Torvehallerne are food halls which are positioned in the center of Copenhagen which sell a large variety of food. This includes fresh vegetables, cheese, fish, and freshly baked bread. The prices are high and the focus is on quality and ecology, rather than price and quantity. The shops are specialized in offering a selection of products from their respective shops. In conversation with cashiers, they explained to me that the dialogue is what sets apart Torvehallerne from regular supermarkets. This is the conversation around the products being sold. An example was given by a retailer from a cheese shop who told me that they used a more” old-fashioned” way of producing the cheese, which was correspondingly more expensive. The clientele in Torvehallerne sees (high end) restaurants buying from the stands, and appeals to Copenhageners as well as tourists. A noticeable aspect was the emphasis on Danishness, where it was often advertised if the product was grown within the country.

By Astrid Zibrandtsen as part of the LUC project "Decolonising the Plate" led by Dr. Maja Vodopivec

Relevant reading:

“Knowledge, Food and Place. A Way of Producing, a Way of Knowing.” Sociologia Ruralis 48, no. 3 (2008): 200–222. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9523.2008.00462.x.