Dine and Dish: Valhalla in Visalia

VISALIA, Calif. (KFSN) - Velkommen to Valhalla in Visalia.

"Valhalla. When people see that, what does that mean? It means Viking heaven," Valhalla owner Kim Payne says.

You don't have to be a hungry Viking to enjoy the Danish food here.

"Yeah my favorite spot for breakfast. Amazing." customer Angel Felix said.

"A lot of these foods are foods you grew up eating," I asked.

"I did. Yep. My grandma made them. We grew up eating Danish pancakes, aebleskiver."

Fascinating to watch Payne create the round aebleskiver. Each pancake ball is carefully shaped.

"The aebleskivers are really amazing with their homemade jam," Payne says.

Payne grew up eating thin Danish pancakes rolled up.

You can also have a more traditional Danish pancake.

"We get this delicious lingonberry jam in and it comes from Sweden. That's where the berries are grown," Payne says.

"This is actually a Danish sausage called medisterpolse. The Scandanavians and the especially the Danes use allspice and cloves in their meat," Payne says.

Tourists from Denmark visiting the national parks have been impressed.

"They said it was spot on like home so that's always a compliment to me."

A fiery show is the rum base for the bananas foster French toast.

"The foster itself is butter, brown sugar and rum. And you can taste the rum. It's indescribable. It's just yummy," Payne says.

Oralia Najera can handle any order that comes in.

"Orio has been with us for 30 years. 34 years. She is our staple in the kitchen," Payne says.

"I'm gonna start crying. Oh my goodness," Najera says.

She makes tasty chile verde. Her chorizo and egg comes with potatoes, bell pepper and onion.

"We make a cilantro creme sauce from scratch that we drizzle across the top that really kind of makes it pop."

The Valhalla staff, even the customers here, make you feel at home. So much so that Perez makes the drive from Woodlake to eat at Valhalla.

"What do you like about this place?" I asked.

"Good food. Period," Perez responsed.

Valhalla serves only breakfast 7 a.m. to noon, Tuesday through Saturday.

"My mom and I started the restaurant back in 1982. I think one of the reasons why we stayed open is our customers appreciate everything we make is homemade," Payne says.