The chefs at Restaurant Olo served precisely productized Finnish potatoes to their Belgian colleagues. Until now, Finland has exported mainly seed potatoes to the world.
Antwerp
“Belgium is the homeland of potatoes. The appreciation for potatoes is great, ”says the chef at the Michelin restaurant Olo Pekka Terävä.
Therefore, exporting potatoes from Finland to Belgium sounds a bit like selling sand to the Sahara.
However, this is what we are trying to do now: Sharp is together with Olo’s chef Tuomas Vierelän with enlisted Belgian chefs to prepare a tasting menu for a Finnish Frex potato.
Olo has been using Frex alone in addition to stick potatoes for a few years now.
Chef Tuomas Vierelä from Olo (left) and sous chef Nicolaï Vanquickelberghe from the Belgian restaurant Horseele.
Terävä and Vierelä collect potato dishes in a test kitchen at a food wholesaler near Antwerp. The presentation has attracted more than a dozen chefs from restaurants across Belgium. Some have Michelin stars, some are still aiming for them.
Frex is not a potato variety, but its own brand developed for carefully grown Finnish potatoes. Eggs are also on sale under the same brand, which are also tasted in Belgian experiments.
In addition to potatoes, one test portion contains herring caviar.
Brand underlying Tapio Knuuttila and Pia Tapio-Knuuttila say the potatoes come from two producers with several farms in Southwest Finland and Ostrobothnia.
Among other things, the production method involves the farms alternating between two years of potatoes and two years of other crops left in the field as fertilizer.
Tapio Knuuttila and Pia Tapio-Knuuttila have previously lived in Belgium for a long time. Tapio Knuuttila met a three-Michelin-star Belgian chef at an embassy in Finland in 2002, wondering why bulk roots are being produced in Finland when conditions would allow for better things.
“The idea came from there. Through a courier company, I received various Finnish potatoes in Belgium to taste with both chefs and consumers, and the final product began to take shape. ”
This end product has attracted the interest of European restaurants, even though the supply of potatoes is guaranteed. According to Tapio Knuuttila, there are already over a hundred restaurants in France, Belgium and Germany that use Finnish potatoes.
A breakthrough requires work, as each chef must be insured one at a time.
“I said three years ago that the goal is to get to top European restaurants so that Frex’s name appears on the menu. It was a bit of a laugh at the time, but it has already come true in some restaurants, ”says Tapio Knuuttila.
One of the Finnish potato tasters who came to the experimental kitchen are Nicolaï Vanquickelberghe, who is the sous chef next to the chef at the Belgian one-Michelin-star restaurant in Horseele. The location of the restaurant is not quite the most common in the Michelin category, as it is connected to the football stadium in Ghent.
Nicolaï Vanquickelberghe examines a portion of potatoes.
In Belgium, potatoes are used in restaurants in many different forms. The country’s most famous gift to the world are frites that is, what is called French fries to the displeasure of Belgians.
According to Vanquickelberghe, the Belgian potato is of ‘very high quality’ and its floury variety is particularly well suited to French fries. His employer has sourced his potatoes directly from a local organic producer.
“We mainly use products bought from Belgium, but we are interested in trying,” says Vanquickelberghe.
In the sharp and Vierelä six-serving tasting menu, the potatoes have been prepared in different ways to give the chefs an idea of the taste and texture.
After the event, Vanquickelberghe packs a sample box of Finnish potatoes in the car. Chefs are wondering, among other things, whether transport from Finland to Belgium affects the quality of the potatoes.
“The potential, but I want to test it myself first,” says the chef at De Koolputten Nick Dapper.
Business Leader of the Food from Finland export program focused on food products in Finland Esa Wrang says that Finnish food exports have survived reasonably very difficult interest rates.
In 2020, Finnish food exports amounted to approximately EUR 1.77 billion. Based on January – November 2021, the level has remained unchanged.
“The decline in exports has not come at any point. Former customers have been retained and no significant losses have been incurred in any market. The biggest problem for companies is that it is not possible to travel to Asia, for example, so it is difficult to start new trade relations. ”
More than 40 export transactions are planned for this year, according to Wrang, but despite the cautious opening of Europe, there is still uncertainty as to whether all of them will materialize.
Although Finland strives to increase the value added of food exports, Wrang also has a good understanding of the export companies of carefully branded unprocessed potatoes.
“They have managed to arouse interest in European restaurants. Until now, potatoes have not been an export item, but mainly seed potatoes have been exported from Finland to Eastern Europe. If potatoes are to be exported, it must be through such special products. ‘
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