My parents are in Thailand now, so I wound up having orphan Swedish Christmas with some NYC stragglers. One person got stranded here after his flight was canceled because of the weekend blizzard, one person was finishing closing on a new apartment, and a few, like me, were staycationing for no particular reason. Given the travel nightmares abounding -- major delays, swine flu, explosive-rigged terrorist -- I can't say I'm sorry about it.
Besides, I'd been hoping to do Swedish Christmas since I left Stockholm. My Swedish friend Lina and her friend Johan hosted and we made the julbord (Christmas table) of my Ingmar Bergman fantasies. We even watched the beginning of Fanny and Alexander, the part before it descends into domestic violence nightmare. Tjohoo!
Lina and Johan in the kitchen.
I adore Lina's singular sartorial sense. She's near six feet tall with short, asymmetrical blond hair and she's always the most interestingly dressed person in the room. On Christmas night, she wore a single shoulder length earring with little tufts of recycled fur and a metal mesh belt in the shape of a snake clamping down on its tail. She was dressed in the colors she had painted her apartment walls, which she referred to as her "favorite ice cream flavors. The bedroom is Haagen Dazs vanilla and the kitchen is Haagen Dazs coffee."
Janssons frestelse on the left, prinskorv in the pan next to it.
Herring, consumed with snaps. Skål!
The Swedish palate favors sweet and pickled flavors, far east spices like cardamom and saffron, fishy little fish like herring and anchovy, zero garlic and buckets of butter and cream. As with all cuisines, you can rank the foods' level of accessibility, universally-lovable cinnamon buns being Level 1, bulging, natives-only cans of surströmming being about level 10.
So our julbord's Level 1 dishes included:
Classic köttbullar (meatballs) with rårörda lingon (stirred lingonberry preserve), pressgurka (pressed cucumber) and cream sauce
Lussekatter (Swedish saffron buns)
Prinskorv (little cocktail sausages)
Ham
Gravad lax (cured salmon) with dill on rye bread
Glögg (mulled wine)
Eggnog
Various cheeses
Pepparkakor (gingerbread thins)
Apple pie with vanilla ice cream (Paj, as it's spelled, is actually quite Swedish)
Level 2 dishes were:
Janssons frestelse (Jansson's temptation), a julienned potato, onion, cream and anchovy dish that sounds weird but is less weird than it sounds
Sweet pickled beets
Sill (herring) plate with curried herring, cream herring, matjes herring, mustard herring and dill herring, with boiled potato, knäckebröd (hard bread) and Västerbotten cheese
Snaps (aquavit)
Johan's meatballs were superb, and it was instructive to watch a native expert's technique. He rolls the meatballs a little larger than I have -- about 1 1/2 inches in diameter, making sure to push any errant pieces of onion into the meatball so they don't break apart. A generous amount of butter goes into the nonstick pan to melt down. Then, before he places the very round meatballs in the pan, he jiggles the plate they're on a bit to make sure they roll around easily. Then into the pan they go, enough to almost cover the entire pan in a single layer. Johan immediately gives them a good shake to make sure they roll and brown all around. None of them fell apart. Genius! Another key -- LOTS and LOTS of white pepper.
Dinner was such a lovely affair, about ten of us sitting in white chairs around an all white table, two caterpillars of tea lights flickering against elegant conical glasses filled with syrupy frozen snaps. I led Helan går, since that's the only drinking song I know, and Lina and Johan each contributed a few from memory. (One of them translated to something having four legs, something having three legs, and a cock having no legs but it can stand on its own?) Am feeling a bit nostalgic for Sverige, du gamla, du fria.
Recipes forthcoming!
Besides, I'd been hoping to do Swedish Christmas since I left Stockholm. My Swedish friend Lina and her friend Johan hosted and we made the julbord (Christmas table) of my Ingmar Bergman fantasies. We even watched the beginning of Fanny and Alexander, the part before it descends into domestic violence nightmare. Tjohoo!
Lina and Johan in the kitchen.
I adore Lina's singular sartorial sense. She's near six feet tall with short, asymmetrical blond hair and she's always the most interestingly dressed person in the room. On Christmas night, she wore a single shoulder length earring with little tufts of recycled fur and a metal mesh belt in the shape of a snake clamping down on its tail. She was dressed in the colors she had painted her apartment walls, which she referred to as her "favorite ice cream flavors. The bedroom is Haagen Dazs vanilla and the kitchen is Haagen Dazs coffee."
Janssons frestelse on the left, prinskorv in the pan next to it.
Herring, consumed with snaps. Skål!
The Swedish palate favors sweet and pickled flavors, far east spices like cardamom and saffron, fishy little fish like herring and anchovy, zero garlic and buckets of butter and cream. As with all cuisines, you can rank the foods' level of accessibility, universally-lovable cinnamon buns being Level 1, bulging, natives-only cans of surströmming being about level 10.
So our julbord's Level 1 dishes included:
Classic köttbullar (meatballs) with rårörda lingon (stirred lingonberry preserve), pressgurka (pressed cucumber) and cream sauce
Lussekatter (Swedish saffron buns)
Prinskorv (little cocktail sausages)
Ham
Gravad lax (cured salmon) with dill on rye bread
Glögg (mulled wine)
Eggnog
Various cheeses
Pepparkakor (gingerbread thins)
Apple pie with vanilla ice cream (Paj, as it's spelled, is actually quite Swedish)
Level 2 dishes were:
Janssons frestelse (Jansson's temptation), a julienned potato, onion, cream and anchovy dish that sounds weird but is less weird than it sounds
Sweet pickled beets
Sill (herring) plate with curried herring, cream herring, matjes herring, mustard herring and dill herring, with boiled potato, knäckebröd (hard bread) and Västerbotten cheese
Snaps (aquavit)
Johan's meatballs were superb, and it was instructive to watch a native expert's technique. He rolls the meatballs a little larger than I have -- about 1 1/2 inches in diameter, making sure to push any errant pieces of onion into the meatball so they don't break apart. A generous amount of butter goes into the nonstick pan to melt down. Then, before he places the very round meatballs in the pan, he jiggles the plate they're on a bit to make sure they roll around easily. Then into the pan they go, enough to almost cover the entire pan in a single layer. Johan immediately gives them a good shake to make sure they roll and brown all around. None of them fell apart. Genius! Another key -- LOTS and LOTS of white pepper.
Dinner was such a lovely affair, about ten of us sitting in white chairs around an all white table, two caterpillars of tea lights flickering against elegant conical glasses filled with syrupy frozen snaps. I led Helan går, since that's the only drinking song I know, and Lina and Johan each contributed a few from memory. (One of them translated to something having four legs, something having three legs, and a cock having no legs but it can stand on its own?) Am feeling a bit nostalgic for Sverige, du gamla, du fria.
Recipes forthcoming!
This looks absolutely amazing. I don't know what any of this tastes like, but I really want to go and make it all right now! Thank you for these lovely pictures and the recipes you provided. That goes for just about everything you've posted. I've only just found your blog but I know that I'll be coming back to it again!
I believe my son is planning something similar. I wish luck to you.