Last February, the dinner at Relae was memorable and I had to go back. This time was far and above better than the first. It was the single-greatest meal I’ve ever had in my life and some photos below will share just how amazing and rewarding this meal was. Thanks.
The incredibly approachable facade is unalarming and simple like a late-night Internet Cafe
I went with the 7-course and did not include the wine pairings to save some money
Asparagus and Pistachio – These raw asparagus were picked fresh and allowed to rest for some time to reduce the bitterness, then rubbed with a pistachio creme, sprayed with an oil of some kind and then rolled in pistachio powered
The sourdough bread at Relae is the greatest I’ve ever had. A dense olive oil is served with it.
Razoclam is covered with a thin sheet of cucumber and topped with powdered spinach. Unfortunately, this was the most unappealing part of the meal. Very salty, fishy and obviously uncooked throughout.
These onions were baked delicately, allowed to rest and topped with Sol and a touch of birch syrup. The oil & syrup has a bit of cherry wine added which brings a balsamic nose but a sweet and tangy taste
Green asparagus cooked very lightly over steam for only a few minutes and topped with Ramsons and herbs from the beach. A hearty crunch vegetable soup and all of the leaves had a vinegar / lambic beer nose and the bite was also acidic and vinegar like. Incredibly delicious! I could have eaten a lot of it.
This was the highlight of the evening! Chicken raised locally by a small far that’s friends with the head chef, these chickens are allowed to free range in a rural setting, the heart & pieces of chicken leg are poached very lightly at 65 degrees Celcius with a few pieces of skin. The orange crumbles you see is the skin removed and fried in a pressure cooker and then crumbled w/ salt. You get that fried chicken taste in every bite. The layers is celery allowed to sit for 10 days in a low sodium salt brine with spices and fermented at just below room temp. It develops kimchi like fermented vinegar qualities and the entire dish just melds together beautifully.
This little chunk of char is a dehydrated spring carrot shaved incredibly thin into 50+ slices. Then, it’s wrapped tightly and allowed to sit undisturbed for some time. It’s then charred black quickly over high heat in a cast iron skillet until it starts smoking. Finally, a dedicated chef places gobs of butter, garlic and spices over the carrot on low heat for roughly 90 minutes over and over and over until each slice comes apart with little effort and it literally melts in your mouth.
This is house-made hollandaise with oxalis. It has a great bite and went well topping the carrot.
This is house aged 5 year parmesan.
A house-made apple jam (more akin to the mouthfeel of chutney) that went great with the cheese
What looks like a creature of the sea is actually ice cream. They make ice cream on-site. It’s creamy, not crunchy, no oxygen bubbles at all (which form ice pieces) and they top it over sliced almonds. The pink on the edges is rhubarb sliced razor thin and dehydrated. Rhubarb powder covers the ice cream
I took this photo showing how thin the rhubarb was
A chef surprise! At the end of our meal, we had been there for 2.5 hours. Presented was a vanilla ice cream with whole vanilla bean specs topped with orange pieces each different cuts and different dehydration levels. The brown pieces were dehydrated much longer than the more orange pieces
So concludes the greatest meal I’ve ever had. I hope the chance to return to Copenhagen. Relae is still on my must-do-again list.
