A FOOD TRADITION

Sámi Cuisine

Sámi cuisine is an Indigenous circumpolar tradition practiced across Sápmi, including northern Finland, and organized around seasonal access to reindeer, freshwater and coastal fish, game, berries, herbs, and other wild foods. Characteristic methods include drying, smoking, salting, boiling, roasting, and cooking over open fire, reflecting mobile and seasonal foodways as well as contemporary household practice. Recognizable examples include suovas, lightly smoked reindeer meat, bidos, a reindeer stew, and gáhkku, a traditional flatbread. Sámi cuisines vary among communities and regions, and Finnish Sámi food should be presented as part of a wider transnational Indigenous culinary culture rather than as a uniquely Finnish invention.

Catalogue preview Cuisine connections may be unreviewed. Regional comparisons include their food references and do not establish the ingredients of a particular meal.