there's a saying in Dutch '‘Haring in ’t land, dokter aan de kant.’, meaning something like 'when the herrings are available, the doctor is not necessary.' literal translation would be 'herring in the country, doctor to the side.'

here's a herring stall in the 30's. 1933 to be precise. not much has changed since.

the new herring season started exactly 2 weeks ago. so far 14 herrings have slid down beautifully in fact, 4 has just slid down again beautifully this afternoon :P i'm going to make a big mosaic of all the herring piccies i've got up to now.

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edited to ask Saara...do Finns eat herrings in Finland? what do herrings there taste like? i've heard the Danish and Swedish versions are close to the fabulous NL maatjes

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Good food is the basis of a good existence. (by Someone)

Yes! They eat loads in various ways - pickled, salted, etc. I've eaten plenty of the Baltic herrings, but cooked. They're wonderful dipped in rye flour and fried.

It's one of the cheapest foods round the year and easy since they're filleted and packed in boxes and purchased frozen. Of course, when they're available fresh then those are preferable. It's rare to have a buffet without a cooked herring dish and there's always salted/pickled herrings.

thanks for the Finnish herring info! i've just read about it in my new herring book in Dutch. it's great! well we have one more thing in common then!

there are quite a few recipes for herrings in the book and i'm going to try making them sometimes in the future. i personally prefer it the Dutch way, with raw sweet onions and perhaps some gherkins. any other ways, German and/or Scandinavian, are most likely unknown in NL. we prefer it pure

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fun info: eating herrings Amsterdam style: cut up in bite size chunks and eat with a toothpick. chopped onions and a couple of gherkin slices. elsewhere they just lift the beast by the tail, dip into chopped onions, tilt head, mouth open wide and let it glide down. delicious! [mind you, many Dutchies hate herrings! don't think they all love it when you think of NL ]