Creator journal / 18 days until the next adventure
Helsinki wants me
to eat fish.
I asked for one Finnish food I cannot leave without trying. The internet answered—and immediately found the exact edge of my comfort zone.
The short answer: people are sending me toward Finnish salmon soup, butter buns from Fazer Café and Finnish candy—especially licorice. Salmon soup is leading the vote, which is inconvenient because seafood, particularly fish, is where I hesitate.
Eighteen days before Helsinki, I asked TikTok a very simple question: if I only try one Finnish food while I am there, what should it be?
I asked because food has a way of becoming the memory of a place. In Copenhagen, a hot dog became one of those memories for me. It was casual, specific and completely tied to being there. I want Helsinki to give me its version of that—not necessarily the fanciest meal, but the thing I will still be talking about after I come home.
The first recommendations arrived quickly. Finnish candy and licorice. Butter buns from Fazer Café. And then the answer I had already heard whispered from several directions: salmon soup.
The salmon soup problem
One viewer told me her son lives in Finland and insisted she try salmon soup while visiting. She was completely against it and ended up loving it. This should be reassuring. Instead, my brain read it as a challenge personally designed to expose me.
I have a hesitation with seafood that I cannot fully explain. It is especially strong with fish. Maybe it is the smell. Maybe it is the texture. Maybe it is simply the expectation of tasting something unmistakably fishy before it even reaches my mouth. I genuinely do not know. I can talk myself into being adventurous right up until the plate arrives, and then some primitive internal alarm begins behaving as if the salmon has intentions.
But this countdown is supposed to change the trip. If I ask people for the real recommendation and then retreat to something familiar when they answer, I am not actually letting the audience shape anything.
So salmon soup is going on the list.
The current Helsinki food list
Finnish salmon soup: the recommendation with the clearest story behind it and, currently, the one most likely to test my resolve.
Butter buns from Fazer Café: an extremely persuasive phrase. No struggle here. I am prepared to approach this assignment with professionalism and possibly repeat it several times for research.
Finnish candy and licorice: I have been warned that the licorice can be intense. “Intense” is not normally how I want candy described, but it does make me curious. I need to learn whether people mean ordinary sweet licorice or the salty Finnish variety that appears to function as both confectionery and character assessment.
This is already a better list than anything I could have assembled alone because it contains opinions, warnings and personal history. It is not just what to order. It is what someone else remembers.
The real assignment
I will try the food, but the story is larger than a checklist. I want to know where people in Helsinki actually go for these things, what time of day they eat them and what makes one version different from another. A dish without context is just content. The context is what turns it into a place.
I am also trying to resist turning every day of this countdown into a photography exercise. I am a creator who uses photographs, video, drone footage, sound, conversation and writing. Sometimes the best way to understand a city is to put the camera down long enough to taste what someone told you not to miss.
Even when it is fish.
What this changes
The list now has three real assignments: take the salmon soup seriously, find the correct butter bun and approach Finnish licorice with appropriate caution. When I reach Helsinki, I will report back honestly—including if the soup changes my mind or confirms every irrational fear I brought with me.