Recipe
🍽️ DINNER
Smørrebrød (Three Classics)
Denmark’s open-faced rye sandwiches, built in proper order: egg & tomato, potato & chive, and beet & apple.
Danish · easy · serves 3
prep 30 min · cook 15 min
~467 cal · 14g protein · 57g carbs · 21g fat · 9g fiber · 14g sugars · 12g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
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Smorrebrod, the Danish open sandwich, is deceptively strict for something so everyday. It starts with a slice of dense, dark rye bread, rugbrod, buttered right to the edges so no topping ever touches bare bread, then built upward: pickled herring, or roast beef with crispy onions, or tiny shrimp piled high, each with its own traditional garnishes.
There is even an order of operations. At a proper smorrebrod lunch you eat from the sea to the land, herring first if it is present, then other fish, then meat, and always with a knife and fork rather than the hands. Each piece is composed to be beautiful as well as balanced, and a cold aquavit or beer alongside is part of the ritual.
Copenhagen's lunch counters and old basement restaurants have spent a century elevating it from a labourer's packed lunch into something close to a national art form. At its best it is precise and generous at once, a small still-life you happen to be allowed to eat.
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Make it yours
✓ Naturally vegetarian and nut- and pork-free. No swaps needed.
Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
🐖 Pork-Free
Dietary labels are a cooking guide, not allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish; we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, read the label on every product you use, and note that a kitchen can cross-contaminate in ways a recipe cannot control.
Ingredients
US
Metric
Serves 3
6 Danish rye bread (rugbrød), thin slices
Hard to find? a dense wholegrain rye from a bakery, sliced thin - it has to be the heavy, dark, close-grained sort that holds a topping without bending. Supermarket light rye is mostly wheat and will fold under the weight
4 tbsp good butter, softened
3 eggs, boiled jammy
4 small potatoes, boiled and sliced
2 beets, roasted or pickled, sliced
1/2 apple, thin slices
a squeeze lemon
1/3 cup crème fraîche or thick yogurt
a small handful chives
a small handful dill
a small handful cress
1 tomato, for topping
1 tbsp capers, for topping
2 tbsp crispy onions, for topping
Instructions
1
Butter every slice of dense rye bread completely, right to the edges.
✎ Chef’s note
The Danes call this tat-smurt, buttering thickly edge to edge. It waterproofs the bread so the toppings do not make it soggy.
2
Build the first: shingle egg slices with tomato, capers, and cress.
3
Build the second: potato slices, a ribbon of creme fraiche, chives, and crispy onions.
4
Build the third: beets with apple, a little yogurt, and dill.
5
Serve open-faced, eaten with a knife and fork, one kind at a time rather than stacked.
Copenhagen lunch-counter tradition.
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🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
📍
Zealand (Copenhagen). Smorrebrod has a documented ceiling: Oskar Davidsen's in Copenhagen listed 178 different open sandwiches on its menu in 1933. The rules are strict too, buttered rye underneath so nothing soaks through, one clear main topping, and the whole thing taken with a knife and fork.
🗺️
Denmark. What Danes call wienerbrod, Vienna bread, is what everyone else calls Danish pastry, and the name is the accurate one: the laminated technique arrived with Austrian bakers in the nineteenth century. The other Danish export is dated too. The New Nordic Cuisine Manifesto was written in Copenhagen in November 2004, by named authors, and is a movement rather than a tradition.
🌍
Europe. A surprising amount of European cooking is under five hundred years old. Tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, maize, beans and chocolate all crossed from the Americas after 1492, and none of them was trusted quickly: the potato took most of the eighteenth century to be accepted as food rather than animal fodder across much of the north.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from Denmark
WienerbrødThe original "Danish": flaky laminated pastry with custard or jam, glazed and eaten with coffee.
FrikadellerPan-fried pork-and-veal meatballs, flattened and golden, the everyday staple at the heart of Danish home cooking.
RisalamandeA cold almond rice pudding folded with whipped cream and cherry sauce, the Danish Christmas dessert with a hidden almond.
Browse all Denmark recipes →
Good to know
Storing it: Best made to order. Prep the fillings ahead and assemble just before eating so nothing turns soggy.
Make it a Denmark meal
RisalamandeDessert
FrikadellerLunch
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Frequently asked questions
What is Smørrebrød (Three Classics)?
Denmark’s open-faced rye sandwiches, built in proper order: egg & tomato, potato & chive, and beet & apple.
Where does Smørrebrød (Three Classics) come from?
Smørrebrød (Three Classics) is a Danish dish from Zealand (Copenhagen), Denmark.
Can Smørrebrød (Three Classics) be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Smørrebrød (Three Classics) recipe includes substitution suggestions for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free, and pork-free versions, including several at once such as gluten-free and dairy-free together. Treat them as a starting guide rather than a guarantee, and see the allergen note below.
Is Smørrebrød (Three Classics) safe for people with food allergies?
Our dietary labels and substitutions are a cooking guide, not medical or allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish, but we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, always read the label on every product you use, and remember a home or commercial kitchen can cross-contaminate ingredients in ways a recipe cannot control.
How long does Smørrebrød (Three Classics) take to make?
About 45 minutes total (30 minutes prep, 15 minutes cooking), serving 3.
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