Trip Report: Copenhagen + our Disastrous Dinner at Noma

I couldn’t believe our two-week vacation was already coming to a close, but after our rowdy antics in Stockholm and a sea day mainly spent recovering from the non-stop pace, our cruise was sadly at an end. That meant one final full day in Copenhagen before we boarded our flight back home.

Upon disembarking our cruise ship, we set off for our hotel, the Copenhagen Crowne Plaza. This hotel is located just a few minutes from the airport, which was ideal for our early departure the next morning, and was nicely appointed to boot; after living in a cruise ship cabin for 10 days, it felt hugely spacious! Even better, they somehow miraculously had a room available for us to check in to at 10am.

Our King Room at the Copenhagen Crowne Plaza

The bathroom in our Copenhagen Crowne Plaza

After ditching our stuff in our room, we took the metro into town to explore a few last sights in Copenhagen. Up first, the storied Tivoli Gardens. For anyone who is unfamiliar, Tivoli is one of Europe’s oldest amusement parks, and it’s been said that it was what inspired Walt Disney to build DisneyWorld.

We explored the intricate lands, taking in sights like a mini Taj Mahal, and fully functional pirate ship, but opted not to ride any of the rides, as the weather had finally turned fall-like and was dreary and rainy.

The pirate ship lagoon at Tivoli Gardens

Once lunchtime rolled around, we headed over to the Tivoli food hall to see what might tickle our fancy. There we got to try a variety of smørrebrød from one vendor and some native Danish wine from another.

The many open faced sandwiches at the Tivoli Food Hall. Unfortunately they looked more beautiful than they tasted.

That afternoon, we headed off to one other Copenhagen attraction we’d missed during our initial visit: the Danish Design Museum. Here we got to learn all about the history of Danish design and it’s impact on things like modern furniture, plus the hubby finally found a chair that was just his size.

The hubby’s grand Danish chair at the Danish Design Museum

…which turned out to be one of MANY chair that we can apparently thank the Danes for.

At last, our final evening in Copenhagen was upon us, and what better way to celebrate than by having dinner at the restaurant that has many times been called “the best in the world?” That’s right; we’d managed to score reservations at Noma.

As foodies will know, Noma offers only one menu option: a 20-25 course seasonal menu that changes just three times a year, and which focuses on hyper-local ingredients, many of them grown on-site or foraged nearby. When we happened to be there, they were still serving their summer menu, which meant the focus was on vegetables — no meat or seafood was served with our meal.

To say I was excited was an understatement; I’d been reading about Noma for years, and was beyond thrilled to get to experience everything Noma and chef Rene Redzepi had to offer. Little did I know the evening would end up going really, really wrong.

The table on your way in is a showcase of all the ingredients that you’ll experience that evening…yep, right done to those pine cones and bee larvae.

The cooks busy meticulously assembling the dishes at Noma in Copenhagen.

The meal started with a drink in Noma’s iconic greenhouse, before being ushered in past the “ingredient board” and through the open kitchen. Once seated, our servers asked if anyone at the table had any food allergies, and our one vegetarian group member piped up. The rest of us said nothing,

This was my big mistake.

You see, I’m allergic to mold. I was diagnosed as allergic to penicillin as a child, and also have seasonal allergy issues whenever mold is high in the air as well (particularly alternaria). But I’ve never mentioned my mold allergy to a restaurant, because I don’t generally expect to be served moldy food. Looking back, though, I should have told them I was allergic to mold.

The courses started to come, rapidly, starting with an edible butterfly, then a stuffed pepper, and on and on until around course 7, when we began the “mold series”. The kitchen had innovated a way to grow an edible mold onto certain foods: making it into a little tortilla, coating it around young cucumbers, and finally using it to surround an organic egg yolk.

A butterfly made out of some sort of cracker, flowers, and bee pollen to start

This was a poblano pepper stuffed with mushed peas. 3/4 of us enjoyed it. But the hubby got a pepper so mind-bendingly hot he said he couldn’t actually taste his next few dishes.

This was kind of like a high-end gusher. Fruit leather stuffed with beets, I believe.

The “mold taco” with tortilla made of mold, sandwiched around a Danish cheese and black truffle.

Young cucumbers coated in mold, in a citrus-y sauce.

The piece de resistance – a tarte filled with an egg yolk covered in mold, and some sort of mold fruit around the outside.

And at the time, I didn’t really think too much about it — I had always assumed that some forms of mold were edible and others weren’t; after all, I ate blue cheese regularly and it was one of my faves. I assumed this was one of the edible kinds of mold. I was at Noma, for goodness sake, and so I ate what I was offered.

This was actually my favorite course of the night. It was a soup with fresh peeled tomatoes, chili oil and berries.

This was kind of like a little vegetable pizza, if I remember correctly. It was pretty bland.

These were little celeriac pancakes, filled with greens, which you could dip in the cream

The famed Noma flowerpot – actually some mashed potatoes coated in spice to look like soil, with a planted nasturium flower. Probably the “homiest” meal of the night.

But as the courses continued and we moved beyond the mold series, my allergies flared like crazy. By the end of the meal I was completely congested, nose and eyes watering, and throat feeling raspy and itchy. My skin turned red and splotchy, the beginning of hives. I couldn’t even finish my last few courses.

We had originally planned to head out for a nightcap after our dinner, but instead I just went straight back to the hotel, where I soon began throwing up. And I didn’t stop until I’d given back every cent of that $500 dinner I’d just consumed.

This was kind of like a dolma, and it was super bitter. Probably my least favorite taste-wise.

The only “big” course of the night was a bunch of random stuff on a plate that you were instructed to “mix and match”. By this point, I wasn’t eating.

I’ll be honest…I don’t really remember what this dish was. Something to do with pinecones.

This one was kind of like a custard cookie. The topping was bee larvae.

The final dish was a piece of white chocolate bark, covered in flowers.

Once the vomiting slowed, I was finally able to get down some Benadryl, and eventually the other symptoms started to improve as well. The hubby stopped freaking out that he was going to have to rush me to a Danish hospital, and we were able to get a few hours of sleep before getting up around 4am for our long day of flights back home.

So, moral of the story: when a place like Noma asks if there are any allergies, tell them ALL of your allergies. Because you just never know.

That being said, our flights home were fairly uneventful, and we enjoyed our trip immensely. I hope you’ve also enjoyed following along with our 2019 European adventure! If you missed any of my trip reports, here they are again in chronological order.

Until the next time!

Trip Report: Copenhagen + our Disastrous Dinner at Noma

Whitney