Whenever I have an extended visit in a city, I try to partake in a local food tour. While in Stockholm I enjoyed a guided food tour run by www.foodtoursstockholm.com, which focused on Nordic cuisine. It was a terrific tour lead by a great guide (Katherine). It was a cool fall day, nice for walking and exploration. Stockholm lends itself to walking.
There were nine individual stops along our tour:
1) Urban Deli
The business is an interesting combination of a grocery store, market, restaurant, bakery and social gathering spot. There’s even an adjoining hotel affiliated with it. It’s a comfortable place to meet with friends and share a meal or a cup of coffee.
Our food sample here was Skagen, a cracker (or toast) with shrimp, dill and a cream sauce topping. A quick and easy to make appetizer, and quite good.
There was a lot of interesting food available at the Urban Deli, including cook-at -home and prepared take out options. Well worth visiting when in Stockholm.
2) Finska Butiken
The next stop was a Finnish deli in the Hay Market (Hötorgshallen), specializing in the sale of food items from Finland. I was surprised to find there was a demand for Finnish food in Stockholm, but was told there is a sizeable Finnish population in the city who love the food from their home country.
We were served a Pirog (Karelian pie), a bread-type item filled with a variety of options — ours was egg butter. These pastries were great — you could easily make a meal just of them.
As you can see from the photo below, this deli sold a variety of pastries and other goodies. I tried several of them in my remaining days in Stockholm.
3) Fromageriet
Another stop in Hötorgshallen was the cheese market, featuring an impressive variety of cheeses. I can’t remember exactly what type of cheeses we had, but they were very good.
(our samples)
4) Hellbergs
The most unusual stop of the tour. Hellberg’s features foods made from exotic meats, mostly game. For example, they have elk (moose), reindeer, boar — even rare cuts like ostrich and crocodile.
Our samples are shown below, the sausage being made from game animals. It was nicely seasoned and very lean.
Photos of their counter show some of the wide assortment of meats sold here.
5) Hav
Our next stop in Hötorgshallen was at Hav, a seafood vendor and restaurant.
Our samples included three types of fish — herring served up two different ways, and pickled salmon — all very tasty.
We also were giving a sample of hard drinks — the most unusual being a hard liquor called Linie which is boated to the equator and back again because it’s thought the trip improves its flavor.
A sampling of Hav’s seafood counter:
6) Kajsas Fisk
A real treat was the traditional fish soup at Kajsas Fisk in Hötorgshallen. The idea of fish soup doesn’t really appeal to me because I’ve had a few bad experiences. But the broth surprised me with its incredible complex and interesting flavor. I came back again on my own to enjoy it the following days.
(Fish soup and a herring cracker)
7) Tennstopet
We left the interesting assortment of food vendors at the Hay Market and took the metro for a few stops to Tennstopet, a traditional restaurant.
It was here we got to try classic Swedish meatballs, with mashed potatoes and gravy. Comfort food at its best!
8) Chokladfabriken
The chocolate factory was a nice touch and as good as you’d expect handmade gourmet chocolates to be.
Our final stop was a bakery, the name of which eludes me, where we were given a small plate of treats and shared some of the popular cinnamon buns favored by the Scandinavians.
All-in-all this was a really good experience. The tour lasted more than 3 hours and was fast-paced. I could see that someone with difficult walking might have trouble keeping up. The assortment of Nordic foods we tried were interesting, tasty and filling.
It’s always important to do food tours early in your visit to a city so that you learn what restaurants are worth coming back to in future days.
