Copenhagen Travel Guide
What to Eat in Copenhagen
A food lover's guide to Copenhagen: open sandwiches and how to order them, Danish pastries, hot dogs, New Nordic cooking, food markets and street food, coffee, beer and Christmas treats, with tips on eating well for less.
Copenhagen has become one of the great food cities of the world in a single generation. In the 2000s, a group of chefs launched the New Nordic movement, cooking with local, seasonal and foraged ingredients, and the city's restaurants have collected international acclaim ever since. But you do not need a fine-dining budget to eat brilliantly here. The traditional dishes, the bakeries, the markets and the street food are just as rewarding, and they are the best way to taste the city. Here is what to eat and where to find it.
Smorrebrod. The open sandwich is the classic Danish lunch: a slice of dense, dark rye bread, rugbrod, spread with butter and piled high with toppings. The traditional combinations are fixed by custom: pickled herring with onions and capers; fried fish fillet with remoulade; boiled egg and shrimp; roast pork with crackling and red cabbage; roast beef with remoulade, crispy onions and horseradish; liver pate with bacon and mushrooms; and potatoes with chives and mayonnaise. Eat them with a knife and fork, in order, fish first, then meat, then cheese, and two or three pieces make a full lunch. Smorrebrod is traditionally a lunch dish, served in old-fashioned restaurants, many of them in cellars, with a cold beer and a shot of aquavit, and modern places have reinvented it with creative toppings. Torvehallerne is the easiest place to try it at a counter.
Danish pastries and bakeries. What the world calls a Danish, the Danes call wienerbrod, Viennese bread, after the Austrian bakers who introduced the technique in the nineteenth century. Every bakery has its own versions: the kanelsnegl, a cinnamon swirl, the spandauer with custard, and the tebirkes with poppy seeds and marzipan filling. Copenhagen's modern bakeries have also turned sourdough bread and cardamom buns into an art form, and queues at the best ones begin early. A coffee and a pastry is the perfect breakfast.
Hot dogs and street food. The polsevogn, the hot dog wagon, is a Danish institution, serving red sausages in soft buns with ketchup, mustard, remoulade, crispy onions and pickled cucumber, often eaten standing at the counter. In summer, the street food markets on the harbour bring together dozens of stalls from around the world, with seating by the water, and they are a fun, informal and relatively affordable dinner. In the centre, Torvehallerne and Tivoli's Food Hall offer a wide choice under one roof.
New Nordic and fine dining. Copenhagen has a remarkable concentration of acclaimed restaurants, many of them led by chefs who trained in the New Nordic kitchens, cooking with seasonal Danish ingredients, fermentation, foraged herbs and seafood from the cold northern waters. The most famous tables are booked weeks or months ahead and are expensive, but many acclaimed chefs also run more casual bistros, wine bars and bakeries, where you can taste the same ideas for much less. Lunch menus are often the best value.
Traditional Danish dishes. Look for frikadeller, Danish meatballs; stegt flaesk, crispy fried pork belly with potatoes and parsley sauce, often called the national dish; and fiskefrikadeller, fish cakes. In winter, warming dishes such as roast pork and duck appear on menus, and in December the julefrokost, the Christmas lunch, is a long, festive meal of herring, meats and aquavit.
Coffee, beer and wine. Copenhagen is serious about coffee, and speciality roasters and cafes are everywhere, serving excellent filter coffee and espresso. For beer, Carlsberg is the historic brewery, and the city has a thriving craft beer scene, with innovative brewers and bars. Natural wine is another local passion, and the wine bars of Vesterbro, Norrebro and the old town are among the best places to spend an evening. Aquavit, the caraway-flavoured spirit, is traditionally drunk with herring.
Christmas and seasonal treats. From November, the Christmas markets sell glogg, mulled wine with raisins and almonds, and aebleskiver, round, fluffy pancake balls dusted with icing sugar and served with jam. Tivoli's Christmas market, from 13 November 2026, is the most famous place to try them. In summer, strawberries, new potatoes and fresh herring are the season's highlights, and ice cream kiosks line the harbour.
Eating well for less. Copenhagen is expensive, but you can eat brilliantly on a budget. Make lunch your main meal, as many restaurants offer cheaper lunch menus; eat smorrebrod at markets and bakeries rather than in sit-down restaurants; graze at Torvehallerne and the street food markets; and buy pastries and bread for breakfast if your hotel rate does not include it. Drink tap water, which is excellent and free, and save the fine dining for one special evening. Many restaurants close their kitchens around 22:00, and popular places are booked ahead at weekends, so reserve for dinner.
Where to stay for food lovers. Stay in the Latin Quarter at Hotel SP34, with its free Wine Hour and easy access to the old town's bars, or near the Lakes at Manon Les Suites, close to Torvehallerne and Vesterbro. Hotel Sanders, near Nyhavn, has one of the city's best hotel bars and a much-loved kitchen.
A one-day food walk. Start with coffee and a cinnamon swirl at a neighbourhood bakery, then walk to Torvehallerne for a mid-morning browse and a smorrebrod lunch. In the afternoon, walk through the Latin Quarter and the old town to Nyhavn, stopping for ice cream on the quay in summer or glogg in winter, and cross the harbour bridge to Christianshavn for a drink by the canals. In the evening, head to Vesterbro and the Meatpacking District for dinner and a natural wine or craft beer, or, in season, to Tivoli for dinner among the lights. Finish with a late hot dog from a wagon, the most Danish way to end a night out.