COPENHAGEN: There is fast food and then there is ‘fast food’. One of the things that shocked the culinary world after the first lockdowns was René Redzepi’s reopening of Noma as a temporary burger and wine bar.
That decision was a roaring success despite some scepticism from foodies who thought that Redzepi should have been more ambitious that serve just the humble ‘hamburger’ on reopening.
Large queues would form outside Noma as locals visited the world acclaimed restaurant for the first time ever.
Was the fuss worth it? It seems so as René Redzepi is making the concept permanent with POPL, a new burger and wine bar that will open instead of 108 on 3 December. Restaurant 108 was closed in September because it was no longer made business sense to continue with that project.
The new restaurant Popl, which comes from the latin name populous is indeed aimed at Copenhagen residents first and foremost though of course everyone in every city around the world is awaiting tourists to return post-pandemic.
When Noma reopened for the first few weeks as a burger bar, it served a cheese burger and a vegetarian burger as well as various natural wines and beers in the gardens of the restaurant.
The concept at the former 108 will remain pretty munch intact.
Copenhagen, which has been at the forefront of many innovations over the past years seems to be leading the way to a more informal approach to dining.
Christian Puglisi, for example, has announced the closure of Relae and Manfreds and will also be working more on his informal restaurants Mirabelle and Baest and even when it comes to GELINAZ!, Redzepi together with Rosio Sanchez have decided to organise their Stay at Home event at Rosio’s place rather than noma.
It seems like Redzepi is again leading the way showing that the future is going to be much less formal when it comes to dining.
Redzepi said that he realised through the first experience how important it was to create something that was accessible to everyone. “I did not realise how important it was for me to create something that was able to be enjoyed by anyone. This year, we have faced the largest challenges and we have had to renounce to many things but we have also been able to concentrate and create new ideas,” he said.
There will be four burgers to choose from. The classic, the cheese burger, a vegetarian and a vegan burger and all these can be accompanied a number of side dishes.
Kristian Bauman, on the other hand, chef and partner for Redzepi at Restaurant 108 has opened a pop-up restaurant a few weeks ago inside the former factory of Empirical Spirits. The restaurant is called Koan and is inspired by Korean cuisine. His aim is to turn this pop-up concept into a permanent restaurant.
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