We at My Little Norway wish all our readers a Happy New Year!

Decorating the whole house for Christmas is a big tradition in Norway.  It is certainly worth all the fuss as it not only creates a great atmosphere but your work will be up during the whole Christmas season – from December til mid-January.  (That’s better than displaying your artwork at most galleries!)  No table is [...]

Kransekake is a cake made from almonds, icing sugar and egg whites. The dough is a little coarser than marzipan and sometimes has specs of almond skin as a ‘rustic’ feature.  The cake is often served at holiday celebrations like Christmas and for weddings.  Even though kransekaker is a ‘cake’ it is rather more like [...]

A Norwegian Christmas is filled with many celebrations and traditions, old and new. As the snow falls, the white landscape is the first sign of Christmas and Norway starts to prepare for their long season of juletid.
November
As the snow comes, Norway enters the Christmas season early with a series of Christmas parties. Work, clubs, schools [...]

Sometimes you don’t have the time to make a cake for every celebration in Norway, and there are many.  That’s okay as you can buy traditional fresh cakes from the store at the last minute.  (This is so you don’t have to store it for a whole day in the fridge at the risk of [...]

A Troika in Norway is a special chocolate bar – a layer of marzipan, a layer of chocolate truffle and a layer of raspberry jelly dipped in chocolate to hold it together.  It is very thin and compact similar in texture to a Cherry Ripe or a Wonka Bar.
As it’s my birthday we thought [...]

There is an opposition in everything. At the darkest time of the year, we celebrate Christmas. And at the exact opposite end, when the midnight sun is at its highest, we celebrate Midsummer.

Australians grow up with the idea that the great Aussie barbie is a true blue tradition that distinguishes us from the rest of the world.  We (used to) get a kick out of our Australian icon Paul Hogan (aka Crocodile Dundee) trying to teach the Americans how to put on a ‘real’ BBQ.

When I came [...]

The 17th of May – Norwegian Constitution Day – is celebrated all over Norway and around the world.  Tromsø puts on a grand event with ‘the people’ being the focus of the day.  Events happen from 7am in the morning with the flag raising and the laying of wreaths at particular memorial sites to commemorate [...]

The National Anthem of Norway, Ja, vi elsker dette landet (Yes, we love this country) was written by romantic nationalist poet Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, with the music composed by his cousin Rikard Nordraak. Nordraak was only 21 when he composed the tune, and he died two years later from tuberculosis with some 40 works in his [...]