Name: Smørrebrød
Prep time: 25 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 35 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: Danish
Ingredients: 8 slices dense Danish rye bread (rugbrød); 120 g good salted butter, softened; 200 g pickled herring fillets; 1 small red onion, sliced thin; 2 tbsp capers; Fresh dill; 250 g cold-water prawns; 4 tbsp mayonnaise; 1 lemon; 1 handful dill; 200 g rare roast beef, sliced thin; 4 tbsp remoulade; 2 tbsp crispy fried onions; 1 handful watercress; 4 eggs, boiled 8 minutes and sliced; 2 tomatoes, sliced; Chives and flaky salt

Smørrebrød

Dense rye bread, buttered to the edges, built up with one main topping and a short list of things that agree with it. Eaten with a knife and fork.

35 min total Serves 4 servings Easy

Smørrebrød, in preparation
Photograph credit: Smørrebrød (Vester Voldgade) by Orf3us · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

How to Cook Smørrebrød

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Take the butter out an hour ahead. It must be soft enough to spread without tearing the rye.
Boil the eggs 8 minutes, cool in iced water, peel and slice with a wet knife.
Soak the sliced red onion in cold water 10 minutes, then drain.
Butter every slice of rye right to the edges and corners. This is the step that makes it work.
For the herring, lay the fillets across the bread, then scatter red onion, capers and dill.
For the prawn, mix the prawns with the mayonnaise and a squeeze of lemon, pile them high, and top with dill and a lemon wedge.
For the roast beef, drape the slices in loose folds, spoon remoulade along the middle, and finish with fried onions and watercress.
For the egg, shingle the egg and tomato slices, season with flaky salt, and scatter with chives.
Serve on a board with a knife and fork each, and cold beer with a shot of aquavit.

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Things to Watch For

Butter to the very edge. Nothing else keeps the rye from going soft.
One idea per slice. Two competing toppings make a mess, not a smørrebrød.
Build them within half an hour of eating.

Good to Know About Smørrebrød

Butter spread right to the edges is structural rather than decorative — it waterproofs the rye against wet toppings, which is why a smørrebrød holds together for the twenty minutes it takes to eat. Each one is built around a single idea, and the garnishes are there to sharpen it, not to add a second idea.

To Go With It

A cold pilsner and a shot of aquavit · Pickled cucumber salad · Strong coffee afterwards

Leftovers

Assemble to order. Prepped components keep 2 days refrigerated.

The Numbers per Serving

No nutrition figures are given for this recipe: they cannot be worked out reliably from its ingredient list (some ingredient lines cannot be read). Why some recipes have none.

No Added Sugar