The Putrid Swedish Food That Explodes

Back when I lived in San Diego, I worked with a girl from Sweden. She ended up in the United States after she had married a marine who she'd met while they were each living in Paris, France (and, yes, I am friends with quite a few international married couples).

Anyway, she used to talk a lot about how great her beloved homeland was/is and, as most expats do, how delicious the food is. I remember her making quite a few runs to Ikea for the raw ingredients to some old, back-home recipe. Mostly, though, she had quite fond memories of two foods in particular from her childhood. One, which is available in the U.S., was salted-and-chewy black-licorice candy. If you've never had this combination, you'll either love it or hate it. I haven't seen anyone react neutrally to it. The second food is what this story is about.

As with most places I've been, I didn't really know what to expect in terms of Swedish food. Unfortunately for Sweden, I was predisposed to think in terms of what they sell at the Ikea restaurant just like people who have never been to the U.S. think that McDonald's or K.F.C. is what it's all about there.

I was very happily surprised during our first night in Sweden when Lena and Toni took us to have dinner at her mom Karen's house and there wasn't a meatball in sight. Like I wrote about in Part 1 of our trip, her food was super yummy and a great intro to home-style Swedish food. A couple of days later, they took us to a restaurant-museum-adventure-park (yes, adventure park) combo place in a nearby town. Called Svansele, you sit at tables outside (I'm guessing not during the winter, though) and eat barbecued reindeer, moose, fish, and veggies served up by some super friendly and entertaining cooks.

Even though the food is excellent, and worth the relatively-high price, the highlight of the restaurant is the attached multi-large-roomed museum/display of stuffed-and-mounted local wildlife. Each room is themed by a season of the year with matching temperature controls (the winter room is like a walk-in-refrigerator). The animals on display range from the largest local residents like bears and moose to the smallest fish, birds, and mice.

The best part of the restaurant for sure, well after the delish food, was the display showing the various traps created by hunters to catch their meals. It included all sorts of creative methods such as tying a string to a shotgun that's triggered by a the animal trying to remove a piece of food. Excellent!

So, what's this got to do with my friend's other favorite Swedish food? Not much really but I did enjoy the restaurant and museum!

On our last night in town, Lena and Toni had prepared something very special for dinner. It was special enough that we cleaned the gazebo so we could eat outside. How nice, right? Lena and Diana started by cutting up some veggies and other prep and then we all moved outside so Toni could open the cans of Surstromming.

Wait! Why did we need to go outside to open our dinner? Well, we were about to enjoy Surstromming, which is a fermented fish that's a super-trad food in Sweden. The problem is that sometimes the contents of the can explode out when it's opened! Woo-hoo! Exploding food! For some reason, I flashed back to that old urban-legend where Mikey died eating Pop Rocks and Coke...

But, wait! The potentially deadly releasing of the can's contents isn't even the best part of prepping and eating this nutritious super food. No, that honor is held by the incredibly putrid smell that emanates from the newly-opened can. I was beginning to understand why I had to vacuum the dead mosquitoes and other local fauna out of the gazebo that day...

Diana's priceless reaction to her first wiff of our soon-to-be dinner:

Turns out that my Swedish friend from San Diego's second-favorite food is a small, fermented herring fish found in the nearby Baltic Sea that comes in a can. This is how kids in Sweden say "Yummy, Mommy!!! Can I have more???":

In a good-ole Hatfield-and-McCoy's way, one legend credits the beginnings of this Swedish delicacy to some sailors giving their "beloved" Finnish neighbors old, stinky fish as part of a trade. Upon their next visit, the Finns, who are the butt of lots of Swedish jokes, are said to have asked for more of that "delicious fish". Diana and I were definitely in luck, I think.

Lena's recipe for Surstromming, which is eaten right out of the can without any cooking/processing, starts with a Swedish flat bread, a bunch of butter and boiled potatoes that are spread liberally on the bread, and pieces of the peeled and boneless fish:

To this, she adds some fresh dill, sliced tomatoes, and sour cream:

For the terror that arises from the potentially deadly package with the it-makes-you-cry smell, I can definitely say that my friend was right all along. Salty black licorice and putrid fish are both surprisingly delicious and must-not-be-missed Swedish foods. Maybe Ikea still has a thing or two to learn. Just look at these happy campers with their dinner:

Again, a big thanks to Toni and Lena for not only giving us a place to sleep, introducing us to their culture, and putting up with my limitless "why and how-come" questions, but to sharing their lives, family, friends, and exploding rotten fish with us. You guys rock and we miss you!

Skelleftea Sweden - Part 2

This is part two of our visit to Skelleftea, Sweden. To read part one, go here.

I know I wrote about it in part one but the 24 hours of daylight was truly awesome. I wasn't sure what to expect when we went up there. Would I be able to sleep? When do you know it's time for bed?

I remember hearing a story when I was a puppy about the kids who live up in Alaska where they have 24 hours of daylight. During the summer the kids would stay outside all day and their parents would let them sleep (outside) where ever they ended up falling asleep. I'm sure that someone somewhere allowed their kids to sleep outside but I'm guessing now that it's not a widespread phenomenon. All I could picture in my mind was random kids laying in random spots throughout suburban neighborhoods in scenes like some post-apocalyptic movie or something.

Well, let's just say that, although the idea of sleeping outside on the grass all night was definitely appealing, I was afraid of being carried off by Wizard-Of-Oz-flying-monkey-sized mosquitoes so inside the summer house it was.

A ~2am shot I took out the bedroom window one night (or was it morning?):

Skelleftea, as I mentioned in Part 1, is a fairly small town but it's been one of the bigger towns in the region for a long time owing to its success in mining and having a port nearby. The town has served as a social hub for the outlying areas for a long time as well.

Toni and Lena took us to Bonnstan, which is a village that developed around one of the community's churches. During the time when everyone was required to go to Sunday mass, farmers would build small living quarters near the town's church (and river) that they could use when they and their families made the trek into town.

The wooden structures, which sometimes are only one room, are fairly simple and have no bathrooms. We got lucky and were able to go inside two different Bonnstan (bonn = farmer and stan = town) residences, which are still mostly privately owned. As with the outside, they're fairly simple but that simplicity and utility is what makes them so nice. If you've ever stayed at a cabin when camping, I think you'd appreciate their design.

Skelleftea is located on the banks of the Skelleftea River and its core radiates out from the central plaza where Lena and Toni have their apartment. In a lot of ways, including the architecture, cold-weather-ready designs, bicycle friendliness, and overall livability, it reminded me a lot of Boulder, Colorado in the United States. My guess is that, if a resident of Skelleftea found themselves in Boulder, they'd feel particularly at home.

As in the U.S., pretty much every country in the world has televised game shows "where contestants compete for cash and prizes". They're just as popular in those countries too. But, do you ever wonder what happens to the folks who win a whole boat-load of money on one of those shows?

Skelleftea is home to one of those fortunate folks and, if he's not a local celebrity, he's at least very well known. So, what would you do if you suddenly found yourself with enough money to "follow your dream"? Well, this guy built his own museum and toy shop that occupies a couple of store fronts in Skelleftea:

The highlight, at least for me, is its collection of museum-quality LEGO dioramas featuring Star Wars scenes. These dioramas along with a whole bunch of other displays are a nerd's wet dream.

Welcome to Skelleftea's own LEGO Hoth:

One of the first things that I noticed in Skelleftea was that almost all of the parking lots have charging stations. I was really excited when I found out that Sweden was so green that they provide free charging for electric cars. Very cool!

Until I found out that they're not. What I thought were electric-vehicle charging stations are electrical outlets that people plug their cars into while parked SO THAT THE CAR DOESN'T TURN INTO A CARSICLE during the winter!!! Seriously? Does it get that cold? Well, in a word, yes. Actually, I found little things all over of how they're set up for some serious winter weather. Take for example these heaters below every pew in this church:

Lena or Tony, I can't remember which, at some point told me that it sometimes gets down to something like -42c (-44f) during the winter. Having lived in San Diego for almost 20 years, I have no idea what it's like to be somewhere so cold but it just doesn't seem possible. That's cold. In spite of the lovely winter weather, I still want to go back one day to experience the northern lights, the 24 hours of darkness, and, yes, the absurdly-low temperatures. But I may need to install one of those car heaters in my myself so that I can plug in at every opportunity!

One other random note. Yes, Sweden is probably most famous for its confusing-to-assemble-but-comes-in-a-flat-box-furniture-hometown-hero IKEA. Even though I didn't see one IKEA the entire time I was there (again, Skelleftea's a small town), I did see lots of examples of Swedish design and many, many things built from wood. I especially loved this built-from-wood parking structure in the center of Skelleftea. I wonder if it too came in a flat box with confusing instructions? Either way, I'm sure that Ingvar Kamprad would be proud!

Our trip to Skelleftea was pretty amazing. Not only did we get to experience 24 hours of daylight and eat a bunch of antlered animals, we got to hang out with Lena and Toni again. They're awesome. Thanks Toni and Lena for the great time. Hopefully we'll see each other again soon. Maybe in Barcelona? Or the U.A.E.?? Or perhaps even back up in Skelleftea???

What it looks like when you mix raw ingredients from four different countries with the loveliness that's Sweden:

One last note. Even though I still can't quite process how cold it gets up there, when Toni mentioned that the entire bay in the photo above freezes into a block of ice, I started to get the idea. Brrrrrrrr!!!

Skelleftea Sweden - Part 1

Just about two years ago, we had the opportunity to make a couple of new friends from Sweden. We met Lena and Toni through couchsurfing while they were living in Barcelona studying Spanish. The four of us very quickly became good friends and we were bummed when they had to return to their regular lives back up north. Before they left, though, they threw out one of those "if-you-ever-get-the-chance, you-should-come-visit-us" invitations that people do sometimes to be nice. Well, this'll serve as a warning to you if you've (or haven't yet) said something similar to me. You just might find me/us darkening your doorstep one day:

But first, the day before Diana and I left for Sweden, I came across the photo below on instagram (whereisdarrennow). It had a Swedish caption so I wasn't positive, but it looked a hell of a lot like a wedding photo. Sure enough, on the day before we went to visit them, and without telling anyone in advance, Toni and Lena GOT MARRIED! Congrats to the newly-improved couple!

I'm not sure how much of a honeymoon it was being with us, but we had a great time!

After they picked us up at the airport, we drove directly to their "summer house", which is located about 15 minutes outside of town. Apparently, lots of Swedish folks have summer houses where they go during the summer (duh!) to enjoy the outdoors and get eaten by mosquitoes the size of hummingbirds. Lena and Toni's place is a simple but exceptionally lovely and cosy with a bunch of out buildings on a couple of acres surrounded by lakes, farms, and other summer houses.

In fact, the whole area looks a lot like this random scene from one of our day trips. Amazingly beautiful, isn't it?

Random photo from near the summer of house with a typical, but unusual (for me) fence:

We had a fun-filled first day with one of the best parts being a traditional Swedish dinner served up by Lena's mom. We ate reindeer and other local delicacies (including handpicked lingonberries, of course!). Karen, thanks for the fine, fine food and to Lena for sharing your mom with us! Karen, when your travels bring you south, you're always welcome at our place!

Skelleftea, if you're like me and never heard of it before, is a smallish town (population just over 30,000) located way up in northeastern Sweden just inland from the Baltic sea and almost up near the border with Finland. It's just about an hour south (via car) of the arctic circle and the farthest north that I had ever been! To give you an idea of how far north that is, get on a plane in Barcelona or Boston, and fly straight north for FOUR hours! If you look at a map of where Alaska and Russia almost touch, it's just about there!!!

One of the things that I was most looking forward was experiencing 24-hour daylight. We were a few weeks late for 24 hours of sun but it didn't get dark during our entire one-week trip. This is a photo of the summer house (to the right of the flagpole) that I took at right around midnight:

It's strange because the sun rose at about 2am, completely circled the sky, and then set at about 11pm almost where it came up. To better grasp how cool it was, imagine that you're facing north and standing on a large clock with the 12 out in front of you and the 6 behind you on the ground. The sun would rise at about the 1:30 position, circle around you to the right, be at the 6 position in the middle of the day, continue to circle around you to the left, and set at around the 10:30 position. Awesome, no? The only problem with this, of course, is the opposite darkness, which happens during the middle of the winter. I definitely want to go back to experience it and the northern lights one day!

The next morning, we woke up leisurely and ate a breakfast of local breads, jams, sausages, and cheeses. After breakfast, I got to watch Toni at work. There was a wasp nest in one of the house's eves, which Toni was about to do battle with. Before he started, he put on a beekeeper hat that had a net to cover his entire head, a pair of heavy gloves, and a jacket. Lena, on the other hand, like some battlefield war reporter, ran over to snap photos to later post on instafacetwitgrambook completely unprotected. Fortunately, there were no casualties and the wasps were dispatched like Sant Jordi's dragon!

After the battle was won, we headed into town to check it, and their apartment, out. Their apartment is super cool and located above the town's main plaza. We walked around town for about an hour or so before heading off on our next adventure.

Part of the view of Skelleftea from Lena and Toni's apartment:

This is just the first part of our Swedish adventure. For part 2, click here (story coming soon).