Here's What Danish Superstar Claus Meyer Will Be Serving At His NYC Food Hall

Danish culinary star and Noma co-founder Claus Meyer's hotly anticipated new Grand Central Terminal Nordic food hall will be opening as early as May — with porridges, baked goods, smørrebrød, coffee, and more on deck. The Great Northern Food Hall, a 5,000-square-foot space in Vanderbilt Hall, will be divided into five pavilions and a bar, his rep tells Eater. Each one will focus on a different menus that rotate daily, with an emphasis on seasonal ingredients from around New York state.

Grain Bar will be serving both sweet and savory porridges. Salads, house-pressed juices, and vegetable-driven small bites will be offered at a pavilion called Almanak. Meyer will focus on "an expansive in-house bread and pastry program," and he'll be selling the baked goods at a food hall outpost of Meyer's Bageri, a bakery that's currently in pop-up mode in Williamsburg. The Danish restaurateur's also currently working on setting up a coffee roasting site in Brownsville, where he's opening a culinary school and restaurant. Coffee from the new facility will be sold in the hall in a pavilion called Brownsville Roasters.

Finally, a fifth pavilion called Open Rye will be dedicated to smørrebrød, the traditional Danish open-face sandwiches on rye bread. Meyer's previously talked about introducing New Yorkers to the classically Danish food, which dates back to the 1800's. In a video promoting the food hall, he made a kartoffelmad, a potato version of the sandwich with wholegrain rye bread, onion, chives, bacon, butter, and mayonnaise.

Unlike many other new food halls, Meyer controls all the menus and concepts for the Great Northern Food Hall. He won the bid to take over the landmarked space over 14 other groups a couple years ago, and since then, he's moved his family to New York and ambitiously pursued local projects. Besides the food hall, culinary school, and Williamsburg bakery, Meyer is also opening an 100-seat restaurant called Agern in Grand Central, led by Icelandic star chef Gunnar Gíslason. Plus, he plans to offer Scandinavian-style worker benefits like paid leave and life insurance to all his employees. Stay tuned as more information about the chef's activities becomes available.