Interview
FG: Alright let’s do this. Can you please state your name for the record please?
BW: My name is Boyd Wermedahl.
FG: And where are you from Boyd?
BW: I am from Fargo North Dakota.
FG: are you a Fargo North Dakota born and raised?
BW: No I was actually born in Fargo North Dakota but I was raised in Hatton North Dakota
FG: Awesome. Uh, I am going to ask you a series of questions about uh a Norwegian food, rømmegrøt and feel free to answer them please. Aw alright let us get this going. How does your family pronounce the dish itself?
BW: Rømmegrøt…
FG: Great. How does this dish come into existence?
BW: uhh I have never, my mother never made it, and it is made though, with cream and I think flour and uhm some other small ingredients, water of Course. And I… like I have said I have never really seen it (quickly corrects himself) YES I have seen it being made but in somebody else’s house hold.
FG: Do you know any history behind this dish?
BW: Well just that in Norway uh, they don’t have an awful lot of cultivated land and so they rise a lot of cattle and sheep and goats and of course uh, rømmer is cream and grøt is a pudding and so you would have a lot of cream and so you would make things out of the products that your farm produced, which was cream was a big one.
FG: Uh. And uh what do, what do you thing makes this dish a Norwegian dish?
BW: Well I think I rather told you the last question in fact that it, Norway is poor country only a very small percentage of the land is tillable. It’s like four percent or something, it’s under ten for sure, you know and so you rely on cattle because cattle can be sustained under less agricultural conditions or ideal farm conditions.
FG: Provide cream for the dish itself, nice, uh, uhm what is your favorite memory uh about having this dish growing up or just you know?
BW: Well haha (he laughs).
FG: When your parents made it?
BW: My parents actually never did (clears throat). We had an aunt that made it, and that’s the irony of it because as a a boy particularly and a teenage boy, I did not particularly like my aunt (I started laughing). She was a kind of a funny annoying and a little pushy and so on, “oh everyone got to have my Rømmegrøt”(his aunt would say), because she would always bring it to family uhm reunions and picnics and what have you. And she insisted that everybody have some, and I just said I do not like Rømmegrøt and then she didn’t like me and so that was fine and so we just worked that out. But the irony of it, it is that once she was gone, I had Rømmegrøt somewhere and I rather like it. (I oow in amusement). In fact I had Rømmegrøt with Sandy (my mother).
FG: HAHA (I laughed) uh you mentioned your aunt making uh the dish and stuff like that uh. Who else in the family would have made this uh dish possible
BW: ooh my grandmother would’ve and I am sure I had a number of aunts that would, and actually I had an uncle, that I didn’t particularly care for either but (he starts to laugh) I got a bunch of relatives I do not like almost all of them, but any way uh he was not the brightest person in the world, but he could make Rømmegrøt. And if his wife was done, I guess he would make Rømmegrøt for himself, you know. So it cannot be very hard to make. (Starts to laugh in mockery of his uncle)
FG: So the men could make it to? Not just the women.
BW: OH yeah surely.
FG: Do you know when this dish was served? Like the dates, any ceremonies or like celebrations that….
BW: Well it depends, uh I think if you would go back to Norway 200 years ago, you would just probably have it for an evening meal maybe not so much here, I don’t know, you know probably an evening meal and because it was relatively easy to prepare and it intel no meat even though you could have meat with it you know. Uh and it was prepared in my home in North Dakota, it would have been prepared in the in the winter time or fall or early spring but I can’t imagine that it would have been prepared in the middle of the summer, except for family reunions this sort of a thing, you know 4th of July.
FG: Awesome uh do you have your own family recipe or do you, does your family use like their own family recipe or do they have like a traditional recipe that they use?
BW: Well as I said my mother never made it you know, we didn’t, we make a different kind of grot, a milta grot or a milk pudding and uh I have no idea, that recipe am sure was an oral one that was just handed down, and am sure that my aunt that made it, and she made good Rømmegrøt I have been told you know, anyway uh am sure hers to she didn’t have a recipe written on how to make it she just knew how to make it.
FG: she just knew how to make it. Uh you know this recipe?
BW: NO
FG: Can you recall it?
BW: No.
The interview is switched to other person of whom has the idea and the recipe, and the making of Rømmegrøt. Her name is Sandy Eggermont (SE) a resident of Moorhead MN. (my mother)
FG: Hello!
SE: Hello!
FG: I am going to ask you a series of questions about Rømmegrøt and how it made and the recipes and I would like you to answer them please. Can you state your name for the record please?
SE: Sandy Eggermont.
FG: Thank you! What is this recipe?
SE: UH this recipe is a cream soup it’s served hot and usually used as an appetizer to a meal.
FG: What are the ingredients in this recipe?
SE: There is butter, and flour, and cream, and milk. It usually topped with uh sugar, cinnamon and more butter.
FG: Are those ingredients easy to find?
SE: Very easy.
FG: How do you prepare this dish?
SE: Well my recipe is a little bit easier than some of the recipe that there are, (I agree with her softly). I just melt some butter in a saucepan and add flour until it’s really smooth, usually takes just a short time. Then you bring back to a boil over medium heat and you stir it all the time, you uh scold milk and uh add that and uh so that it doesn’t get lumpy, and then you bring the whole mixture to a boil again and you add some salt and some sugar and you just eat it by the bowl full.
FG: And what’s the time, how long does this take? Does it take a long time or you could say three, four hours or?
SE: No not at all it probably takes uh 20 to 25 minute.
FG: Alright well thank you that’s all we have. And I’m looking forward for this dish. (My dad laughing in the background)
I then switched the interview back to Boyd just to finish it all with the remaining questions.
FG: What side dish would you have served alongside this?
BW: Well as a peasant, and uh my people come from peasantry in Europe, bread and butter that would have been a lot it, I think it was more of an evening meal you know at least that’s when we would have tend to have had it. And the thing is that if you didn’t eat all of your Rømmegrøt the night before why you could, if there is some left over you could fry it the next day.
FG: Haha really?
BW: Yeah
FG: And make what?
BW: Probably I do not know, you would just have fried Rømmegrøt (I let out a laugh) I do not know, I thing you could put sugar and well you know what you put on it. You put sugar and cinnamon I think (I softly agree with him and so does sand in the background).
FG: Yeah uhm cinnamon that’s what I had to. UH
BW: Oh have you had Rømmegrøt?
FG: I have had it before
BW: OK
FG: Uh would you say the dish is becoming less popular or more popular to the American society today?
BW: Well it is practically unknown to the American society of Couse, but even locally, uh I would say that it is less popular. In fact I wonder in the city of Fargo I am sure there is some women that know how to make it but not very many anymore (I softly laugh) and especially when you can buy it at the sons of Norway for five bucks or so. it uh there are not so many people, it’s a nostalgic food or soul food or whatever you know (as I agree with him) and there are not that many people left who have ever experienced having Rømmegrøt just as a meal, you know (as I agree with him) uh, I remember miltagrot or milk pudding but uh, we never had Rømmegrøt except like I said with my aunt, uh you know.
FG: That’s interesting, uh last question here. What is something you would like the world to know about this dish like you know as in, it could be family orientated or anything
BW: Oh it’s an ethnic food and uh it would be difficult to sell to the world, for the simple reason that not an awful lot of people like Italian food which is highly spiced, you know? It got a tang to it. And of course Rømmegrøt you can put sugar on it, uh it got sweetness to it and then of course put melted butter on it and that always for those of us who love butter that’s a real come on, but for the world I doubt whether there will ever be a Rømmegrøt stand like you would have a uh pizza stand or something like that you know.
FG: Thank you.
BW: Thank you.