Dishes · A classic of Nordic and Baltic rye
Pickled herring
Salted herring fillets soaked, then kept in a sweet-sour pickle of vinegar, sugar, onion and whole spice.
What makes it pickled herring
- Herring, salted first, then soaked.
- A pickle of vinegar and sugar, sweet and sharp at once.
- Onion, allspice and bay; eaten cold.
Where it comes from
Herring shoaled in huge numbers in the Baltic and the North Sea, and salting it was a trade that helped make the Hanseatic towns rich. Salted, it kept through the winter; pickled in vinegar and sugar, it became the centre of the cold table.
Every Nordic Christmas and midsummer table has several kinds — in mustard sauce, with dill, in curry cream — eaten on rye bread or with boiled new potatoes, and a glass of something cold.
How it varies
- Senapssill
- In a sweet mustard sauce.
- Rollmops
- The northern German way — fillets rolled around onion and gherkin.
- Karrysild
- Danish, in a mild curry cream.
Be the first here
Start your own pickled herringNo one here has made pickled herring yet. Start it as v1, and every version after is an experiment the next cook can learn from.
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