A Viking family would typically eat two meals per day. Dagmal was the morning meal in which the adults would eat leftover stew from the night before with bread and fruit. The children would usually have porridge and dried fruit or, on occasion, buttermilk and bread.
The Vikings ate a fairly healthy diet that consisted of meat, fish and vegetables. However, the harsh Scandinavian weather made it difficult for Vikings to raise animals and grow crop in the winter months, limiting their winter meals to predominantly pickled meat and vegetables.
The most common method for cooking food was by boiling it. Meat was sometimes prepared by boiling it in a wood-lined pit. A pit was dug and lined with wood. Meat and water were placed in the pit, and hot stones were dropped in to bring the temperature up to boiling.
The Vikings were good sailors. They used the position of the Sun and the stars to find their way at sea. They sailed in wooden ships called longships. Rowers and sails moved the longships across the seas.
Grains and bread
A large part of the Viking diet consisted of grain products like bread and porridge. Bread would have been enjoyed with every meal, though it wouldn't be much like the bread we eat nowadays.
Archaeological findings show that the Vikings in the ninth century AD already ate flat, round pastry based loafs showing all kind of ingredients, which were baked in ovens that look like something like modern pizza ovens. This was about eight hundred years before the first mention of pizza in Italy.
For dessert the Vikings will eat fresh fruit and a little honey on buttered bread. Beer will be drunk as well as mead, a beverage made from honey. Horsemeat was spitted and roasted rather like a kebab. The Vikings had bowls and plates very similar to our own, but made more often from wood rather than pottery.
Your child should watch Vikings if…
They're old enough. The show is intended for a more mature audience, and the violence and suggestive themes may be too much for younger audience. They like history. The show does an amazing job of recreating the lives of 8th century Scandinavians.
Vikings ate fruit and vegetables and kept animals for meat, milk, cheese and eggs. They had plenty of fish as they lived near the sea. Bread was made using quern stones, stone tools for hand grinding grain. This clip is from the BBC series, 'See You See Me'.
I don't recommend this for young children under age of 18 unless they are very mature for their age and It won't affect them. Nevertheless it's an amazing show and teaches a person a little bit from the Viking period and how they meet other civilisations. 1 person found this helpful.
Vikings loved rich stews, so often meats, vegetables and wild greens were stewed in the cauldron with water. Breads were baked on flat stones or iron griddles over the fire. Salt and pepper were available to most Vikings while costlier spices were imported and added to the foods of wealthier Vikings.
Viking Age tablewear consisted of plates, bowls and mugs mainly made from wood. The fork was not yet known. Instead people used their fingers, spoons and knives.
The Vikings did not make much pottery but used natural materials such as wood (for plates) and bone and horn (for cups). Their cooking pots and similar were made from soapstone.
Eggs. The Vikings not only ate eggs from domestic animals like chickens, ducks and geese, but they also enjoyed wild eggs. They considered gulls' eggs, which were collected from clifftops, a particular delicacy.
The Vikings had several options, when it came to making porridge. It could be made from barley, oats, buckwheat or millet. They mixed berries and apples into the porridge to add sweetness. Porridge was typically part of the daily food intake, especially that of the poor.
Food would have been dried or salted meat or fish. It could only be cooked if the crew were able to land. They'd drink water, beer or sour milk. The hardship of life on board, especially in rough seas, meant that Vikings did not make voyages in the winter but waited until spring.
Vikings were avid hunters, and would capture reindeer, elk and even bear to bring back to the hearth fires. And of course, since Vikings spent so much time on the water, fish formed a major part of their diet.
Though relatively few historical records mention the role of women in Viking warfare, the Byzantine-era historian Johannes Skylitzes did record women fighting with the Varangian Vikings in a battle against the Bulgarians in A.D.
For Mature Teenagers and Up.
Netflix released the popular historical drama series “Vikings” in India in May 2020. However, to viewer's shock it was a censored version. The show, released uncensored in US and Italy, comes with several cuts and blurs as reported by users. The scenes censored depict nudity, violence and even meat!
In Iceland, especially, Vikings enjoyed their dairy, and often ate it in the form of skyr, a fermented, yogurt-like cheese that today is sometimes marketed as a dairy “superfood.” Viking lore mentions the creamy substance, says Barraclough, who recalls a “saga where a man hides from his enemies in a vat of skyr—which ...
Did the Vikings have ice cream? Perhaps not, but they certainly could have had it on Iceland – using Skyr! Read on and follow our frozen journey back to the ancient origins of this...
Play is not a recent development in history in fact from grave goods and the sagas, we learn that Vikings played board games avidly, they carved dolls and toys for their children, played dice and gambled as well as partaking in boisterous sports at their feasts and gatherings.