January 9th – Leif Erikson Day

Ah, now we come to a day I was looking forward to for personal reasons, Leif Erikson Day.  It honors Leif Erikson, a Norse explorer who is said to be one of the first Europeans to set foot in North America (screw you, Columbus!). The date has nothing to do with Erikson’s life, but instead was chosen because a ship carrying Norwegian immigrants docked in New York Harbor on October 9^th, 1825.  This marked the beginning of large scale, organized immigration from Norway to the United States.

The day commemorates Erikson’s achievements, and by extension, the contribution of Norwegians to the United States.  It is celebrated mostly in the upper Midwest and Great Lakes regions, where a large population of Norwegians settled upon coming to America.

If the name “Lars” didn’t clue you in, I am of Norwegian descent.  I am named after my great-grandfather, Lars Horpedahl, who came to the United States in the early 1900’s to set up a new life for himself and to start a family.  He left the frozen country of Norway, bound for…the frozen state of Minnesota.  Apparently, he was a cold weather kind of guy.

He was also the kind of guy that typifies the industrious spirit that made this nation what it is today.  My great-grandfather was born on September 21, 1889 in Norway, and died on June 30, 1960 in Minnesota.  He spent his entire life working hard to provide his wife and their six children with an opportunity to seize the American Dream.  He was respected by his peers and his neighbors.  You couldn’t ask for a better namesake, and I hope that I can one day live up to his name.

Norwegian culture was important at my Grandma’s house growing up (Lars was her father, and had instilled in his family a deep sense of pride in heritage and hard work). I grew up eating lefse, which is a Norwegian flatbread made out of potatoes.  My brother and I would spread butter on it, sprinkle it with cinnamon and sugar, roll it up and devour it.  When times were tough (and we were lazy), we’d substitute flour tortillas to create the same effect.

We avoided lutefisk, which is also known as lye fish.  Yup, you read that correctly.  Lye.  Like the stuff that Brad Pitt pours on Ed Norton’s hand in Fight Club (I guess that Ed Norton technically pours it on himself, but you get the idea).  Here how its prepared…

Lutefisk is made from dried whitefish (normally cod) prepared with lye in a sequence of particular treatments. The first treatment is to soak the stockfish in cold water for five to six days (with the water changed daily). The saturated stockfish is then soaked in an unchanged solution of cold water and lye for an additional two days. The fish swells during this soaking, producing a jelly-like consistency. When this treatment is finished, the fish (saturated with lye) has a pH alue of 11–12 and is therefore poisonous. To make the fish edible, a final treatment of yet another four to six days of soaking in cold water (also changed daily) is needed. Eventually, the lutefisk is ready to be cooked.

In other words…woof.

So, instead of losing my lunch before I was actually able to eat it, I had to do some modification.  Today, I celebrated by having a (modified) Norwegian meal.  I made a smoke salmon sandwich with cream cheese and pickles, all of which are eaten quite often by Norwegians.  I also made a little modification to a celebrated, Scandinavian inspired candy:

They’re wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy better than the Swedish kind.