Greenlandic cuisine is traditionally based on meat from marine mammals, birds, and fish, and normally contains high levels of protein. Since colonization and the arrival of international trade, the cuisine has been increasingly influenced by Danish, British, American and Canadian cuisine. [1] During the summer when the weather is milder, meals are often eaten outdoors. [2]
The national dish of Greenland is suaasat , a traditional Greenlandic soup. [3] It is often made from seal, or from whale, reindeer, or seabirds. The soup often includes onions and potatoes, and is simply seasoned with salt and pepper, or bay leaf. The soup is often thickened with rice, or by soaking barley in the water overnight so that the starches leach into the water. It is also a traditional Inuit food. [4]
Because the majority of Greenland is covered by permanent glaciers, the sea is the source for most food. [5] Seafood dishes include various fishes (often smoked), mussels, and shrimp. Ammassat or capelin is commonly eaten [2] and can easily be dried. Atlantic halibut, redfish, deepwater redfish, Greenland halibut, and lumpfish are fished from the west coast, as are Greenland cod (Gadus ogac) and shorthorn sculpin (Myoxocephalus scorpius), but these two are eaten only as a last resort. [6] Arctic char is fished off the east coast. The Greenland shark (Somniosus microcephalus) is rarely eaten because it is poisonous but can be edible after a complicated preparation [7] of either boiling the meat repeatedly or fermenting the meat.
Global warming has shifted the migration of Atlantic cod, allowing for commercial fishing off Greenland's east coast. Drift ice can create problems during fishing season. [8] There are a couple of large-scale fish and shrimp processing factories in Greenland. [9]
Sea mammals provide important staples to Greenlandic diets. A traditional Inuit specialty is mattak , a Greenlandic term for the raw hide of narwhal or white whale. Mattak can be prepared with blubber, and occasionally dried reindeer meat. When eaten raw, mattak is an important source of vitamin C. [10] Hunting hooded seals were traditionally an important annual social event as well as subsistence activity, which included men, women, and children. [8] Also popular is arfivik, or bowhead whale, smoked whale meat served with onions and potato. Dried cod and whale with whale blubber is a popular lunch and snack food. [2] Bearded and ringed seals are hunted year round, especially by Polar Inuit, while narwhals and white whales are hunted during the summer. [10] Subsistence whale hunting by indigenous peoples is legal, but some animal rights organizations are concerned about commercial whale hunting in Greenland, with one company, Arctic Green Food freezing and distributing a quarter of Greenland's whale meat. [11]
Land-based dishes include reindeer, lamb, mutton, and musk-ox, which can be served tartare. [12] Sheep farming and cattle ranching were introduced to Greenland by the Norse. [5] Reindeer are hunted in the fall, foxes and hares year round, musk-oxen in the spring, and polar bear are hunted in the spring and fall. [10] Meats can be boiled, dried, frozen, fermented, or occasionally eaten raw. Reindeer livers are consumed raw, immediately after the hunt. [10]
There are 21 species of birds that legally can be hunted in Greenland, although there are various restrictions (region, period, numbers or method) for several of them. [13] Spring to fall is the primary season for hunting birds. Among others, the Greenlandic Inuit hunt dovekie, common and king eider, ptarmigan, thick-billed murre, and a variety of sea gulls. [10] Additionally, kittiwake and ptarmigan are hunted on the east coast. [7] Sometimes wild eggs are gathered by hunters. [6]
Blueberries and crowberries (Empetrum nigrum), harvested in the autumn, often garnish cakes and other desserts. [2] Berry compotes accompany meat dishes. [12] Seaweed is stored as a reserve food for winter. [6] During the summer, roseroot ( Sedum rosea ), fireweed ( Epilobium ) leaves, and Greenland lousewort (Pedicularis groenlandica) are gathered. [7] Green vegetables are scarce but global climate change has slightly extended the growing season, so Greenlandic farmers are experimenting with new crops, such as broccoli. [12] Rice and potatoes are common starches in meals. Onions are commonly found in meals.
Greenlandic coffee is a popular after-dinner drink. It typically features hot coffee, whiskey, Kahlúa, Grand Marnier, and whipped cream. Served in a bordeaux glass, the coffee is set on fire before drinking. [14]
Ice beer, that features 2000-year-old natural Arctic ice harvested from glaciers, was pioneered by the Greenland Brewhouse in Narsaq. [15] Currently, the Godthaab Bryghus, in Nuuk, [16] and Icefiord Bryghus, in Ilulissat, [17] brew with glacial water. Both crowberries and angelica are brewed into ales at the Icefiord Brewery. [12]
Until 1954, alcohol sales were heavily restricted in Greenland, so homebrewing is widely popular. [18]
Animal foods comprised most of the Greenland Inuit diet until around 1980 (and still do today in some regions), but grocery stores now provide coffee, tea, biscuits, potato chips, and other foods. [10] Depending on location, the diversity of fresh fruit and vegetables varies greatly during the year. In the capital Nuuk, the diversity is considerably higher and more consistent year-round than in smaller, more isolated places further north. In more isolated regions, supplies depend on ice cover and can typically be delivered by ship during the summer (approximately May through November, but varies depending on exact location) where the diversity is mostly better than in the winter period, where vegetables and fruit only can be delivered by plane.
Eskimo is an exonym used to refer to two closely related Indigenous peoples: the Inuit and the Yupik of eastern Siberia and Alaska. A related third group, the Aleut, which inhabit the Aleutian Islands, are generally excluded from the definition of Eskimo. The three groups share a relatively recent common ancestor, and speak related languages belonging to the Eskaleut language family.
Swedish cuisine is the traditional food of Sweden. Due to Sweden's large north-to-south expanse, there are regional differences between the cuisine of North and South Sweden.
Finnish cuisine is notable for generally combining traditional country fare and haute cuisine with contemporary continental-style cooking. Fish and meat play a prominent role in traditional Finnish dishes in some parts of the country, while the dishes elsewhere have traditionally included various vegetables and mushrooms. Evacuees from Karelia contributed to foods in other parts of Finland in the aftermath of the Continuation War.
The culture of Greenland has much in common with Greenlandic Inuit tradition, as the majority of people are descended from Inuit. Many people still go ice fishing and there are annual dog-sled races in which everyone with a team participates.
Norwegian cuisine in its traditional form is based largely on the raw materials readily available in Norway and its mountains, wilderness, and coast. It differs in many respects from continental cuisine through the stronger focus on game and fish. Many of the traditional dishes are the result of using conserved materials, necessary because of the long winters.
Indigenous cuisine of the Americas includes all cuisines and food practices of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. Contemporary Native peoples retain a varied culture of traditional foods, along with the addition of some post-contact foods that have become customary and even iconic of present-day Indigenous American social gatherings. Foods like cornbread, turkey, cranberry, blueberry, hominy and mush have been adopted into the cuisine of the broader United States population from Native American cultures.
Muktuk is a traditional food of the peoples of the Arctic, consisting of whale skin and blubber. It is most often made from the bowhead whale, although the beluga and the narwhal are also used. It is usually consumed raw, but can also be eaten frozen, cooked, or pickled.
Reindeer hunting in Greenland is of great importance to the Greenlandic Inuit and sports hunters, both residents and tourists. Reindeer (caribou) are an important source of meat, and harvesting them has always played an important role in the history, culture, and traditions of the Greenlandic Inuit. Controlled hunting is important for the welfare of reindeer, the quality of life for Inuit, both as food, and part of the their culture and Greenlandic culture in general, and the preservation of tundra grazing areas. Therefore, scientific research is regularly performed to determine the quotas needed to maintain a proper ecological balance.
In Greenlandic Inuit religion, a tupilaq was an avenging monster fabricated by a practitioner of witchcraft or shamanism by using various objects such as animal parts and even parts taken from the corpses of children. The creature was given life by ritualistic chants. It was then placed into the sea to seek and destroy a specific enemy.
Inuit are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwest Territories, and Alaska. Inuit languages are part of the Eskimo–Aleut languages, also known as Inuit-Yupik-Unangan, and also as Eskaleut. Inuit Sign Language is a critically endangered language isolate used in Nunavut.
Although the bulk of its area is covered by ice caps inhospitable to most forms of life, Greenland's terrain and waters support a wide variety of plant and animal species. The northeastern part of the island is the world's largest national park. The flora and fauna of Greenland are strongly susceptible to changes associated with climate change.
Historically Inuit cuisine, which is taken here to include Greenlandic cuisine, Yup'ik cuisine and Aleut cuisine, consisted of a diet of animal source foods that were fished, hunted, and gathered locally.
Whale meat, broadly speaking, may include all cetaceans and all parts of the animal: muscle (meat), organs (offal), skin (muktuk), and fat (blubber). There is relatively little demand for whale meat, compared to farmed livestock. Commercial whaling, which has faced opposition for decades, continues today in very few countries, despite whale meat being eaten across Western Europe and colonial America previously. However, in areas where dolphin drive hunting and aboriginal whaling exist, marine mammals are eaten locally as part of a subsistence economy: the Faroe Islands, the circumpolar Arctic, other indigenous peoples of the United States, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, some of villages in Indonesia and in certain South Pacific islands.
Greenlanders are people identified with Greenland or the indigenous people, the Greenlandic Inuit. This connection may be residential, legal, historical, or cultural. For most Greenlanders, many of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being Greenlandic. However, the term can in different contexts be delimited more precisely in different ways: as the inhabitants of Greenland, as nationals of Greenland or more broadly as persons who feel a cultural affiliation in a broad sense to Greenland. More controversial is a more recent use of the word in the sense persons of Greenlandic origin, i.e. persons whose parents were born in Greenland.
Important parts of Faroese cuisine are lamb and also fish owing to proximity to the sea. Traditional foods from the Faroe Islands include skerpikjøt, seafood, whale meat, blubber, garnatálg, Faroese puffins, potatoes, and few fresh vegetables.
Greenland Brewhouse was Greenland's first brewery. It was located in Narsaq in Southern Greenland and was founded in December 2004. The beer was brewed from water derived from melted icebergs. Melt water was collected from icebergs and transported to the brewery by local fishermen on their fishing boats. Greenland Brewhouse pioneered 'ice beer', brewed from 2000-year-old natural Arctic ice harvested from glaciers.
Marine mammals are a food source in many countries around the world. Historically, they were hunted by coastal people, and in the case of aboriginal whaling, still are. This sort of subsistence hunting was on a small scale and produced only localised effects. Dolphin drive hunting continues in this vein, from the South Pacific to the North Atlantic. The commercial whaling industry and the maritime fur trade, which had devastating effects on marine mammal populations, did not focus on the animals as food, but for other resources, namely whale oil and seal fur.
Yup'ik cuisine refers to the Eskimo style traditional subsistence food and cuisine of the Yup'ik people from the western and southwestern Alaska. Also known as Cup'ik cuisine for the Chevak Cup'ik dialect speaking Eskimos of Chevak and Cup'ig cuisine for the Nunivak Cup'ig dialect speaking Eskimos of Nunivak Island. This cuisine is traditionally based on meat from fish, birds, sea and land mammals, and normally contains high levels of protein. Subsistence foods are generally considered by many to be nutritionally superior superfoods. Yup’ik diet is different from Alaskan Inupiat, Canadian Inuit, and Greenlandic diets. Fish as food are primary food for Yup'ik Eskimos. Both food and fish called neqa in Yup'ik. Food preparation techniques are fermentation and cooking, also uncooked raw. Cooking methods are baking, roasting, barbecuing, frying, smoking, boiling, and steaming. Food preservation methods are mostly drying and less often frozen. Dried fish is usually eaten with seal oil. The ulu or fan-shaped knife used for cutting up fish, meat, food, and such.
Chukchi cuisine refers to subsistence foods and their methods of preparation used by the Chukchi people, one of the indigenous peoples of Siberia.
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