Think of a crepe or a soft tortilla, and you’ll have the idea

March 1, 2024 5:29 AM

Although lefse was available year-round in Norway, it is more often a holiday food in the U.S., served especially around Christmas. Want to know more about lefse? Life in Norway has you covered, as does Lefse Time.

Note that the author of the Library of Congress post linked ("The Potato Transformed: Norwegian Lefse") also wrote "Kebabs, Kabobs, Shish Kebabs, Shashlyk, and: Chislic?" That's relevant to recent "meat on a stick" interests around these parts.

posted by cupcakeninja (44 comments total)

As a Minnesotan, thank you. The great debate in our family at Christmas is: do you eat lefse with just butter, like a slice of bread, or do you add butter and a huge pile of sugar so that it crunches when you eat like God intended? If you eat leutefisk, you probably don't do the sugar, if you're ten years old, definitely sugar. I am 10 years old.
posted by AzraelBrown at 6:12 AM on March 1 [17 favorites]

Same, AzraelBrown! Usually brown sugar, which may be heresy to some, but as I am 10 years old, I don't know from heresy...
posted by cupcakeninja at 6:21 AM on March 1 [2 favorites]

The correct answer to the butter or sugar debate is neither. It is the Norwegian Burrito. Most of the parts of a Thanksgiving dinner - turkey, stuffing, potatoes, gravy, beans, and cranberries if you're adventurous - rolled up in lefse.

If it's good and fresh lefse you just plain eat it. I'm lucky to have several excellent lefse makers in my family so it's always fresh. There are several grocery stores around here with decent lefse but the one that makes the best lefse (and sandbakkels, krumkakke, and rosettes) right in the store is closing soon.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 6:35 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]

I am Norwegian, and the vast majority of lefse I've eaten is Vestlandslefsa. It is a small plastic pack with two lefser that are outweighed by the amount of butter and sugar spread on them. For sale in all gas stations and on all trains and ferries. They are what I think of as lefse, and they definitely crunch.

That being said, I've eaten way more of a thin, floppy, potato-based "lefse" that is clearly the best way to wrap a hot dog—and barely used for anything else—but that is called lompe.
posted by Spiegel at 6:41 AM on March 1 [6 favorites]

do you eat lefse with just butter, like a slice of bread, or do you add butter and a huge pile of sugar so that it crunches when you eat like God intended?

This is one of those rhetorical questions, right?
posted by chavenet at 7:16 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]

Sidenote: my wife, a woman from Wisconsin with a deep Germanic history, upon her first Christmas with my Scandinavian family, called them "potato tortillas" which is a lot of fun to say.

(On a sad note: the last grandparent of Scandinavian descent passed recently, and this will likely be the end of those traditional Christmas holidays. They were the last holdout that served lutefisk, made krumkakke and rosettes, and had to get Freddy's Lefse because no other compared.)
posted by AzraelBrown at 7:36 AM on March 1 [7 favorites]

Made these before. Maybe I'll have to make another batch to freeze now that we have a big freezer

Scandinavian cooking is rather fun
posted by AngelWuff at 7:45 AM on March 1 [2 favorites]

Flatbread, it's all lefse.

Although lefse was available year-round in Norway...

It still is! Such weird phrasing, as if Norway and its traditions no longer exist there.
posted by Dysk at 7:58 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]

I once had a chat with a Lutheran vicar who told me about the lefse his husband's family prepares every Christmas. I, in return, extolled the virtues of latkes. The butter/no butter/sugar and butter debate of his culture seems very akin to the applesauce/sour cream/both debate of mine.
posted by Faint of Butt at 8:12 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]

There's a norwegian food place in a tiny rural town near me that does real good lefse year round. Always grab a few when I'm passing through.
posted by Ferreous at 8:12 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]

wait, so it's just flat potatoes? how is this different from potato chips?
posted by Wolfdog at 8:23 AM on March 1

I thought it was spelled lefser?
posted by Snowishberlin at 8:34 AM on March 1

> I thought it was spelled lefser?

A lefse, the lefsa/lefsen, several lefser, all the lefsene. (Though Norwegian doesn't use as many prepositions. It's just "lefsa" or "lefsene" without any word for "the". Somebody that knows linguistics could say this so much more precisely).
posted by Spiegel at 8:47 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]

lefser is plural, lefse is just one. always eat them plural
posted by chavenet at 8:48 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]

AzraelBrown: do you eat lefse with just butter, like a slice of bread, or do you add butter and a huge pile of sugar so that it crunches when you eat like God intended?

Depends: are you out of sugar? (Growing up in MN, lefse was the great excuse to eat as much sugar/butter as possible.)

Wolfdog: wait, so it's just flat potatoes? how is this different from potato chips?

No, it's soft, rather like a flour tortilla.
posted by wenestvedt at 8:51 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]

My late aunt was born in Norway, and I remember krumkakke and rosettes at Christmas time. SO MUCH POWDERED SUGAR

My mom was very game to try cooking anything, but those rosette irons didn't get out much, considering how miserable it was to heat up all that oil, and make the batter, and then we would try to devour them as soon as they were ready and whine about burned mouths... I don't blame her!
posted by wenestvedt at 8:55 AM on March 1

I’m waiting for the follow-up post on lutefisk… it’s less of a food, more of a dare.
posted by nathan_teske at 9:00 AM on March 1 [6 favorites]

I think one of the reasons they only show up at Christmas in the US, is that they're kind of a pain to make. Cook the potatoes, mash or rice them, make the dough, cool overnight, roll them out, then cook them one by one at 500F. Also, the dough is rather fragile, so if you want nice thin ones, you have to be careful when rolling. Takes about two half days.

I've never tried doing it with instant potatoes, that might speed things up, but I don't know what it would do to texture and quality.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 9:03 AM on March 1 [2 favorites]

I still serve lefse (usually store-bought, rarely from-scratch) at Thanksgiving, which is our one big family get-together meal. Since it's Thanksgiving, my favorite treat is to roll up leftover turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and gravy in lefse and eat it like a burrito. But usually, I like it with butter, sugar, and either cinnamon or cardamom.

And I make krumkake (old stovetop iron!) for Christmas, with extra cardamom, 'cause that's how my great-grandmother used to make them.
posted by xedrik at 9:04 AM on March 1 [3 favorites]

I’m waiting for the follow-up post on lutefisk

If lutefisk is going to be mentioned, i have to share Clay Shirky's essay from the early days of the internet.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 9:09 AM on March 1 [2 favorites]

mmmm...carbs

(lovin' these food posts!)
posted by supermedusa at 9:22 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]

always eat them plural

This. And thanks for the clarification, both of you! We also make duflape (but that's not how you spell it, and for the life of me I can't figure out how) and I lovelovelove that.
posted by Snowishberlin at 9:37 AM on March 1 [2 favorites]

I’m waiting for the follow-up post on lutefisk

Flagged for offensive content and threats of chemical weapons.
posted by wenestvedt at 9:59 AM on March 1 [5 favorites]

Someone brought in a pack of Lefse to work and left it on the "free food table", and on trying it the guy of Mexican descent said he thought there was something wrong with those tortillas.

I had to explain that they were "northern European style" and mostly potato.
posted by ArgentCorvid at 10:03 AM on March 1 [5 favorites]

>It still is! Such weird phrasing, as if Norway and its traditions no longer exist there.

You can't step in the same river twice. The Norway of 1860 does not exist anymore. Norway 2024 carries on some versions of Norway 1860's traditions, but it's not an unchanged eternal place.
posted by Easy problem of consciousness at 10:05 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]

I’m waiting for the follow-up post on lutefisk

Flagged for offensive content and threats of chemical weapons.

Weapons of Norge Digestion
posted by chavenet at 10:12 AM on March 1 [3 favorites]

Isn't it good, Norwegian Food
posted by Daily Alice at 10:16 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]

For more good, if dated (or is it eternal?), humor that involves both lefse and lutefisk, I recommend Scandinavian Humor & Other Myths. Long ago it was my first serious introduction to ethnic humor & popular ethnography, and I'm still fond of it.
posted by cupcakeninja at 10:17 AM on March 1 [2 favorites]

Norwegian here. There's also local variations. My ex's grandmother did a southwestern variant with potatoes (though it's not lompe but I'm at a loss to explain why) and they were extremely delicious hot off the stove. In the valley I live the most common variant is called kling and contain a bit of semolina, and elsewhere in Norway they are called lems or klenning.

Any supermarket will have around four different variant mass-produced wrapped in plastic, so it's very much a living tradition. Farmer's markets will usually have some homemade for sale, fresh or frozen.
posted by Harald74 at 10:21 AM on March 1 [3 favorites]

My mom was very game to try cooking anything, but those rosette irons didn't get out much, considering how miserable it was to heat up all that oil, and make the batter, and then we would try to devour them as soon as they were ready and whine about burned mouths... I don't blame her!

My mom makes rosettes for Christmas. Lots of flower and snowflake-shaped rosettes, but the true prize is the pig-shaped rosettes, because those are very tough to get off the iron intact. Each family member gets one pig rosette per year.

I think one of the reasons they only show up at Christmas in the US, is that they're kind of a pain to make. Cook the potatoes, mash or rice them, make the dough, cool overnight, roll them out, then cook them one by one at 500F. Also, the dough is rather fragile, so if you want nice thin ones, you have to be careful when rolling. Takes about two half days.

It also helps to make them at Christmas or other big family holidays because you can tag team the second half day, with one person rolling and one person cooking/folding, and you can swap out when you get tired/bored.
posted by bassooner at 10:39 AM on March 1 [2 favorites]

"As a Minnesotan..."
With the exception that I don't know AzraelBrown, I have verified with a Minnesotan everything in this comment is factual. :)
posted by rubatan at 10:43 AM on March 1 [4 favorites]

In a move to offend both norwegians and italians I use a krumkake iron to make pizzelles which I then roll into tubes and fill with cannoli filling.
posted by Ferreous at 10:48 AM on March 1 [7 favorites]

imnotevenmad.gif
posted by Harald74 at 10:56 AM on March 1 [1 favorite]

one pig rosette per year

oh thank you but I had mine in hot dog
posted by away for regrooving at 11:00 AM on March 1

I can't remember if I ever actually had lutefisk, because my memory of a sort of fish jelly does not at all jibe with Shirky's experience. I do remember that there's a long shaggy-dog Minnesotan-Norwegian story about how lutefisk was actually invented by the Irish as a plot to kill off the Norwegians that backfired. Now, lefse, I do remember, and I could eat that all day.
posted by Halloween Jack at 11:34 AM on March 1

You can't step in the same river twice. The Norway of 1860 does not exist anymore. Norway 2024 carries on some versions of Norway 1860's traditions, but it's not an unchanged eternal place.

But lefser are still available year round. The very thing he references isn't a 'was' thing.
posted by Dysk at 1:09 PM on March 1

A lefse, the lefsa/lefsen, several lefser, all the lefsene. (Though Norwegian doesn't use as many prepositions. It's just "lefsa" or "lefsene" without any word for "the". Somebody that knows linguistics could say this so much more precisely).

Speaking with the authority of someone who has learned a bit on Duolingo, Norwegian doesn't have an equivalent of English "the", i.e., a standalone definite article. Instead, noun endings are used to convey the same meaning. It's less confusing to first give an example using a common English word: "a chair", "the chair", "chairs", "the chairs" become "en stol", "stolen", "stoler", "stolene" in Norwegian. We can do the same with "lefse", keeping in mind that the first set of words is using "lefse" and "lefser" as words that are borrowed into English: "a lefse", "the lefse", "lefser", "the lefser" would be English equivalents of "en lefse", "lefsen", "lefser", "lefsene".

Although based on what Spiegel is saying, it sounds like maybe the Norwegian "en" is not used exactly the same or as often as the English "a".
posted by jomato at 2:03 PM on March 1

As a Scandinavian-American, the ONLY option in my family was a coating of butter and then sugar. The controversy was solely if one used white or brown sugar. This is the way.
posted by Ber at 2:45 PM on March 1 [1 favorite]

My Norwegian great grandmother's recipe was passed down to me as follows. Gather 1 more egg than the total number of people to be fed. Put the eggs in a bowl and stir in flour a little bit at a time until you have formed a paste. Gradually add milk while stirring and dissolve the paste until you have a not too runny batter. Heat up a cast iron frying pan and melt butter once it is sizzling hot. Then pour in enough batter to cover the pan to an appropriate depth. Wait until it dries out on top and then flip to cook it evenly (this will take some practice to get the thickness and timing/temperature correct). Use whatever toppings you think you would enjoy. Butter and sugar have always been a personal favorite.
posted by interogative mood at 8:19 PM on March 1

Wait, isn't that the recipe for crépes??
posted by wenestvedt at 8:21 PM on March 1

Vikings conquered France so it’s the other way around.
posted by interogative mood at 7:07 AM on March 2 [1 favorite]

Another Minnesotan here! My mom's family is primarily Norwegian, and we always used to have (store-bought) lefse with Christmas Eve dinner. Every time he took a piece, my uncle would sing the first line of "Just a Little Lefse," complete with funny accent, which always made me laugh as a kid. My mom and her brothers would also make a lefse burrito with the rest of their dinner (usually pork roast, mashed potatoes, etc.), but they called it something that sounds like "lefse boose." I have no idea where that came from.

Fun fact, there is (or at least used to be) a lefse stand in the food building at the Minnesota State Fair.
posted by leftover_scrabble_rack at 2:11 PM on March 2 [2 favorites]

Huh! We used a word like that, too, when I was growing up—the “boose” (sp?), which I’ve never seen written down. It usually meant the tail end of a container of food—the dregs. I thought it was maybe a made-up word in our family. Mrs. cupcakeninja, to whom I just mentioned this, suggested it might have derived from “caboose.”
posted by cupcakeninja at 2:41 PM on March 2 [1 favorite]

I think you could usefully mash up "lefse" and "Zamboni" here...
posted by wenestvedt at 6:34 AM on March 4