Fish balls and other staples: On Swedish cuisine

Sweden’s food quality is excellent.  A hamburger from Macdonald’s  tastes (in my opinion) 10X better than a burger from the Golden Arches in the states.  Standards for meats, veggies, and processed food are significantly higher than our FDA’s.  Combine high quality with the decline of the dollar, though, and you’re looking at an American exchange student with a very limited menu.

So, I may not get to truly explore the finest cuisine Sweden has to offer (though I do make special room in my budget for an almost-daily fika–Swedish sweets and pastries are to DIE for.  More on “fika” to come in a future post).  But, between grocery shopping, dining at Universitetet between classes, and dinner with my contact family, I’ve learned a thing or two about the quirky and iconic staples of the Swedish diet.

1.  Kannelbullar (or, the cinnamon bun).  Cinnamon buns are everywhere—every convenience store, café, and restaurant.  But don’t think cinn-a-bon.  These aren’t the soft gooey messes of Pilsbury origin.  Swedish cinnamon buns are doughier, more savory, and topped with sugar instead of frosting.
2. Köttbullar (or, Swedish meatballs).  Surprise, surprise.  This iconic dish is a staple in nearly every Swedish household.  Swedish meatballs are traditionally served with potatoes (usually boiled), a brown, creamy gravy, and lingonberry preserves.  Yum yum.
3. Lingonberries.  Similar to the cranberry, but more tart.  These small berries grow in the forrest, and picking them is a popular Swedish tradition, particularly during the summer months.  They can be eaten alone, but are most often turned into either juice or jam.
4. knäckebröd—(or, crispy bread—the most popular brand is the Wasa cracker). Served at nearly every meal, this “crispy bread” is typically eaten with a generous smearing of margarine or butter.  It’s also popular to top it with….well, just look below to number 5.
5. Caviar…in a tube.  So here’s where it gets a little weird folks.    Fish roe in a blue, toothpaste-esque tube pervades grocery store shelves as well as the fridges of the Swedes.  I’ve had it on knäckebröd with every meal at my contact family’s home.  It tastes like you would expect—salty and fishy, but not half-bad.  Note the smiling Swede on the label—how can you resist.
6. Fiskbullar(or, fish balls).  The Swedes are not a wasteful people.  Perhaps nothing embodies that sentiment more than the existence (and popularity) of fish balls.  Like their name suggests (and get your mind out of the third-grade gutter), they are balls of fish—“excess” cod and other mild fish—that are salvaged from the butchering and formed into the shape and size of a golf ball.  Packaged similarly to canned tuna, fiskbullar come floating in a variety of flavored sauces (I’ve only tried “lobster flavor”—it’s my contact family’s favorite).  They are cheap and nutritious, and , like the fish roe-in-a-tube, not half bad.

The bullet points obviously only offer a small window into the stange-but-delicious world of Swedish cuisine.  And I haven’t even told you about the PASTRIES.  There’ll be time for that later.  For now, time to whip up some fiskbullar (sounds much more appetizing in Swedish, huh?).

Hälsningar och god natt!

Taylor

From the journal…

Hej igen!

Since I’m getting such a late start on this blogging deal, I thought I’d include an excerpt from my personal travel journal/thought catalogue.  I wrote this a few weeks ago in September (three weeks into my time here).  Forgive the sweeping generalizations and clichés–it was what I felt in the moment and I wrote where my whimsy took me.  Welp, here it is:

After almost three weeks in Stockholm, I am finally settling in to daily life and abandoning the role of “American Tourist.”  When making a new, foreign place home ( even if only for a while), I take comfort in the moments when my days feel second-nature and routine.  For example, I have come to rely on my hour commute (combining walking and tunnelbanna ride) to and from Universitetet as a time for quiet meditation and reflection.  I no longer gape out the windows attempting a faint grasp of my surroundings, study the t-map anxiously awaiting my next stop, or twiddle my thumbs in boredom.  No, now I feel that, as I board the tube, I am seamlessly meshing into part of the collective—the living, breathing entity that is Stockholm.

In a sense, then, my transition into a normal routine marks a shift in my focus from myself as the individual to myself as a part of the collective, the whole, the community.   Perhaps this transition in thought has, at least in part, been learned through careful observation of Swedes.  When a crowded tunnelbanna train car stops, those waiting to board the train move politely to the side to allow passengers to exit before calmly entering the subway car themselves.  Upon entry, passengers file in any way possible to allow the maximum capacity to travel to their destination.  While allowing those last 4 or 5 passengers to squeeze and shimmy their way into the car means compromising your own personal space and comfort, you scrunch ever more close to the door anyway.  This scenario, which I experience almost daily, so profoundly strikes me because, having taken American public transportation (and interacted with Americans in public places in general), I know the unpleasantness that results from an individualistic mindset in a crowded situation.–unnecessary pushing, shoving, and general discontent.

To say that Swedes hold the well-being of the collective above that of the individual would be an unfair and sweeping generalization.  I have, of course, observed exceptions, and I have been here for a mere three weeks.  I am still in the honeymoon phase with Stockholm and Sweden, and I have thus far been envious of this partiality toward the collective and biased in its favor to notice and observe.

In terms of positive exceptions to the mindset-of –the-collective, Swedish style among young women has both impressed and baffled me since my arrival in Sweden.  I have been impressed by the chic, polished, yet edgy and fresh look of nearly every 20-something female on the tube and at the university.  I have, too, been baffled not by any outrageous style, but by the seemingly impossible ability of Swedes to adhere almost exactly to current trends (the omnipresent leather jacket, leather boots, patterned tights, tailored blazer, and leather bag combination) but still manage to look absolutely unique with a defined and individual style.  Of this feat, too, I am envious.

I shared my sentiments about the palpability of the importance of ‘the whole’ with my contact family’s daughter, Ebba.  (We were having dinner at my contact family’s Syrian frined’s home).  She expressed her own anxieties about a perceived negative transition among Swedes—a shift of focus away from the collective and towards the individual.  My observations were, she said, a bit of a comfort.

Hej då!

Taylor

hej från sverige

Hi Mom!

So I’m late.  Very late, actually.  I created this blog back in August before I left for Stockholm.  I never fully warmed to the idea of blogging while abroad, but (after some prodding from family and family friends) I launched the site with the inclination that, once in actual existence, it might motivate me to, I don’t know, post something.  Well, here I am, a month and a week into my studies in Stockholm, and the urge has finally struck.

My experiences thus far have been incredible.  No fear! I don’t plan on trying to make up for the last blog-less month or so by recounting every event or experience I found important or interesting.  I will say, though, that I am happy here and couldn’t imagine studying abroad anywhere else.   Stockholm is infectious.  I know that, following my departure, I’ll always carry a piece of the city with me.

To get things rolling, I’ll supply some general information about what I’m actually doing here. (Note: I apologize for the disjointed nature of this post.  In the future, I hope to maintain some coherency within my ramblings).

• I go to school at Stockholm University—about an hour total commute from my apartment in Bromma (12 minute walk to the Tunnelbana, 30ish minutes on two trains, and a 15 minute walk to class).

• I am taking four classes (all in English):  History and Theory of Radical Politics, Swedish Film and Television Culture, Swedish Language 1, and the Swedish Crime Novel.  I love my classes so far.  I get to read crime novels for school.  How cool is that?!
• I have an internship with the Stockholm International Film Festival, and currently I am editing the English version of their catalogue.  The festival is in November, and it will no doubt be a very busy, very exciting couple of weeks.
• While I live in an apartment with another American student, I have a Swedish “contact family.”  I spend time with them often—sometimes out in the city, sometimes at their home, and sometimes wandering through the Swedish wilderness (picking mushrooms, of course).   Their names are Birgitta (a lawyer for a large telecom company here in Stockholm), Kjell (pronounced “Shell,”a retired engineer for Sony Ericsson), Ebba (their 17-year-old daughter), and Plinius and Saskia (their two cats).  They are lovely, warm people and have so graciously welcomed me into their family.

• Sweden is expensive.  A coffee or tea will run you around $4 USD.  Learning to buy groceries and cook for myself in a working kitchen is a new undertaking.  That two chicken breasts will cost me around $12 USD increases the difficulty significantly.  (Read this as a desperate plea for easy, cheap vegetarian recipes.  Seriously. Send your knowledge my way!).  I can only eat so much cereal, egg, pasta, and salad.

• Swedes are an enigma.  They are chic (my GOD are they chic).  They have great skin.  They are polite.  They are reserved.  They are difficult to get to know, but once you have broken the barrier between stranger and friend (there is no ‘acquaintance’ or in between), consider yourself as having expanded your immediate family.  I so admire the honesty and strength of Swedish friendship.

So there you have it.  An (short and choppy) introduction to my life in Stockholm. More (coherent and interesting—hopefully) posts to come!  Thanks for reading (1 of you? 2 of you?)

Hej då!

Taylor