Shrimp Salad Sandwich

Each Thursday, Emily Vikre (a.k.a fiveandspice) will be sharing a new way to love breakfast -- because breakfast isn't just the most important meal of the day. It's also the most awesome.

Today: We promise, they eat this for breakfast somewhere.

There is almost nothing that signifies summer in Norway more than a sandwich of crusty white bread with tiny arctic shrimp, mayo, lemon, and dill. Quite simply, it is summer. In digestible form.

In Norway, a shrimp sandwich is a perfectly acceptable meal at any time of the day.  You’ll find shrimp sandwiches (sometimes also with sliced hardboiled egg on top of the shrimp) for sale in cafes.  For supper you might have a complete reke aften, or shrimp evening -- sort of the Norwegian equivalent of a clambake, where you sit for hours with a giant bowl of freshly caught and cooked shrimp, peeling them, assembling them into sandwiches with a smear of mayo and plenty of dill, and drinking far, far too much white wine. And for breakfast you may have rekesalat, shrimp salad, on your morning slice of bread.

My old tante Mari, my great aunt, was something of a rekesalat fiend. At least, I assumed she was because we would always buy a plastic container of the goopy, mayo drowned stuff they had in the grocery store to have around for breakfast when she was with us in the summer. I never understood the appeal, until I got over the commercial variety and started to make my own, fresh. It’s like a way of extending your reke aften into the next morning! And that, believe me, is a grand thing. I thought of my tante Mari the other morning when I remembered I had some leftover shrimp in the fridge, and so I made myself a shrimp salad sandwich for breakfast and basked in every bite of summer.

Shrimp Salad Sandwich

Serves 2

1/2 pound shrimp, as small as you can get them, boiled/steamed until just cooked, and peeled
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
2 tablespoons creme fraiche
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons fresh dill, finely chopped
Salt and pepper
2 pieces of baguette or white, crusty rolls, warmed

See the full recipe (and save and print it) here.

Photos by Emily Vikre