Karen Blixen, Hot Dogs and Norddjurs

The Food Festival Aarhus will be held from September 2-4, and in this connection, The Green Museum's food historian Bettina Buhl has a busy - but extremely exciting - program about food and history.

The three days offer several exciting activities and presentations from the big culinary scene.

In addition to a guest visit on stage when Søren Gerriche has the floor; and an exciting lecture about how to work as a food historian. The two major events are the Hot Dog Championship in collaboration with restaurateur Kim Thygesen from Restaurant Den Gamle Stald, and a food history play in collaboration with actor Pierre Miehe-Renard, Norddjurs Municipality and Den Gamle Stald.

Karen Blixen and Norddjur's pantry

On Friday, September 2, the festivities will start with the food history play, where Pierre Miehe-Renard plays an aging Karen Blixen, looking back on the beautiful summers at Katholm Castle near Grenaa.

Something that really sticks in her memory is the delicate dishes and ingredients that she was allowed to enjoy on her visit to Katholm Castle.

And Pierre Miehe-Renard is looking forward to Friday's performance.

– I love challenges, and have almost never said no to a project, as long as it was serious, positive and nice to participate in. I have been on the sidelines since I was three years old. But this is the first time I have had the opportunity to play Karen Blixen. And I have really dug into the role and personality, and enjoy trying something new and a new role. I have no doubt that it will be a good and positive experience for all of us on Friday, says a smiling and optimistic Pierre Miehe-Renard.

The two menus that are created on stage are completely true to history. Food historian Bettina Buhl has been hunting through local history and has found the old menus from the summers of 1895 and 1896 from Katholm Castle – both the lunch and dinner menus. And to be as authentic as possible, only locally produced ingredients are used; exactly as was the case back in 1895.

The two dishes that are being created are exactly 127 years old to the day, as they are the two dishes that were served on September 2, 1895 at Katholm Castle.

Hot Dog Championship

On Sunday, the second major prestige project awaits – participation in the Danish Hot Dog Championship.

Here, The Green Museum and restaurant Den Gamle Stald are participating with a very exciting Hot Dog. Namely what could have been Denmark's oldest Hot Dog.

Because in close collaboration, food historian Bettina Buhl, Kim Rosengreen from Bag & co. and Kim Thygesen, as well as head chef Martin Steentoft from the restaurant, have created a Hot Dog, which, based on raw materials and preparation, is a very exciting, and hopefully tasty, idea of what a 'Hot Dog' from Harald Bluetooth's time might have looked like - if the 'Hot Dog' had been invented back then.

– What we know about the raw materials from that time is that bread, for example, was baked using wild yeast, so of course we do that too, and we have chosen to use wild yeast from the elderberry. In addition, game meat was used, which is why our Hot Dog is of course based on red deer meat. Finally, a very special beer has also been created, based on the finds from the Viking castle Fyrkat; where it is prepared with, among other things, sage, says Bettina Buhl from The Green Museum.

The opportunity to play with old flavors and ways of cooking - but in a modern interpretation - is something that Kim Thygesen from Den Gamle Stald enjoys.

– The opportunity to participate in the Danish Hot Dog Championship is exciting in itself. But when we then go in and make a historical Hot Dog together with The Green Museum, where we can play with old techniques and ways of creating a menu, it hits my professional curiosity and joy of creation. So I am very much looking forward to presenting this Hot Dog to the judges, Kim Thygesen elaborates.

Very fitting for this Hot Dog, which is supposed to be Denmark's first of its kind, is that it has been named 'Harald Bluetooth in the Swamp'.