National dish

What is the national dish of Finland?

Finland's national food is ruisleipä, dark sourdough rye bread, chosen in a 2017 public vote run by the ELO Foundation with the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. It took 25.7% of the vote, just ahead of Karelian stew (karjalanpaisti) at 24.7%. Because bread is not a cooked dish, Karelian stew and Karelian pasties are also often named as Finland's national dish.

Updated 2026-10-123 min read

How Finland chose its national food

Finland is one of the few countries that has actually voted on the question. In autumn 2016 the ELO Foundation for the Promotion of Finnish Food Culture organised a national vote, together with the farmers' union MTK and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. In a first round, about 10,000 people proposed more than 1,000 dishes. A jury of food professionals cut that to 12 finalists, and nearly 50,000 people then voted.

The result, announced by the public broadcaster Yle in January 2017:

Rye bread: 25.7%, the winner;
Karelian stew: 24.7%, a very close second;
Fried fish with mashed potatoes: third;
Karelian pasties and pea soup: also highly ranked;
the other finalists were cured fish, fish soup (the jury's own favourite), liver casserole, bilberry pie, mämmi, pizza and viili.

What is Finnish rye bread?

Ruisleipä is a dark sourdough bread made from wholegrain rye flour. Unlike Swedish rye bread, which often contains syrup and spices, Finnish rye bread is unsweetened and can taste almost bitter. According to Yle, 70% of Finns buy rye bread every week.

It comes in several regional shapes. Large, round, thick loaves were the weekly staple in Karelia and Savo. In western Finland, reikäleipä ("hole bread") was baked as flat rings and hung on poles under the kitchen ceiling to dry, so it would keep through winter. Softer loaves are called limppu.

Finns distinguish perinneruoka, traditional dishes kept for holidays, from kotiruoka, everyday home food. Rye bread sits firmly in the second group, alongside meatballs and pea soup.

Karelian stew, the dish that came second

If you want a cooked national dish, Karelian stew is the one that came closest, one percentage point behind rye bread. Karjalanpaisti is a stew of pork and beef seasoned with salt, black peppercorns, bay leaves and allspice, sometimes with carrot, onion and root vegetables. It is traditionally braised in a pot inside the oven, which is why people in Finnish-speaking Karelia simply call it paisti or uunipaisti, "oven stew".

Meat was once scarce, so the stew was festive food. It became an everyday dish across Finland in the 20th century and is still eaten on Independence Day and at Christmas. In 2007, readers of the tabloid Iltalehti voted it Finland's national dish, ten years before rye bread won the larger vote.

Karelian pasties

The third Karelian dish in the running is the Karelian pasty, karjalanpiirakka: an open oval of very thin rye dough with the edges pinched into pleats around a filling of rice porridge. It has had EU Traditional Speciality Guaranteed status since 2003, so only pasties made to the traditional recipe may carry the name; others must be sold as rice or potato pasties.

The filling has changed over time. The oldest pasties had a rye crust filled with barley or talkkuna. Potato and then buckwheat arrived in the 19th century, followed by rice and millet. Rice is the most popular filling today, with mashed potato and rice-and-carrot also common.

In our recipe, 200 g of short-grain rice cooks slowly in milk for 40 minutes and is cooled until firm. The rye discs are rolled almost translucent, filled, pleated and baked for 10 to 15 minutes at 275 °C, the hottest an oven goes. Straight out of the oven they are brushed with butter and hot water, covered so the crust softens, and topped with munavoi, egg butter made from mashed hard-boiled eggs and soft butter.

Other dishes to know from Finland

Lohikeitto is one of Finland's most popular salmon dishes: a soup built on a stock of salmon head and bones with allspice and bay, then leek, potato, carrot, salmon and cream, finished with dill. The salmon goes in off the boil and poaches for five minutes, or it shreds and the cream splits.

In Lapland the signature plate is poronkäristys, sautéed reindeer. The meat is shaved paper-thin while frozen, browned in butter, braised for 45 minutes to an hour, and served on mashed potato with crushed raw lingonberries and pickled cucumber.

Kama, Estonia's roasted grain flour, is eaten in Finland as talkkuna: see the national dish of Estonia. Rye pastry with a creamy filling also links Karelian pasties to Latvia's sklandrausis, covered in the national dish of Latvia. Read our guide to Nordic food, or find all three recipes on our page about the food of Finland.

The recipes

Questions people ask

Is rye bread really Finland's national dish?

Rye bread won the 2017 public vote for Finland's national food, organised with the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. Karelian stew came a very close second, and it is often named as the national dish too.

What is the national dish of Finland besides rye bread?

Karelian stew (karjalanpaisti), a pork and beef stew braised in the oven, is the main other answer. Karelian pasties are also widely cited.

What is served with Karelian pasties?

They are served warm with munavoi, a spread of chopped hard-boiled egg mashed into butter.

Are Karelian pasties Finnish or Russian?

They come from the region of Karelia, which is split between Finland and Russia. They are eaten throughout Finland and in neighbouring areas such as Estonia and the Republic of Karelia.

What do Finns eat in Lapland?

The best-known Lapland dish is poronkäristys, thinly shaved reindeer braised in butter and served with mashed potato and lingonberries.

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