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Kven Foodways

Kvääni / Kveeni

Ethnolinguistic

The Kvens are a recognised NATIONAL MINORITY of Norway, descended from Finnish-speaking migration into Troms and Finnmark from the 17th century onward, with KVEN FINNISH a recognised minority language. ⚠ NOT SÁMI, NOT NORWEGIAN, NOT SIMPLY FINNISH. Their food is a northern borderland kitchen: rieska and flat barley breads, river and sea fish, salmon on the Alta and Tana, potatoes, sour milk, cloudberries, coffee, and the sauna. Vadsø, Børselv, Nordreisa and Porsanger are the centres, and the fornorsking policy hit this community as hard as it hit the Sámi.

Atlas — where and when

Where in the world

Communities and languages

  • Kvens community documented

Languages: Kven Finnish

What is recorded

  • Kvens are a recognised national minority of Norway descended from Finnish-speaking migration to Troms and Finnmark, with Kven Finnish a recognised minority language. Kven foodways are recorded as a distinct system and are not classified as Sámi, Norwegian or simply Finnish. documented

Related foodways

This foodway relates to

  • related to Finnish Foodways documented

    Kven Finnish descends from the Finnish of the migrants and is a recognised minority language of Norway in its own right.

  • related to Norrbotten and Tornedalen Foodways documented

    Kvens in Norway and Tornedalians in Sweden are the two national-minority communities of the same Finnish-speaking northern borderland.

  • related to Sámi Foodways documented

    Neighbours and often intermarried in the same northern districts, and two distinct peoples.

Recipes

No recipes are filed under this cuisine yet.