I had been dreaming about proper Norwegian fish for weeks before our trip, so when we finally set off for Hundeidvik in More og Romsdal, my stomach was practically rumbling louder than the hire car engine. The journey from Alesund Airport was all winding roads and fjord views, and I had packed what I considered a very sensible snack bag. Unfortunately, in my excitement, I had placed a tub of pickled herring right next to my partner's jacket on the back seat. The lid, it turned out, was not fully secured. By the time we reached our holiday home, his waterproof smelled like a fishmonger's bin and he was threatening to feed me to the nearest seagull. Not my finest moment as trip planner, I will admit.

The holiday home itself was a proper charmer, wooden and red with white trim, perched where the mountains seem to tumble straight into the water. But what genuinely made me gasp was the kitchen. I am used to holiday rental kitchens having approximately one blunt knife and a saucepan with a wobbly handle. This one had actual space, a proper cooker, and windows looking out towards the fjord. I stood there planning meals like a general before battle, while my partner aired his herring-scented jacket on the washing line and muttered about revenge.

Our first morning, I insisted on doing things properly. We drove the few miles into the local area and found a small fishmonger where a chap with enormous hands wrapped up cod so fresh it practically still had opinions. Back at the house, I attempted my grandmother's fish soup recipe from memory. I am not Norwegian, and my grandmother was from Derbyshire, so this was already questionable. The cream split. The potatoes went slightly mushy. But we ate it on the terrace wrapped in blankets, watching the light change on the water, and it tasted like absolute triumph. My partner conceded that perhaps I was forgiven for the herring incident. Perhaps.

The next day we found a farmers' market, modest but wonderful, where I bought root vegetables with soil still clinging to them and cheese that the seller explained came from goats who spent their summers on nearby hillside pastures. I nodded seriously as if I understood goat seasonal migration patterns. We also picked up cloudberries, which I had never tasted fresh before. They are strange little things, tart and honeyed all at once, like eating a sunset if sunsets were slightly confusing.

That evening I attempted pan-fried cod with the market vegetables and a cloudberry sauce that I improvised based on absolutely nothing but optimism. The sauce was too sweet. The cod was slightly overcooked because I got distracted by a passing boat. But we opened a bottle of wine and ate slowly, and the kitchen windows steamed up with cooking smells and contentment.

Breakfast became my favourite ritual. Proper coffee in the big pot, brown cheese on crackers, and smoked salmon that we bought from another local supplier who seemed mildly amused by my enthusiasm. I would stand at the counter in my socks, looking out at the fjord, feeling genuinely pleased with myself for no particular reason.

By our final evening, I had improved somewhat. The fish soup actually worked, creamy and proper, with dill from a pot I had noticed growing wild near the house. We ate it with bread from the small bakery we had discovered, and I felt that rare satisfaction of having cooked something decent in an unfamiliar kitchen, in an unfamiliar country, using ingredients that had not travelled far to reach the plate.

I am not a brilliant cook. I am enthusiastic and occasionally lucky, and I own at least one leaking tub of herring. But something about that kitchen, those views, and the quiet pleasure of feeding ourselves from what we found nearby made me feel briefly capable and genuinely content. We finished with cloudberries and cream, and I decided not to mention that I had slightly burned the first batch. Some details can stay between a cook and her fjord.