A reindeer with my name on it

It might be difficult to trace the origins of Brazilian beef, but Finnish reindeer leaves a trail from Lapland to Helsinki

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By Sami Simola
     
      It was pretty much a random order. Eyes closed, and the finger came down by chance on the Sallivaara Reindeer Herding Cooperative, nestling up against the Norwegian border in the Lemmenjoki National Park.
      From here we are going to buy a whole reindeer - two halves, in fact - and have it shipped down to Helsinki.
     
It may be hard to determine the origins of cuts of Brazilian beef in the shops, but one would think it is not impossible to track the path of a reindeer from Sallivaara to the capital.
      So, the first step is to make a call to a reindeer herder from the cooperative, Nils Heikki Näkkäläjärvi, from Lemmenjoki. He promises to sort out the order.
     
Because of the strange weather we have been having, the reindeer round-up - in which the animals are separated into those for slaughter and those to live another year - has been rather late, particularly in those cooperatives where there are a lot of lakes and rivers in the area.
      Normally the greater part of the slaughtering would be over by around Christmas, but with the lakes being open later and later, the herders have had their work cut out rounding up the animals from grazing areas separated by water.
      These delays mean that it looks as if reindeer can be ordered from the northernmost cooperatives well into the early spring.
      "Everyone up here knows everyone else. If somebody hasn’t got what you want, then they can ask from a friend who has. We can sort you out a reindeer, although you would be more certain to get what you want if you order in October", Näkkäläjärvi assures me over the phone.
     
On Thursday January 17th, the reindeer is taken to the village of Kaamanen, to the Sámi Area Educational Centre, where it will be slaughtered and skinned.
      The reindeer is a 23-kilo calf and it belonged to Nils Heikki’s cousin, Iisko-Henrik Näkkäläjärvi.
      Iisko-Henrik’s round-up pen is in Hirvassalmi, around 100 kilometres west from Ivalo.
      This much is made clear, but his answers become more vague and evasive as the conversation turns to the number of livestock owned by the herder.
      The replies vary from the cryptic “Well now, they are both sides of the tree”, to the stonewalling classic of “Now, you are not going to tell me the balance of your bank account now, are you?”
     
The cutting up of the meat begins on the following Tuesday at 11 a.m.
      The knife is being wielded on this occasion by Erik Valle, a student in his second year towards a reindeer diploma.
      Usually a calf of this size would be done and dusted in half an hour, but since Valle is still training and there is a photographer looking over his shoulder all the time, the job is completed at 13:30.
      The cutting for osso bucco discs from the front and hind legs is carried out the following day, as the work is safer and the results are better when the carcass is not fresh but has been frozen, explains Janne Utriainen from the Education Centre.
     
After this procedure, all of the meat is chilled in a wind-tunnel and it is then vacuum-packed for transport in frozen form.
      On Thursday January 24th, the reindeer continues its journey in two ten-kilo packages, half of the animal in each.
      The next stop after Kaamanen is Ivalo. Ivalo is not strictly the capital of the Sámi region of Finland (that is Inari), but it is the largest community in the area.
      A truck picks up the packages on Friday from outside the S-Market in Ivalo and heads for Oulu.
     
On two occasions in the past a consignment of meat from Ivalo to Oulu has disappeared along the way, although in both cases it turned up later.
      In this particular area there are the Nellim and Ivalo reindeer cooperatives, and there have been disputes aplenty around here over such things as mandatory culling of the herds or tree-felling rights.
      Some believe the disappearances are related to these spats.
      In any event, nothing goes amiss on this trip. The truck brings the reindeer halves to Oulu on Friday evening.
     
On Monday 28th January, Tauno Peltola sets off with the iced reindeer boxes on board, heading for Helsinki.
      The refrigerated truck is also carrying a consignment of French fries and hamburgers.
      Peltola stops to have a bite at the ABC gas station at Hirvaskangas, just south of Äänekoski, and has a ham and egg sandwich on rye.
      The reefer unit in the truck keeps the reindeer and the other foodstuffs happily frozen at -28°C.
      Peltola drives on, and makes a second stop in Hartola, on Highway 4 between Jyväskylä and Heinola.
     
At around 4 a.m. on Tuesday morning Tauno Peltola backs the truck up to the loading bay in the yard of KWH Freeze, a Vantaa “icehotel”.
      The storage area for frozen goods is in an industrial hall close to the Helsinki-Vantaa International Airport.
      In all other respects the cold storage facility looks just like any other rather forbidding warehouse block, but the difference is that inside it is a permanent deep-freeze.
     
At 8:19, the phone rings from Vantaa.
      The reindeer packages can be collected.
      It is now roughly three weeks since my first call to Nils Heikki Näkkäläjärvi.
      The reindeer calf with my name on it has travelled a good 1,150 kilometres from Lapland to Helsinki.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 14.2.2008
     
Note: Helsingin Sanomat’s two reindeer halves cost EUR 115 and EUR 135 respectively. The meat in the more expensive package was further processed into minced meat and also for the thinly sliced sautéed reindeer (poronkäristys) that for many foreigners is the first and perhaps only experience of the delicacy.
      Reindeer can be ordered in this way from the herding cooperatives at the link below, or from the Sámi Area Educational Centre, also linked here.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Reindeer meat is the tender, tasty, and nutritional fare of the North (9.11.2004)
  Reindeer recipes (9.11.2004)

Links:
  KWH Freeze
  Sámi Area Educational Centre
  The Sámi (Virtual Finland)
  Reindeer Herders´ Association
  Reindeer (Wikipedia)

SAMI SIMOLA / Helsingin Sanomat
sami.simola@hs.fi