Dreaming of Denmark

Like most Danish words, "hygge" isn't pronounced the way it looks (it rhymes with the English word "sugar" – say it like "hugar"). The Danes proudly boast that it has no English equivalent, and they're right to an extent. The word is usually translated as "cosy", but that doesn't convey the great importance with which the concept of "hygge" is held in Danish society.

It means snuggling up under a blanket in front of a fire, but also the feeling of spending time with friends on a warm summer afternoon. Hmm. This is more confusing than I first thought.

The best way to understand a foreign concept is, as always, to experience it firsthand. The Danes have a reputation for being standoffish towards outsiders, but Iason – a friend of a friend – has been an incredible host since this road-weary Australian arrived on his doorstep. Like most modern Vikings, however, he isn't one for talking about friendship and feelings: instead, he cooks his feelings for you and serves them for dinner.

And they are delicious.

Tonight, his feelings take the form of a thick potato and bacon soup, topped with rye bread fried in butter and mushrooms fried in cream. Just last night, I ate at Noma – which, having been crowned the world's best restaurant three years running, I had to book months in advance – but Iason's simple dinner satisfies me much more deeply. It touches something inside me that the intricate and expensive food at Noma couldn't.

This is true soul food.

Though my stomach can't quite believe it, there is dessert: risengrød, or rice porridge. Made like risotto, with milk instead of stock, it's eaten for breakfast, dinner or supper. At Christmastime, it's always topped with a warm cherry sauce, but tonight we eat it with – sit down if you aren't already – a knob of butter and a sprinkling of cinnamon sugar.

I breathe in its sweet steam while I sit in the kitchen with my new friend, and look out at the snowy streets of Copenhagen. So this is "hygge". It's been inside me all along, but I never had the word for it.