mad,
or North Atlantic
food). Importing ultrafresh fish and shellfish three times a week from Greenland,
Iceland, and the Faroe Islands, they poach, grill, pickle, smoke, and even salt it
according to old Nordic traditions. Chef Rene Redzepi's French Laundry training
comes through in his lapidary plate presentations; having also spent time at El Bulli,
he's not above throwing in a little intensely flavored foam as well. Inside, Noma looks
spare and white as an Atlantic ice floe. In contrast, there's the warm-colored cozy
clutter of
MR
(5 Kultorvet,
&
45/33/91-09-49;
www.mr-restaurant.dk), named
after the initials of chef/owner Mads Reflund. He's been generating loads of buzz
with his ever-changing set menus (four or seven
courses), featuring dishes like scallops and duck tongue
with
cèpes
and onions, or langoustine in milk skin with
woodruff and elderberries. The French-inflected cook-
ing of Kristian Møller and Rune Jochumsen is anything
but simple, though the name of their minimalist chic
cafe translates to “basic formula”:
Formel B.
(Vesterbrogade 182,
&
45/33/25-10-66;
www.formel-
b.dk). They're fanatical about fresh ingredients—vege-
tables from a farm in Lammefjorden,
cèpes
and
chanterelles from their own mushroom grower, dairy
products from Grambogård—and they transform them
into seasonal menu items such as monkfish with lemon
chutney, glazed quail with chanterelles, or rack of veal
with foie gras and fresh cherries.
While venerable Michelin-starred places like Kong
Hans Kælder and Kommandanten still wow the expense-
account crowd, lately they've been getting competition
from a brash new rival,
The Paul
(Vesterbrogade 3;
&
54/33/75-07-75
), located in the greenhouselike Glas-
salen in the quaintly historic Tivoli Gardens amusement park. British-born chef Paul
Cunningham's sense of whimsy is expressed not only in the restaurant's quirky post-
modern decor but in the chatty, offbeat service here; seats at Cunningham's chef's
table (Denmark's first) are highly coveted. His exuberant mix of traditions and ingre-
dients yields dishes like a Bornholm free-range chicken served with a confit of veal
sweetbreads, or a baked turbot with smoked beef marrow, celeriac, and chives.
Noma's name derives from
nordatlantiskl mad,
Danish for
North Atlantic food.
