“My name is Helene Forchhammer. I live here in Nørrebro with my husband and my daughter. I’m an educated food science teacher, and I have the Instagram profile, @eatrealbereal, where I post about home cooked meals and different recipes. My cookbook “Den mad vi spiser” will be published in May, and will have a strong focus on vegetables and a kitchen without restrictions. For me, cooking is inspiration, desire and play.

I found out pretty quickly that I wasn’t supposed to be a regular chef. I was briefly at cooking school, but it didn’t inspire me. Actually it was quite the opposite. I kind of stopped cooking for a long time after, because the place just wasn’t nice. It wasn’t until I started teacher education, that I decided to start a food profile on Instagram.

To be honest it started as a joke, but I felt energized while doing it, and it was a way to be creative and take some funny pictures. After some time I found that I could communicate and educate through food, which are two things that really interest me. Education through food is important - especially with children.”

“Well, I grew up in the collective Fabrikken in Christiania. There were a lot of togetherness and commitment. When I was around 13 years old, I started cooking regularly for the whole collective. A long dining table with 14 people every day eating. I think it’s been a natural part of my life to cook for many people, and it’s very much a social thing for me. Therefore I was often inviting friends home for dinner and gatherings. In my opinion food must unite, and there must be enough for everyone.

Along the way, it went from a hobby to a bit more serious path, but at the same time, I have always been driven by pure passion and desire. I kind of always knew that I wanted to do something with food. EatRealBeReal has been more of a platform and free space, which has allowed me, for instance, to make a cookbook. I also do catering once in a while, and I will continue to do so.”

“The best way is definitely to go traveling, but I haven’t done that for a long time. Both because there has been corona, but then I’ve also been pregnant and had a child. Therefore I have been focusing on exploring and using the food scene in Copenhagen. Otherwise, it’s something like using the big, wonderful internet, where you can sit and get inspired for hours. But I think the game changer is to cook yourself and get inspired that way, which means not having a ready-made recipe.

I feel the most inspired, when I have no restrictions and I can play with the food. Creativity and visuals always play a big part in my cooking, and often you just learn more by doing things yourself and thinking outside the box. As I said, food and cooking must be driven by desire.”

“First of all, I don’t have any intention of telling people what’s right or wrong. For me, this is about eating something that I can vouch for. You know, keeping it real and staying true to myself. And what is real food to me? In my world, it must be food that has been made with the intention that it should taste good and make people happy. Some energy needs to be put in, so we can bring out the good flavors. It has to taste like something, right? It doesn’t have to be all fancy, but it’s important to know what you are eating.

The climate is a key aspect. Including awareness, such as knowing what’s in season and making sure the shopping basket is mainly locally produced ingredients, or as locally produced as possible. Not that I have a dogma that everything should be 100% local. Vegetables are the mainstay on my Instagram profile - that’s the direction I wanna go in. Both in terms of taste, but also for the sake of the climate. Luckily they are also the most fun to make.”

“Toppings is your friend. You can actually make something pretty basic, but if you fire up some different flavors, then it can be pretty easy to make food that tastes like something. Make some simple dishes, and then play with some toppings afterward. That’s a nice tangible piece of advice. Also, don’t forget to taste your food. That’s the most important thing. And if you think it tastes good, then you are doing just perfect.

If you have an autoimmune disease as I do, then my advice is to just eat out of desire. Because you can feel really guilty about things. The best driving force is to get some nice things in the body, and then not focus so much on everything you’re not doing. You just have to keep doing what you’re doing. Remember to feel for yourself and eat all those lovely vegetables, not because you have to, but because you want to.”