Today (Sunday), after a quiet morning at our hostel, we set off to Kauppatori Market Square. This is an open-air market at the same harbour where we caught the ferry to Suomenlinna yesterday.
Here, we finally had the chance to try some Finnish food, including reindeer meat! This is a bit of a weird thought when we are used to associating reindeer with Santa and his sleigh, but in Finland reindeer meat is very popular.
Souvenir stalls.F with his new reindeer horn keyring.The boys had two reindeer hot dogs each from this stall. They loved them!J's reindeer hot dog. Yep, it's pretty much just a normal hot dog, but for €7 ($11.56 AUD). 😂The menu at the stall B and I ordered our lunch from.We shared this mixed reindeer meal. It was superb!! The lingonberry sauce was delicious, and the roast potatoes were crispy and herby. Reindeer tasted just like beef to me. This was definitely one of my top 3 meals of the trip so far! It also came with free mini pancakes in real strawberry sauce — delish! 😋There were several of these dining tents behind the food stalls.
And just to really make your tastebuds tingle, here are a few more pics from the food stalls...
In the foreground is a sausage and potato mix.This was the stall we ordered from. In the foreground is vendace (deep fried fish). We haven't been game to try it yet!Salmon!There was a fruit and vegetable vendor too.
We bought some fudge from this cute stall, which was doing a roaring trade...
Our choices. Left: salmiakki (salty licorice) and lemon. Right: karpalo (cranberry) in salty vanilla.
The Old Market Hall was nearby, but it's closed on Sundays. We haven't managed to go inside a market hall yet, but doing so is on the list for tomorrow if we can get ourselves organised in time!
Old Market Hall. The date on top is 1889. The brickwork down the side is fabulous!
