Spekesild (Norwegian for "salted herring") is Atlantic herring preserved using Edible salt.
Salt curing
The preservation takes place by the salt extracting water from the herring, and thus poorer growth conditions are created for
microbes.
[ Salting of fish in Norwegian]
Until the 1960s, herring was an important export item for
Norway, but the decline in the herring fisheries led to these exports stagnating sharply. In the 1990s, exports picked up somewhat, and
Russia,
Sweden and
Poland are important markets.
[ Spekesild at Store norske leksikon (in Norwegian)]
Desalination
The salted herring is soaked in freshwater for one and a half to two hours for desalination before eating.
Important food resource
In Norway, spekesild was for hundreds of years considered a poor man's diet that kept
hunger away. A traditional Norwegian dish with salted herring (spekesild) is along with boiled
, raw
,
dill, pickled
,
butter or crème fraîche and flatbrød.
[ Spekesild and potatoes food recipe in Norwegian][ Herring and Potatoes (Sild og Poteter) Authentic Norwegian Cooking, page 72-73]
