Greenlandic Food

In Greenland, we normally catch out own food. Greenlandic food is from the ocean, where we catch everything from fish, seals, and whales to land, where we hunt reindeer, musk ox, and birds. We get provided with fresh animals to catch all year round, depending on the weather conditions.

You can catch food all year round, depending on the weather conditions, which is the dominating factor in Greenland. Due to unpredictable weather conditions, the Greenlandic people are very spontaneous and don’t make plans to fare out in the future. Some days you might be out all day, other days you can be trapped inside due to a snowstorm.

The picture above is taken one summer when we went fishing for Ammasette. In Danish, it’s called Lodder, and can be used for bait, when fishing for larger fish, or food for our dogs. We do keep a lot of them for ourselves as well since they taste delicious on the pan or in the oven.

It’s also possible to dry them and put them in the freezer, so you can eat them as a snack all year round. We normally eat them dried with appel and mattak (whale fat) and aromatic spice. Ammasette is filled with nutrients and vitamins.

It’s very normal to see fish and meat hanging outside of houses in Greenland. This is the drying process. We eat them all year round, as well does the dogsled dogs.

We have a very rich ocean life in Greenland. Crabs, shrimps, and oysters are very normal in Greenland and are a big part of the Greenlandic kitchen.

Not everyone catches their own food, and we don’t always serve Greenlandic food. A lot of our vegetables and other food sources are sent from Denmark in containerships.

We often eat traditional danish dishes as well. The man in the image above is my colleague Frederik, who went to Brættet to buy his lunch. Brættet is a place where you can buy fresh caught fish, seals, shrimps, and other Greenlandic food, from local fishermen.

Above you see dried fish, dried Ammasetter, dried whale meat, seal fat, blackberries, and Mattak, which is whale skin. This food is often served at Kaffemik, alongside a lot of other dishes, with coffee and cake.

We don’t only eat food that originated from Greenland. As mentioned before, we do get a lot of food shipped in from Denmark, and we also go to restaurants once in a while, just like other places in the world.

Here is my Nephew Diego and me at a cafe in Nuuk. He got waffles with ice creme and an ice blend, very delicious 🙂

Read our Ultimate Guide to Greenland, for more knowledge about our country.

Wanna catch your own meal, click here.

Read more travel blogs from Laali Berthelsen

Laali Berthelsen

Laali Berthelsen, 38 years Born and raised in Nuuk, Greenland Self-employed Working in the health and tourism industry. I´ve been working with tourism since 2008 in Greenland and abroad, as a tour leader, expedition guide, destination guide, VIP guide, etc. and have travelled for many years both for work and pleasure. I have also had many different projects, like: - Personal development courses for the youth and adults in Greenland (mostly for social damaged groups) - Health courses for companies and schools - Working as an consultant at The Sports Confederation of Greenland Following are my degrees: - 2009 Service economist, tourism as specialty - 2012 Fitness instructor - 2015 Personal trainer - 2016 Nutritionist - 2019 Positive psychology supervisor

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