I have just returned from a weekend to Copenhagen. I never visited Copenhagen before, so Stijn surprised me with a trip to Copenhagen for my birthday, specifically to visit one of the city’s top restaurants: Restaurant 108. Lucky me! I now wonder why I have never visited the city before. It’s just an hour from Amsterdam by plane and the city is amazing. The architecture reminded me of Paris somewhat and the lovely thing about Copenhagen is that almost everything is within walking distance and the shops and food are of high quality. The only downside of our trip was that it was super cold and the city is quite expensive, so save up when you plan to visit.
We stayed in a quirky and eco-friendly boutique hotel in a beautiful part of the city: Babette Guldsmeden. It is located between the famous Little Mermaid in the Northern part of the Harbour at the Langelinie Promenade and Nyhavn, the old iconic harbor with the beautiful old houses. The hotel was easy enough to reach from the airport: a 20 minute metro ride, getting out at Kongens Nytorv Station. From there it was a 10 minute walk to our hotel. The walk itself was beautiful. We walked past the Royal Theatre, Magasin du Nord warehouse, past Nyhavn and into Bredegade street. Bredegade street is full of art, jewelry and interior shops. As you are walking down Bredegade, you’ll pass Frederiks Kirke and Amalienborg, the current residence of the Danish Royal family (they actually had a party going when we walked by).
The old Anglican St. Albans Church was within walking distance of the hotel as well (in fact, everything was within walking distance). The church itself was beautifully built in Gothic Revival style and is located in a tranquil park that is worth a stroll if you want to escape the city.
On our first day, we first had breakfast at Lagkagehuset, a bakery (actually a chain of bakeries) across the street selling traditional Danish pastries. From there we walked through Churchill Park and Langelinie Park to the Little Mermaid. We passed a beautiful kitchen store, Multiform Copenhagen, and foodies that we are, we couldn’t resist taking a peak. The store was the flagship store of Multiform and they operate internationally as well. The lady guiding us mentioned they had just delivered a kitchen in one of the canal houses in Amsterdam. In any case, Stijn and I now have our hearts set on buying a big kitchen island…whenever we find our house that is…
When we arrived at the Little Mermaid, I expected the place to be busy, but to our surprise it was actually not busy at all, with only a few tourists hanging around (this was before noon). The statue was quite small, but bigger than I imagined after reading about how tiny it was. The statue was inspired by Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale the little mermaid and since its unveiling in 1913 it has become Copenhagen’s main tourist attraction.
Langelinie park, where the little mermaid is located, is close to Kastellet (The Citadel), one of the best preserved fortresses in Europe, shaped in the form of a pentagram. It’s still an active military area, but it is open to tourists as well and also serves as a public park. It is a very tranquil area, where you can take a relaxing stroll and do a bit of historic sightseeing.
After sightseeing we walked to the city center for some shopping. The biggest shopping street in Copenhagen is Strøget. Shopping at Strøget is an absolute delight. The street is very broad, and one of Europe’s longest pedestrian streets, so cars are not allowed. You can find both high end shops, as well as the more accessible chains like Zara and H&M. We did some chocolate shopping in Hotel Chocolat, a fabulous chocolate store & chocolate bar, with all sorts of high quality chocolate. I made pictures of the store, but somehow they disappeared from my phone, so only have one shot. We bought some chili chocolate milk and 100% dark chocolate tablets from Ecuador that I want to use for Mexican mole.
We also visited interior shop Illums Bolighus, a fantastic Scandinavian design store and a go to place for everyone that loves pretty things. They sell some of our favorite interior brands, such as Gubi and Skultuna. We are still eying for the Gubi Beetle chairs. Not only do they look stylish, but they sit really comfortable. Unfortunately, Scandinavian design does come with a price tag, so for now, we are just admiring the chairs.
Although Stroget is the main shopping street, the side streets are worth a stroll as well. We took a right to Niels Hemmingsens Gade, where we found Paustian concepts store, selling beautiful furniture and accessories:
We stopped for some lunch at Café Flottenheimer. A quirky student type cafe. Our lunch was so fulfilling that we actually skipped dinner. The lunch is pretty good though, and they have a variety of options, such as salads, soups, sandwiches and burgers. They have a good vegetarian menu as well. I ordered the vegetarian quesadilla and it was delicious, but the red lentil soup and grilled halloumi cheese with avocado also looked very appetizing.
Because we skipped dinner, we had cocktails instead. Initially, we wanted to visit The Bird and Churchkey Cocktail bar, serving “nerdy Gin and Tonics”. It is one of the popular cocktail bars in Copenhagen, which explains why it was so full – too full. To be completely honest, I did not quite fancy the place and it looked like the type of establishment I would visit as a student (I like posh cocktail bars :D). Because there also weren’t any seats left, we decided to find another bar and ended up in Cock’s and Cows, which was completely quiet. The bar was downstairs and the restaurant upstairs. The restaurant was quite busy and they had a beautiful patio outside as well. The bartender was friendly and the cocktails were good (I had the Amelia and Stijn had the John Snow, which funny enough was served in the glass on the right. We both thought that the one on the left was the John Snow because it was more manly looking 🙂
On day 2, we decided to go beyond the city center to Vesterbro, which used to be quite a rough neigbhourhood, but is becoming somewhat of a hipster paradise. I am going to be very honest,..we weren’t really impressed by the neighborhood. One of the tips we found online is to visit Værnedamsvej, a street which is also called the Parisian street of Copenhagen. Having visited Paris in May last year, we could not really recognize Paris. There were French cafes, but the street is so small, it is not really worth the detour and a lot of shops were closed at 3pm. To get there, you will cross sex shops and dodgy looking bars and establishments, and the end destination just doesn’t live up to the expectations. We had a drink in Le Trois Cochons (would not really recommend it) and left after because the kitchen was closed and we were hungry. The restaurant actually needed to send away quite some tourist that were looking for a bite to eat. That’s OK, but they just weren’t that friendly.
The good thing about going beyond your comfort zone is that you are more likely to discover new things that you DO like. And although we did not like Værnedamsvej , nor the walk to it, it did bring us to the most wonderful taco place. We did not have lunch yet and the kitchen of Le Trois Cochons was already closed. I had a taco place bookmarked on google maps that TripAdvisor recommended and realized we were close by, so we started walking there. Initially, we wondered where the heck we ended up. The neighborhood looked really rough (e.g. café pornstar and those type of establishments) and the restaurant seemed to be located in an old Bosch warehouse from the 70s. Boy were we wrong, …the most wonderful little gem of our trip was located in that odd looking place: Hija de Sanchez homemade Tacos.
Hija de Sanchez is located in the old meat packing district of Copenhagen, where you will find high quality restaurants and a trendy nightlife. Don’t be deceived by the rough appearance, it is actually really nice! Hija de Sanchez is tiny, and we were lucky to find a table. You can see that they make everything fresh: from the tacos with Mexican imported corn to the salsas.
We ordered 3 tacos: cabbage, beef and al pastor (with roasted pork). They were delicious and everything tasted fresh. You could see the staff making the tacos, soaking the peppers and grinding them and cooking the meat.
After lunch, we walked back to the city centre, passing Tivoli Food Halls. We did not try any of the stalls, which looked great btw, as we were already full and had dinner reservations at Restaurant 108. As we were walking back I suddenly had a deja vu…I somehow felt I’d heard of Hija the Sanchez before so did some digging and I realized I did! We often watch culinary shows on Netflix, among others Ugly Delicious by Chef David Chang. Copenhagen featured in one of his shows during which he visited famous Noma chef Rene Redzepi. Hija de Sanchez was actually started by one of his former chefs, Rosio Sanchez. What a coincidence!
After lunch it took about 1.5 hours to walk to Restaurant 108 in Christianshavn.
Restaurant 108 is headed by chef Kristian Baumann, who previously worked at Rene Redzepi’s Noma. In fact, 108 is a spin-off of Noma and owns a Michelin star. Stijn actually wanted to reserve us a table at Noma, which is impossible unless you plan months ahead, but their website re-directed him to Restaurant 108.
Our experience at 108 was mixed. The ambiance is not what you would expect from a Michelin start restaurant, and is much more casual. The food can best be described as new Nordic cuisine. Although we did like the food, the service felt quite rushed (albeit very friendly) and we were out of the restaurant within 90 minutes after eating a 4 course meal. This did not feel like the experience we usually have in more high end restaurants, where you are able to dine all evening. Although we did enjoy the courses, we would probably not visit the place again, as the experience and quality of food just did not justify the price. I’ll add a separate review on this restaurant in the restaurant section if you are interested in a more detailed description.
On the final day we grabbed some to go breakfast from Meyers Bageri at Store Kongensgade, one of the longest streets in Kopenhagen, close to our hotel. The kanelsnegle (cinnamon pastry) was delicious, and is considered the best in the city. Store Kongensgade is worth a visit btw, it has some very nice restaurants and designer shops.
After lunch we decided to do something out of our comfort zone again, on the recommendation of my cousin. We visited Freetown Christiania, a hippie commune of about 800 to 1000 residents with their own rules. It still has a hippie vibe going on and the city reminded us of some of Amsterdam’s squatting areas, but bigger. Christiania is known for Pusher street, where cannabis is openly sold (yes we accidentally ended up in that street – oops) and there is some tension with authorities because of this. Photographing in Pusher street is not allowed, but we saw a tourist doing it. A friendly hash dealer instructed him not to and it was all fine, but I read that some tourist had been threatened or assaulted when not following the rules.
A lot of residents of Christiania built their own houses, which is part of the charm, and it will not surprise you that some of the buildings don’t comply to the basic safety regulations (rules are different here after all). We actually did like visiting Christiania as it is a different experience. The people are friendly and the place is packed with tourists, so you don’t feel like an outsider. I would not visit Pusher street at alone at night however. One of the locals told us it is actually a very nice place to visit in the summer. You could picnic there, and there are some cafes and restaurants. They have an outside stage for musical and cultural performances, interesting murals, a museum of their own and art galleries.
After Christiania,we walked back to the city centre for some final shopping in Magasin du Nord. One of the areas I would definitely recommend you to visit there is the food court. It is of really high quality and you have some great shops such as the Almuegaarden old fashioned candy store and Osterlandsk Thehus.
Before flying to Amsterdam, we met up with an old colleague of Stijn for lunch at District Tonkin, an easy going small Vietnamese place open for lunch and dinner throughout the day. It was located close to our hotel, in Dronningens Tvaergade. The lunch was superb and the prices were very friendly for the quality and amount of food you get. Stijn’s beef soup was delicious and packed with tender meat and vegetables, and my pork Banh Mi (a Vietnamese baguette) was delicious (and huge) as well. The place is tiny though, so were lucky to find a table, but the place was packed. We did see that they were opening a larger restaurant Store Kongensgade, so that’s good news!
All in all, we thoroughly enjoyed our trip to Copenhagen. The food is delicious and fresh, the shopping is great, and the architecture of the city is so beautiful that you don’t need to walk into a museum to enjoy the city. Perhaps we’ll see you there again 🙂
The Food Explorer 