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DISCOVER NORWAY

Where are Norway’s Michelin star restaurants?

Norway is home to six new Michelin-starred restaurants following the publication of the Nordic Countries Guide for 2023. These are all the Norwegian restaurants to receive a star in the Michelin Guide. 

Published: 6 July 2022 13:06 CEST
Updated: 13 June 2023 10:38 CEST
Seafood dish
Norway's culinary scene has garnered international acclaim in recent years, as affirmed by the 2023 Michelin Nordic Countries Guide. Photo by Anima Visual on Unsplash

Six new Norwegian restaurants received Michelin stars when the Nordic Countries Guide for 2023 was published last week: À l’aise, Sabi Omakase Oslo, Mon Oncle, Stallen, SAVAGE, and K2.

Scandinavia’s cooking elite gathered in Turku, Finland, to award this year’s stars and individual honours for chefs in the Nordics. 

Five of the new stars awarded were given to restaurants in Oslo, while the other star was given to an eatery in Stavanger. 

Six new restaurants awarded one Michelin star

À L’aise in Oslo, a long-time contender for a star, has been recognised for its “use of Norwegian produce to create sumptuous French dishes,” according to the Michelin Guide.

Located in Oslo’s Universitetsgata, Mon Oncle’s inclusion in this year’s Michelin Guide didn’t come as a major surprise. After all, the eatery is run by the restaurant manager of the three-star Michelin restaurant Maaemo, Esben Bang Holmboe. The Guide lauded Mon Oncle’s “classic Gallic cuisine prepared with great care,” as well as its “impressive wine list.”

Sabi Omakase Oslo, sister to the original in Stavanger (which already boasts one star), has also been recognised in the latest edition of the Nordics Guide. While the counter at the restaurant only seats 12 people, Michelin praised Sabi Omakase Oslo for its “traditional sushi skills.”

The SAVAGE team received its first star, impressing Michelin with a “menu blending flavours from around the world.” 

Sebastian Myhre, the owner and executive chef at Oslo’s Stallen, is a great believer in sustainability. His team started cultivating produce for their own use in 2017 – two years before Stallen was launched. It is precisely this focus on local produce – as well as Stallen’s surprise menu – that caught the eye of Michelin reviewers. 

Last but not least, the final restaurant to receive one star in 2023 is K2, based in Stavanger in southwestern Norway. Located in Pedersgata street, a popular Stavanger foodie hub, K2 impressed Michelin with its locally sourced produce, as well as its overall charm.

Many preserved their stars

Hot Shop, the bistro that got its Michelin start in 2022, is named after the former sex shop the building used to house. It’s located on Københavngata street in east Oslo. The canteen-style bistro serves tasting menus based on seasonal, local ingredients, which the 2022 Michelin Guide described as “elegant, vibrant and technically adept, with delicate touches and real depth of flavour”. 

Schlägergården in Lilleaker, on the eastern outskirts of Oslo, got to keep the one star it received last year. The restaurant is in a converted 18th-century farmhouse with a set menu consisting of local produce, some foraged, grown, or preserved by the eatery’s staff. In 2022, Michelin described the food there as “pure, expertly crafted dishes which have bold, emotive flavours”.

Over on Norway’s west coast, Lysverket in Bergen also retained its Michelin star. The eatery serves up creative, modern takes on Norwegian dishes accompanied by craft cocktails. The restaurant is housed in an art museum, with the menus showcasing “intelligently crafted, balanced dishes”. Bergen’s Bare, a high-end restaurant focusing on regional ingredients located in the city centre – conveniently close to the city’s Fish Market and Old Wharf – also got to keep its star.

The new Nordic cuisine behemoth Maaemo retained its three Michelin star status, while Re-naa kept its two stars.

Other Norwegian restaurants that upheld their one Michelin star in the 2023 edition of the Nordics Guide include Under (Lindesnes), Speilsalen (Trondheim), Credo (Trondheim), FAGN (Trondheim), Sabi Omakase (Stavanger), Statholdergaarden (Oslo), Kontrast (Oslo), and Hyde (Oslo), which all have one Michelin star.

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FOOD AND DRINK

How two women in Norway aim to bring seaweed to new heights in Europe

In the chilly waters of the Lofoten archipelago in northern Norway, two women want to bring the area's seaweed to fine dining tables across Norway and Europe.

Published: 23 April 2024 08:49 CEST
How two women in Norway aim to bring seaweed to new heights in Europe

In the glacial waters of the Lofoten archipelago in Norway’s far north, Angelita Eriksen uses a knife to cut a handful of seaweed that will soon end up in a fancy European eatery.

“We have the cleanest and clearest waters in the world. We’re very lucky that we have this really important resource growing right outside our doorstep,” Eriksen told AFP in a cabin on the shores of the northern Atlantic Ocean where the seaweed is laid out to dry.

“We want to show that to the world.”

The daughter of a Norwegian fisherman, Eriksen joined forces with New Zealand-born Tamara Singer, whose Japanese mother served seaweed with almost every meal, to start the company Lofoten Seaweed — specialising in harvesting and preparing seaweed for the food industry.

With the help of six others, they hand-pick 11 tonnes of seaweed a year, the snow-capped mountains plummeting into the sea behind them in a dramatic tableau.

It’s a demanding and “physical job”, said Eriksen.

The peak season runs from late April until June, but “we harvest the dulse, the nori and the sea truffle in the winter and fall”.

“It can be quite cold, as we can stay out for about an hour along the shore”, with lower legs and hands submerged in the chilly water.

By “late May, I’m actually sweating in my suit”.

Norwegian Co-Founder of "Lofoten Seaweed" Angelita Eriksen picks up Winged Kelp seaweeds in knee deep water.

Norwegian Co-Founder of “Lofoten Seaweed” Angelita Eriksen picks up Winged Kelp seaweeds. (Photo by Olivier Morin/ AFP)

One time, she said, “I took my glove off and the steam was just rising up”.

“It’s physically hard but at the same time it’s very meditative, or therapeutic in a way, to harvest,” she says.

‘Delicate’

Truffle seaweed, winged kelp, nori, dulse, sugar kelp, oarweed kelp: the pair focus on about 10 types of seaweed, long eaten in Japan and increasingly popular in Europe for their nutritional qualities.

The seaweed is sold locally or shipped to gourmet restaurants in Norway and the rest of Europe.

The two women organise workshops to teach chefs about the different varieties and the qualities of each type.

“Seaweeds are like vegetables, they have their own texture, taste and colours,” says Singer.

She said it was a “huge surprise” how many European chefs had little or no knowledge of the different flavours and ways of preparing seaweed.

The duo have worked with Japanese chefs “who know exactly what to do, you don’t have to tell them anything”.

“It’s just so natural for them. It’s like giving a piece of fish to a North Norwegian,” says Singer.

Some 20 kilometres (12 miles) away, chef Josh Wing has been serving the pair’s products in his high-end restaurant Hattvika Lodge for about five years.

He is well versed and does not need to take part in their workshops anymore.

Wing is particularly fond of the dulse, a “very delicate purple seaweed”, which he serves with local fish dishes or bread.

It “can provide a physical texture in a dish that you can’t get from other products”, he tells AFP.

US Chef Josh Haner prepares a dish based on seaweed condiments, surrounded by algae containers. (Photo by Olivier Morin/ AFP)

To ensure that their business is sustainable, Eriksen and Singer have mapped and dated their harvest sites, as well as the volumes of each species, for the past four years.

“Our results show that the regrowth in recently-harvested patches is actually faster than anticipated, almost as if a harvest actually stimulates growth,” says Singer.

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