Finland's Lapland Golden Swamp Berry!
2006
Thousands of Finns are traveling to the swamps of Lapland, defying mosquitoes to get their share of a bumper harvest of cloudberries, a local delicacy used in pies, jams and alcoholic drinks.
This year's crop is more than 10 times bigger than in 2005, helped by warmer-than-usual weather in northern Finland, said Harri Kokko, a berry researcher at the University of Kuopio. The abundance of the tart, golden fruit is luring pickers from as far away as Estonia, almost 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) to the south, and prices are down as much as 50 percent from last year.
This may be the record crop and the quality is exceptionally good, too,'
said Jouko Hernetkoski, 57, who works for the Ranua municipality in Lapland and has picked
cloudberries for more than 30 years. The place is buzzing with pickers.
'
Cloudberries (called: Lakka in finnish), a raspberry-like fruit that is eaten alone or with cheese, ice cream or sauces, are a source of extra income for many people in Finland, where the unemployment rate was 10.2 percent in May.
Finland exports cloudberries to countries such as Norway and is planning commercial cultivation of the berry, which grows naturally in bogs across northern stretches of Scandinavia, Russia and North America.
The cloudberry crop benefited from a warm summer in Lapland, which includes the northernmost reaches of Scandinavia and neighboring parts of Russia.
In Sodankyla, a village about 100 kilometers north of the Arctic Circle, the first two weeks of July were the second warmest since World War II, according to the Finnish Meteorological Institute in Helsinki. The highest temperature in Finland so far this summer, 31 degrees Celsius (88 Fahrenheit), was measured in Lapland.
White Nights
Cloudberries are soft, juicy and about the size of raspberries. They are initially pale red before ripening to an amber color. The plant is well-suited for Arctic regions because it can withstand temperatures as low as -40 degrees Celsius. To avoid the heat, some people pick the berries during the white nights in Lapland, the summer weeks when the sun doesn't set at all.
Mosquitoes, gadflies and black flies, which also thrive in the heat, also aren't keeping pickers away. There are an exceptionally large number of insects in all parts of Finland this year, Juhani Itaemies, a researcher at the University of Oulu, said in a July 21 story in the newspaper Helsingin Sanomat.
Helsinki's Arctic Icebar, which has ice walls and keeps its temperature at -5 degrees Celsius, serves vodka drinks flavored with nothing but a few cloudberries. Cloudberry wine is also popular throughout Finland.
Lapland has among the highest unemployment rates in Finland, making the annual cloudberry crop a welcome source of income. The region's jobless rate was 20 percent in May, according to Statistics Finland.
Prices Drop
Stockmann department store in central Helsinki, which received its first cloudberries on July 21, sells the fruit for 14 euros a kilo. Some Finns living in the southern part of the country ask friends in the north to ship them cloudberries by mail to save money.
Cloudberries are rich in vitamin C and have been used by Nordic seafarers as protection against scurvy. In ancient Scandinavia, tea made from the plant's leaves was used to cure urinary infections.
Today, Finns typically eat cloudberries on top of Lappish farm cheese, or leipaejuusto.
Restaurants serve cloudberries in appetizers, main courses and desserts. They are also served in soups, with cream and cinnamon, and in cakes and pastries.
Finns have several names for the berry, including
hilla, lakka and suomuurain.
Swedes call them
hjortron.
The taste has been particularly magnificent this year,'
Hernetkoski said. Some people are spending their summer holiday picking
cloudberries
.
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