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Brown Cheese Caramel Boller

 

We had a busy day today exploring the city centre of Oslo!

The first thing we did was visit the Norwegian Royal Palace. The current monarchy in Norway has been around since 1905, and this palace is the official residence of the royal family. 

First view of the Norwegian Royal Palace

We didn’t go inside the palace, but we took a nice walk around the grounds. There was an area called Princess Ingrid’s Sculpture Park, which has artwork drawn by children depicted as sculptures. 



This was very cute to walk through, my favourite one was the large rainbow arching over the pathway :)

Under the rainbow

Around the palace there were beautiful flowers, ponds, and statues of the royal family. 

Sunny Pond

Gorgeous flowers 

Queen Maude

King Haakon

The actual city of Oslo is quite modern, with much fewer old buildings than other European capitals we’ve been to. There are many reasons for this, including the fact that Norways not independent until 1905, so much of the countries riches were spent in Sweden or Denmark. Additionally, Norway was hit quite hard by the destruction of WWII. 

However, the modern architecture that is here is quite beautiful and very aesthetically pleasing! Especially by the water. We took a long walk along the harbour to see the beautiful views of the Oslo Fjord.

Beautiful modern buildings

Looking out to the Fjord 

We came upon the Oslo National Museum and decided to go in. But before, we needed a little snack to refuel. Right by the museum is a little place called the BolleBar where they serve Norwegian sweet buns called “boller”. 

My brown cheese boller and Liam’s pistachio-rhubarb boller 

The boller I got had a brown cheese filling. This brown cheese is unique to Norway and is made of cow milk. Its characteristic brown colour comes from milk sugars which are caramelized after they are boiled. As a result, the cheese is also sweet! I really enjoyed it and look forward to tasting more of it while we are here. 

Fittingly to my love of food, the first exhibit we saw in the National Gallery was about Nordic food. I quite enjoyed this temporary exhibition on the evolution, traditional roots, and futuristic directions of Nordic cuisine. 

Part of the Nordic food display

This museum was so great, and the free audioguide really enhanced our experience. We learned about the history of Norway through fashion, art, and design.

Traditional Norwegian outfit

Modern fashion using traditional Norwegian knitting patterns

Beautiful Norwegian made goblets

On the upper floors, there was an impressive collection of art from both Scandinavian and other European artists. Once again, I’ve added some of my favourites here!

Bridal Procession on the Hardangerfjord by Hans Gude (1848)

Rain, Etretat by Claude Monet (1886)

Winter Night in the Mountains by Harold Sohlberg (1914)

White Bear Kind Valemon, Theodor Kittelsen (1912)

Mona Lisa (copy) by an unidentified artist (~1600s)

There was also a room dedicated to Edvard Munch, the famed Norwegian painter who created “The Scream”. We learned that he tried to imitate real life in his art, neither glorifying nor degrading scenarios, but portraying them as they are. Munch painted The Scream after experiencing an unprompted, intense moment of panic and fear on a walkway in Oslo. 

Girl washing her clothes by Munch

The Kiss by Munch

The Scream by Munch (1893)

After spending a few hours in the museum, we were hungry again! So we walked along the water to a food court called Vippa. Here, we got some Greek food - delicious, filling pitas with fries :)

Inside the Vippa food market

Yummy chicken souvlaki pita wrap!

Lunch views 

Continuing our walk along the Oslo port, we got a great view of the Oslo Opera House. At first, I thought it was a museum of modern art, or modern architecture since the design of the building is so futuristic. 

The Oslo Opera House

The great thing about the opera house is that you can walk to the top and get a great (free) view of the city and the harbour. 

Enjoying the Oslo views

Looking out at people swimming

Cruise ships in the harbour 

Now, you may think that it would be cold in Norway, but no! We had 27 degrees today (and we were melting) and so were very thankful that we decided against going to Greece, which is currently experiencing +35 degree weather. 

With the heat, it was very important to cool down. To help, we treated ourselves to some amazing homemade sorbet from Happis gelateria. Liam and I both got the lemon sorbet, and then I had a scoop of brown cheese & lingonberry while he had a scoop of pina colada sorbet. It was the perfect ending to our day!

It’s very important to have ice cream on a hot day


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