Madklubben

On our second night in Copenhagen my friends Andreas and Nora introduced us to a great underground bistro near Nyhavn. The menu was sort of a choose-your-own pre fixe, on the nouvelle side of things. When our server brought out our drinks, they were accompanied by a sweet, cake-like dark rye bread, warm and with a carmelized crust. Almost like a freshly baked boston brown bread, though much richer in flavor.

My first course was a chicken salad,

dressed in a thick creamy (almost cheesy) sauce and topped with grapes, bacon, walnuts, radish and crisp rye croutons. All together is was rich and sweet, but with a subtle smokey after.

The main course was glorious.

Slow roasted pork loin drizzled with a sweet sage sauce and covered in crumbled bacon, anchored to the plate by an apple and a beet, both poached in what seemed to be apple cider. Another smokey/sweet memory driven home by the outstanding cider-poached beet.

Though Madklubben

had a wide array of desserts to choose from, I opted for the cheese plate as my final course. There was one reason: quince paste. It was a normal cheese plate, not anything special, with a hard, soft and a blue cheese served along side a rye cracker, date-nut bread, a cherry reduction and my favorite cheese companion, anything quince! The combinations, all so different, connected my tongue to my heart and pushed me into that post-meal euphoria. Maybe not the best part of it all, but certainly worth mentioning, is the price; about $35 for all three courses.