We try LOCAL FOOD and SAUNA in HELSINKI... First impressions of FINLAND (reaching our 50th COUNTRY)
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- Опубликовано: 3 окт 2024
- We’ve made it halfway through our goal of visiting 100 countries! Country 50 is Finland and we start off in Helsinki. We’ve heard Finland is the happiest place in the world so we were excited to explore its capital to find out why this is? In this vlog we taste the local food, take part in a big part of Finnish culture and venture to an old fortress just off the coast of Helsinki!
Hi! :) We are Ash and Dan, a Scottish couple who met because of our love to travel by working as Travel Agents. We are on a mission to visit 100 countries together. We took our first trip together in 2018 to the Faroe Islands - not usually on the list of first destinations as a couple but we won flights with work so that made the decision pretty easy. Ever since then we have been working and travelling using every single holiday day possible to reach our goal of seeing as much of the world as possible.
In January 2023 we did the millennial thing and quit our jobs, then headed to South America where we spent 5 months. We decided to document our travels on this trip as we want a place to come back and watch back our adventures. Hopefully you would like to see them too! :)
Follow us on our socials to see where this adventure takes us next!
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See you in the next episode!
#finland #finlandtravel #helsinki
Hope you enjoyed your trip. To enjoy karelian pastrys as finns do, they need to be warmed up and have good layer of butter-egg spread on top(butter and hard boiled eggs mixed together with some herbs). Usually tourists seem to eat karelian pastrys just as you did and it might be quite dry and tasteless and make you wonder what is so special in them 😊
Thank you for your comment! We had a great time in Helsinki 😁 also thanks for sharing how to eat the Karelian pastry properly, we had them warm a couple of times after this and they are super delicious but need to try the butter-egg spread in future!
To put it into perspective, Karelian pies as is are like a two, with butter it goes up to a six, and the butter-egg spread is a heavenly 110. Big recommendation, it's a must have. They are sold in most cafes but are also very inexpensive and simple to make, google egg butter or "munavoi" in finnish for a recipe. Here's a simplified version; Cut three hard-boiled eggs into small chunks. Mix into a 100g of room temperature butter. Add salt to taste and garnish with fresh parsley. Cheers from Finland!@@AshAndDan.
That sure does sound heavenly! Thanks again 😀
Yes,so sad they eat them just like that ...
Tippaleipä for 5€ was a robbery. But we don't usually have those at cafe's. We eat them at home or parties around May 1st celebrations.
Ha we did feel we got ripped off a bit but we do love trying some local food! Thanks for watching and hope you join us for more of our Finland videos!
No worries and thanks for getting back. They are usually paired with self-made mulled Pop named "sima" that we make from water, brown sugar, yeast and lemon juice and peels. It's usually non-alcoholic and adults and kids drink that on may day ("Vappu") and eat tippaleipä and donuts. It's a party for workers and students, and we usually gather in parks during the day on a chilly picnic, blasting music, grilling sausages, with our graduation caps on. :)
ah cool 😎 That sounds a lot of fun and Sima sounds delicious! In Aberdeen the city we are from they also celebrate May Day but usually consists of going into pubs and getting drunk. We prefer the sound of your Vappu!
@@AshAndDan. Well got to mention that in Finland May Day or Vappu is the most celebrated among university students and getting drunk is commonly included :D. Students drink both alcoholic beverages and sima at public parks. Families and older people bake tippaleipä (and even more often donuts) and celebrate in a more sophisticated way.
To be honest, the older peoples way with all the snacks sounds more appealing to us 😂
Quite an original choice to take the service ferry which is mainly used by the islands inhabitants to Suomenlinna compared to the main ferry which departs from the market square and is used by 99.9% of the tourists. But on the return trip you already had the more comfortable choice. :)
Thanks for watching and well spotted! The service ferry was closer to where we were staying so that’s why we went with that route. The ferry was very scenic from both locations!
It is true, we Finns love our rye bread! When I was in Tanzania as an exchange student, one of my highlights (aside from meeting my future wife!), was when my dad came to visit and he brought a bag full of goodies from Finland (my mom had prepared it, on my request) which included rye bread (dried version, lasts longer without cold storage), some cheese and french style salami with walnuts. I was so happy.
Oh wow! You must have been one of the only people in Tanzania with rye bread at that time 😂 we tried it and we did enjoy it 😀 thanks for watching and hope you enjoyed the video!
There is many public saunas in Helsinki. The one you went, is almost the fanciest one, but there is also a public sauna in apartment building. Many of the apartments have sauna. Or the apartment building itself have a sauna for the people living in those apartments.
As we travelled Finland we learnt more and more about the sauna culture. The Loyly one is very nice but very fancy as you said! We did try a few more standard saunas, one of our airbnb’s even had one!
It's great to see some fellow Scottish travellers in Helsinki 🙂You'd be surprised there is actually quite a number of us that live in Helsinki including myself. I hope you guys had a fantastic time in the city.
Oh I never knew Helsinki had a few Scottish expats! I know there will be a few Scots there tonight as Aberdeen are playing HJK! Absolutely loved Helsinki and pretty jealous you get to call it home! Hope you enjoyed the video 👍
Not the plain cold karelian pie 😭😭😭💔💔💔 excellent video though, lovely to see especially in these cold months!
Haha, we will eat the Karelian pie properly next time 😂 we must’ve looked a bit silly eating it on the street cold and straight out of the bag ha! Thanks for watching and glad you enjoyed the video 😀
We hope you enjoyed our food tour around Helsinki! The Sauna we visited is called Löyly and we would 100% recommend a visit if you are in Helsinki, such an amazing way to relax and experience the Finnish sauna tradition.
Sauna is pronounced like saw (the mother pig) -na. You say "soona".
Salmon soup never fails to impress foreigners. It is so simple, just few ingredients and it doesn't look anything special. But.. it is just so lovely, specially in the winter. Creamy, salty with bits of salmon... Also, 5€ for tippaleipä is robbery.
It was incredibly tasty! We have a similar fish soup back home called ‘Cullen skink’ but the salmon soup in Helsinki was even better! The tippaleipa was a let down though and the price was very high! Thanks for watching and hope you enjoyed the video!
@@AshAndDan.You need to try Kesäkeitto as well. It literally means ”summer soup”. It also looks very simple vegetable dish but it’s very good. Finnish food is known to be simple but also nutrious because back in a day you had to feed 6 to 10 children with all ingredients you had at hand.
The Finnish food was excellent and felt very nutritious!
With karjalanpiirakka you should try spread made of butter and hard boiled eggs (munavoi). Its so good!
Thanks! Yes definitely next time we get the chance to try them when we are back in Finland we will do this! 😄 sounds yummy 😋
You can eat Karelian pies with hard boiled egg and butter. You just mash them together with a fork and spread on top. It's the traditional way and very tasty. Makes a great breakfast or snack.
Definitely going back to try this! Sounds amazing 😀
Thanks for watching and hope you enjoyed the video 👍
10:35 That's really grand. :)
11:52 Scotland and Finland do remind each other in some ways.
13:06 Lol...
I agree, Scotland + Finland do share some similarities! Haha glad someone laughs at my jokes 😂
Nice video Ash and Dan. Helsinki looks great
Thank you so much! Hope you join us for our next adventures 😀
I was happy to see that you had good time in our capital. In summer it's of course much nicer but your timing was quite good in that way that you saw the autumn colors on the trees that hadn't dopped their leaves yet. What were the dates you recorded this? I guess several weeks ago?
Thanks for your comment! We loved seeing the Autumn colours especially on Suomenlinna, it was so beautiful. Imagine it would be lovely in summer also. We were there about 3 weeks ago 😊
@@AshAndDan. Nice. Now I'm waiting for to see what activities you will have in Lapland :)
it should be eaten warm topped off with plenty of egg butter. homemade, straight from the oven, brushed over with melted butter, they are also delicious for breakfast.
They definitely sound more delicious this way instead of how we ate them! Will do this next time, thanks for your comment!
the tippaleipä is really a once a yea+r thing on may 1st (a spring holiday) and eaten with a glass of mead
Ah I see! It was an okay snack but for €5 it was rather expensive! We will definitely be back for some salmon soup though, that was delicious! Thanks again for watching 😀
Thanks for visiting Helsinki. 👍
You would have got two of those tippaleipä for around €4 from somewhere not the main tourist food hall... 😉
You'll be happy to know that if the air temperature was +3°C, the water temperature was probably a balmy +7°C! 😂 Even if the sea was frozen and you plunged through an ice hole, the water wouldn't be under +2°C.
Helsinki was amazing and everyone we met was so friendly so thank you ☺️ The sauna was a great experience and the cold water certainly refreshing! As we venture north in Finland we experience ice swimming so join us for that! Thank you for watching 😀
intresting choise for the suomenlinna ferry,
Yes it was the one closest to our Airbnb! It was a good experience vs the more crowded tourist ferry! Thanks for watching 😀
The President's Castle (Presidentinlinna), if you see that Finnish flag with a lion in the middle, it means that the president is at home, if it's not there, it's not there.
Interesting! We never knew this so thanks for pointing that out 😀 thanks for watching!
i live i helsinli, am 88
yo but never heard o this ferry. the mainferrywith speciall car spaceand ann upperr scenic deck shuttles between themarketplacee and the fortress every half hour.
Hello Phil! Thanks so much for watching our video 👍 Helsinki is a fantastic place and the ferry we took was from Katajanokka as that is where our apartment was. We did take the more touristy one back to the fortress and both offered a scenic trip 😀 thanks again for watching!
The first day was filmed on 10th November Friday? You can see the official state flags (with golden lion on red background) are only raised until half of the pole, to respect and mourn our late president Ahtisaari, a Nobel peace prize winner, who had was buried with seremonies on that day in Helsinki cathedral.
Thanks for watching! This was filmed in the middle of October. Interesting to know the reason why the flags get lowered and to learn about the state symbol flag so thank you!
Ah in that case it might have been around the time president Ahtisaari passed away, hence the flags! So nice you enjoyed your stay @@AshAndDan.
Karjalanpiirakka is really just a bland base for other delights. most people mash egg, and butter with salt and pepper and spread that on the piirakka (pie). Or you can use fish or fish eggs, or whatever you fancy takes you.
a warm karjalanpiirakka needs real butter with eggs in it (eggbutter)that melts on it. I hope you'd gone to Fazer cafe etc. to get a proper one :)
Yeah would’ve loved to have tried it the proper way! We just ate it the completely wrong way 😂 thanks for watching and hope you enjoyed the video!
I only realized now that you collect states. Would it be worth it to be in social groups in contact with locals so you save money and get the best experiences and not share misunderstandings.
Was a lovely video, hope you had great time! But little bit of constructive criticism - audio levels.
Sometimes your BGM was too loud compared to speech, so I had to play with my volume to hear properly what you are saying.
Wind of course, there isn't much you can do about it, than getting a mic with a windshield, but that didn't really bother me.
It is more enjoyable experience for a viewer when the audio volume is consistent over the video and not jump so much from quiet to loud.
Thanks for your comment and feedback! We are still learning so take any advice on board 😊 we LOVED Finland 🇫🇮 had a great time everywhere we went!
I only buy soft tippaleipä and where i live those always are sold out first
Ah! Hopefully you get some soon 👍 thanks for watching!
Regatta cafe looks so cute 😍
Its a lovely place, and we cannot recommend the hot chocolate more, it was suuuper delicious 😋
Pretty unique place,indeed! Been there and sometimes The customerline is very Looong!
@@satuhamalainen8903 do you recommend?
The queue wasn’t too bad when we arrived but after 5 minutes it got a little busy. We were travelling off season too so maybe we got lucky with it being quiet
Why didn't you look for Finns who could have introduced, for example, different ways of how Karelian pie should be enjoyed. I have never seen someone eat a cold and hard Karelian pie. Normally it is warm and topped with either butter or egg butter.
good video, it's a shame that you found four of the five most expensive cafes in Helsinki.
Glad you enjoyed the vlog, thank you! 🤩 haha woops… yes they were on the more expensive side but at least they were yummy!
I don´t think I know a finn that would eat a Karelian pie from Lidl :D get one from bakery, with something nice on top and it´s like 10000x better :D
Hahaha 😂 we had a few from Lidl just because they were super cheap! I bet from a bakery they are much much nicer though 👍 hope you enjoyed the video and thanks for watching 😀
Funny fact in Suomenlinna are biggest woodburning sauna in the world. It is sauna of naval academie.
That’s really cool! Is it for the public to use or only the naval academy? Loved the views from the island and also the ferry over. Thanks for watching 😀
@@AshAndDan. It's open for public only when there is saunaday in the city. So there is one day of year for public. It is in naval academi campus. Our naval academie is no Annapolis or Kronstad but it is still military school wich train officers for our navy.
Nobady eats karelian pies without any topping.
Ha! We have definitely learnt this now 😂
The ones you get from supermarkets etc. are not the real Karelian pie. They are not even allowed to use that name so they are just called rice pies. You can get the real ones only from certain places. Best are the ones which are baked by a real Karelian.
Ah we will need to go back and try the real Karelian pie one day! The supermarket ones were good, but I imagine the home baked ones from a local bakery would be even better! Thanks for watching!
Nah, they are all good. The real ones were made in Karelia that was ceded to the USSR after WW2 and no longer exists. My mother was from that area and made the real ones, although entirely in the wrong location.
The tippaleipä was a complete rip-off. First of all, I wouldn't exactly call it 'only found in Finland' (google funnel cake) but the price is way over top as well. Granted it's very much off season -- they are enjoyed around the 1st of May celebrations and not throughout the year, but then you can pick them up at the grocery store for around 2e for a pack of two.
Yes it was expensive and not that tasty either! Next time we will definitely grab them from a supermarket 😀 thanks for watching and hope you enjoyed the video 👍
To eat a Karelian pie (Karjalan piirakka) as it is is like to eat a pizza without anything on it....sharpen yourshelves....
We definitely will know for next time 😀 thanks for watching 👍
Oh by the way it is not pronounced like da rude, you say it like it is written and and the e at the end is not silent, but it have to be heard. Just to bring a notice 😊
Thanks for watching! Ah we never realised this, thanks for pointing this out though. We had no idea Darude was from Finland until we read some facts about the cathedral!
They were serving white bread with salmon soup??? I am pretty open minded, but that is beyond acceptable.
Haha I never realised this was a thing 😂 the salmon soup was 🔥 thanks for watching and hope you enjoyed the video!
You should always eat Karelian pasty and cinnamon buns pretty warm. And eating Karelian pasty dry without any butter on top is just waste of time.
We wished we knew how to eat the Karelian pasty properly as it sounds delicious! Must admit, cold and plain was still pretty good! Cinnamon buns were 🔥 thanks for watching!
@@AshAndDan. Yeah, was gonna say that in every single travel video people always eat the pastry dry, and I find it funny and frustrating at the same time 😀Eggbutter (basically smashed boiled eggs with butter) is the most commonly found topping, and it's great. Some people also like them warmed up with some melted butter, but personally I don't enjoy them warm.
You eat Lidl (german) food in Finland?! And you should go everywhere but helsinki. Our capital is not finnish, it's sircus for foreigners and tourists. 80% finns want live in country or at least out of town. Meny of us hate Helsinki bocause traffic and too much people in too little space. And noice and bad air. Allso robberys mostly night time are common. So next time you visit, please take a car and go to easter Finland see thousands lakes by boat. Drive lappland and go where ever you want and see real country. Wellcome again🙂
We enjoyed our time in Helsinki but we agree the true highlight of Finland is up north, we visited Rovaniemi and also Saariselka- both were amazing!
As for going to Lidl, we were on a budget so this was to save some money. We visited cafe Ekberg and had salmon soup at the market so we did get to sample some great Finnish food 👍
Thanks for watching 😀
Eh, all the market halls are made to extract money from tourists for experiencing what the life was 100 years ago for someone going to the market. If one wants value for their money, off to the supermarkets and chain stores you go.
Ohmy this literally is the worst time to visit Finland 😂 No snow, no sunshine, no greenes or no colourful leaves....
Haha we still loved it! I guess the best part was there was a lot less tourists meaning we had the popular sights to ourselves ❤️ we would love to go back in the snow!
Classic blunder that tourist videos do. Youre supposed to eat Karelian pies warmed up and with toppings, at least some egg butter.
Its like making a review of authentic New York pizza by tasting a cold pizza without cheese, propably not very tasty 😅
And as a Finn I must say that tippaleipä sucks! 😅
I dont get it, it doesnt even taste like anything. Guess its an outdated tradition, and that 5 € is robbery...
Haha it seems like we’ve not mastered how to eat the Karelian pie! It does sound tasty the thought of it heated up with butter. We do agree with the tippaleipa being over rated and at €5 for a small bag it made things even worse 😂
Hulluja nuo ulkomaalaiset ku näillä keleillä menee mereen uimaan.
It was cold so I get how you think we are crazy 😂 but it was worth it! Thanks for watching 😀