Lutefisk Pie

[Ducky]

We are hosting a dinner for some senior Norwegian oil executives next week. Discrete inquiries by my secretary have revealed that the Chairman's favouite dish is a Lutefisk Pie. Does anyone have any idea what this is? If so can you point me to a recipe?

[rlibkind]

Someone is pulling your leg. No Norwegian Norwegian eats lutefisk. Only Norwegian-Americans with a misplaced sense of taste.

[srhcb]

Lutefisk is to Norwegians as Haggis is to Scots.

Many feel ancestoral obligations to eat it, and even claim to like it, but nobody will ever believe them.

There are plenty of people of Norwegian descent here in MN. In fact, I'm related by marriage to several. I've eaten Lutefisk. With plenty of butter it's not too bad.

I've never heard of it made into pie though. I suspect said pie would contain potato and rutabega though, and would most likely be served with a white sauce.

SB (would serve the visitors steak .... or pizza)

[snowangel]

Steve is right. With butter, it's tolerable. With a mess of black pepper, it's slightly more tolerable. With a whole mess of sirichai sauce, well, it just sort of disintegrates into the sauce.

And, I would suspect, as Steve does, that if there is lutefisk pie, it involved a tuber or root crop and white sauce. But, no pepper. That's a serious spice to the Minnesota Norwegian's I know.

[srhcb]

And, I would suspect, as Steve does, that if there is lutefisk pie, it involved a tuber or root crop and white sauce.  But, no pepper.  That's a serious spice to the Minnesota Norwegian's I know.

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I almost hate to say it, but Lutefisk Pie, with root vegetables and a creamy white sauce might not be too bad? Maybe a Norski Pasty?

SB (perfect for "white food" devotees)

BTW: When I compared lutefisk to haggis, little did I suspect .... but Google turned up what's claimed to be an old MN poem of (understandably) unknown authorship:

"Ode To Lutefisk"

May be sung to the tune of "O tannenbaum" or "O Christmas Tree"

O Lutefisk... O Lutefisk... how fragrant your aroma

O Lutefisk... O Lutefisk... You put me in a coma.

You smell so strong ... you look like glue

You taste yust like an overshoe

But Lutefisk... come Sturday

I tink I'll eat you anyvay.

O Lutefisk... O Lutefisk... I put you by the door vay

I vanted you to ripen up... yust like they do in Norvay

A dog came by and sprinkled you... I hit him vid an army shoe

O lutefisk... now I suppose

I'll eat uoy as I hold my nose.

O Lutefisk... O Lutefisk... how vell i do remember

On Christmas eve how we'd receive... our big treat of December

It wasn't turkey or fried ham... it vasn't even pickled spam

My mudder knew dere vas no risk...

In serving buttered lutefisk.

O Lutefisk... O Lutefisk... now everyone discovers

Dat Lutefisk and lefse makes... Norvegians better lovers

Now all da vorld can have a ball... you're better dan dat Yeritol

O Lutefisk... vid brennevin

You make me feel like Errol Flynn.

[LB Howes]

Lutefisk is dried codfish which is soaked in lye. Before you eat it you must soak it in water for days to remove the lye.

Why not serve your Norwegian oil executive guests a meal consisting of the best seasonal and regional foods available rather than trying to duplicate something from Norway?

[schneich]

Lutefisk is dried codfish which is soaked in lye. Before you eat it you must soak it in water for days to remove the lye. 

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woudnt that treatment make it a kind of

semiliquid fishsoap

[eje]

You could probably do something with lutefisk like English Fish Pie or boxty and it wouldn't be too bad.

Though, why on earth anyone would choose to use lutefisk instead of regular dried cod or fresh cod, is beyond me.

I would try to get an independent confirmation. As others have noted, lutefisk tends to be more of a Norwegian-American immigrant "delicacy." Not something modern norwegians would choose to eat.

And, yes, I too, grew up in the midwest, and attended more lutefisk and lefse suppers than I care to remember. I don't remember my mom or grandma ever making it at home, though.

[mizducky]

Google turned up what's claimed to be an old MN poem of (understandably) unknown authorship:

"Ode To Lutefisk"

May be sung to the tune of "O tannenbaum" or "O Christmas Tree"

O Lutefisk... O Lutefisk... how fragrant your aroma

O Lutefisk... O Lutefisk... You put me in a coma ...

(etc. and so on and so forth)

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Bravo!

I have nothing substantive to add to this conversation, except to observe that I have eaten lutefisk and actually thought it was not half bad at all.

Oh, and then there's this bit of humor in the same vein as the above song--search on "lutefisk pie" to find the bit I mean (although the rest of the page is pretty droll as well).

[racheld]

Oh, Ducky, Dear,

That entire page was hilarious!!! Especially the amorous bull.

I will add a bit of a caveat: years ago, a dear friend had as a guest a young Japanese woman with whose Mother my friend had carried on a church PenPal correspondence for some thirty years. The daughter was to be in the USA on business, and her Mother had requested that she take a side trip to meet her only-by-mail friend.

SO. They were to be so busy with little outings and sightseeings, etc., that I invited the family and their guest to our home one evening. Then I somehow got it into my head that I needed to cook something Japanese. I checked out books from the library, I inquired of another local family, I read and perused and tried to think how I would find all those exotic ingredients.

So I just gave up and did a good old Southern Sunday Dinner, for an evening meal: Baked ham, green beans right out of the garden, with tiny pink pearls of new potatoes, coleslaw, devilled eggs, tomatoes still warm from the vine, Powderpuff Rolls and sweet tea, banana pudding and fresh peaches right off the trees in the yard. Good old Carb Central, but quite a number of typical Southern dishes. And I was, in essence and afterthought, offering a guest the best fruits of our labors, with the plants that produced them only a few yards from the table.

And the guest LOVED it. She ate and ate, marveling at the fresh juiciness of the tomatoes, and the perfect baby beans in their pot liquor. Then she said: "I'm so glad you did some typical American food---everyone else I've visited here cooked some kind of sukiyaki, to make me feel welcome, and I didn't think I'd ever get to eat any American food. This is wonderful."

I was glad that she felt that way, and in retrospect, felt a bit of relief in that I did not go bumbling about trying to make something she might find find familiar, yet regard as an amateur venture, much as if I'd been in her home, and she had whipped up one of those mushroom soup-bean casseroles. I look on that time as a moment that I escaped trying TOO HARD to do something unneeded in the first place.

Favorites are favorites, but it might be a particular recipe, or a particular cook making that dish so special to him...it's just that old thing about not serving your guests a dish you're making for the first time.

(All the above wordiness brought to you by my own absolute abhorrence of the horrid stuff--I watched Bourdain grimace down the rotted shark and thought, "I'll bet that tastes just like lutefisk!").

edited because I had forgotten the peaches---Aiko took a bite and looked up with tears in her eyes. After all the hustlebustle of cooking and arranging, how could I forget a reaction like that, from something so simple.

Edited April 4, 2006 by racheld (log)

[srhcb]

    Bravo!    

I have nothing substantive to add to this conversation, except to observe that I have eaten lutefisk and actually thought it was not half bad at all.

Oh, and then there's this bit of humor in the same vein as the above song--search on "lutefisk pie" to find the bit I mean.

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"Some citizens have expressed doubts about Rutabaga Lutefisk Pie, but Emilia Wanderlust-Philodendron, the Head Mistress of the lodge, told them to shut up."

In a prior post to this thread, Steve Baker suggested, half-seriously, "I suspect (lutefisk) pie would contain potato and rutabega."

Proving once again that great minds think alike?

SB (even if only one of them can spell)

[Grub]

Norwegians certainly do eat lutefisk, but it's a mixed bag -- people either love or hate it. I don't know if the split is 50-50, but there are enough lutefisk lovers for it to advertised in a big way when it traditionally starts being served in restaurants during the wintertime. I only ever tried it once (and perhaps it wasn't the best place to try it -- a workplace cafeteria), and as much as I love seafood -- even the pickled, sour herring, I really didn't like this stuff...

Lutefisk pie, I've never heard ot, but perhaps it is a regional dish -- most Christmas dishes tend to be.

If at all possible, I would check if this request is genuine, though. It could be that this guy is a huge lutefisk fan, but Norwegians have an enormous sense of humor -- sort of like an American visiting Norway, and his friends conning his hosts into taking him to McDonald's for dinner... Kinda like taking a Japanese visitor to the US to a sushi bar...

I've taken Norwegians out for dinner here, and they went straight for the big, oversized American steaks, commenting after the meal -- with heads nodding in approval -- that Americans really know food! Last thing they'd want, would be lutefisk.

[k43]

Not only Norwegians eat lutefisk. Swedish-Americans, especially in the Yupper Midwest, consume copious amounts of it. It was associated with church dinners in the fall and Christmas eve dinner in Minnesota where I grew up. I personally like it a lot when it's cooked right. But there is absolutely nothing in this world worse than badly cooked lutefisk.

Norwegian style is usually boiled and served with lots of drawn butter and rolled up in lefse -- wrap ala Viking.

Swedish style is served with white sauce instead of drawn butter and minus lefsa.

Because my family contained "mixed" marriages, we grew up eating it both ways.

Never, ever, ever heard of lutefisk pie and can't find any mention of it in a couple of sources I consulted.

However, I agree with the writers who say give these guys the best of your own regional cuisine. You get to show off your cooking.

Best,

Mary Vinquist

From Mary's husband:

Hickory dicory disk

I et some lutefisk

It first went down

And then came up.

Hickory dicory disk.

Mary's brother can't bear it, although he's Swedish on all sides. His motto is "I shall not let a lutefisk pass my lips, and lips that touch lutefisk shall never touch mine."

Edited April 4, 2006 by k43 (log)

[Bobby 2 Shakes]

Teach a man to fish

and he'll eat fish forever

but give him lutefisk

the next time might be never

[mizducky]

This topic is cracking me up so much, I was inspired to start this whole other topic on funny food songs.