A smörgåsbord

3 hours ago
6 min read

"away from its homeland, smorgasbord is, all too often, an excuse for offering everybody a little of everything - or, for that matter, anything." Dale Brown/The Cooking of Scandinavia

I chose that title as a suitable heading for an oddments piece, but got a bit diverted on what a smörgåsbord actually is - I almost turned it into a post about all to itself, but have now decided to revert to the odds and ends concept - or as Dale Brown puts it - "a little of everything - or, for that matter, anything."

I wll tell you a little about the smörgåsbord however. It was such a fashionable thing - along with all things Scandinavian really - in my youth in the 60s and into the 70s. Now, however, you never hear about it. Even our bastardised versions of the smörgåsbord table in the form of Smorgy's et al. - those fast food places where you filled up your plate from a buffet of a very wide range of things. Smorgy's et al. are now defunct, having been replaced, I think, by mezze and tapas. Little shared plates of this and that.

The quote and the pictures are from my now very old (1969) copy of this volume in the Time/LIfe Foods of the World series that I used to collect. That kind of concept - subscription to a series of books has sort of died as well hasn't it? The buffet kind of meal may survive in some hotels, or at receptions and conferences, but mostly it is confined to the hotel breakfast buffet with a rather more restricted selection of breakfast kind of dishes.

The table above is supposedly the best smörgåsbord table of all at the time - in Sweden of course and a hotel. Dale Brown describes its structure and also provided these photographs of various selections from the table. It is laid out in a strict formation:

"at one end of the table are the cold dishes, at the other end the hot, and in between is ranged a spectrum of salads, cold cuts and meats.

As to its history - it is not as old as you may think, although possibly a descendant of the aquavit table which was set up prior to a meal, with cheese, bread and butter. Smörgåsbord translates as bread and butter table and of course there is still aquavit - there's always aquavit in Sweden.

However, Dale Brown tells us:

"that it almost died out a few years ago and that it is not the ancient feast everyone imagines it to be. In its present incarnation, it goes back to the 1880's when food, both in its appearance and proportions could be as full blown as the décor that surrounded it. And strangely one of the things that helped to give the smörgåsbord its start was canning. ... Still another impetus to the devlopement of the smörgåsbord was the invention of the steam-engine and the builidng of railways. With large numbers of people travelling long distances, new hotels had to be built to accommodate them, new restaurants opened to feed them, and none of these could be considered worthy of the designation 'grand' if it did not a feature a smörgåsbord of majestic proportions." Dale Brown/The Cooking of Scandinavia

'A few years ago' - bearing in mind that this was written in 1969 was post the second world war. During the war it was banned and post war there were shortages, and low incomes. But with increasing prosperity a hotelier - owner of the hotel whose table is shown at the top - Tore Wretman - revived interest in the concept via his radio and television shows and also his hotel.

I suspect it still exists in Sweden - well it would be a tourist attraction - but not in the west, even in bastardised versions - replaced by other European and Middle-Eastern traditions, as well as the cheese and deli platters that are advertised so relentlessly in our supermarket magazines.

A lengthy first piece for a bits and pieces post. But then I don't really have many small offerings today - really just a random selection of recipes from here and there, that I thought worth passing on.

Black sesame toffee and chocolate tart - from the current Coles Magazine - still available in their stores. It looks spectacular, is a little bit exotic, very simple and very bad for you. I might give it a go for my son's birthday party on Sunday. No cooking involved really.

Scotch fillet steak with stroganoff sauce

From the same magazine - if you fele like spending big on some scotch fillet steak, give this one a go. I'm always amazed at how delicious stroganoff is. This one is flavoured with paprika, sour cream, Worcestershire sauce and Dijon mustard with some porcini mushrooms and garlic thrown in for good measure. My kind of dish.

Boiled egg and gherkin brine tartare

Tom Hunt - The Guardian's Waste not man, recently showcased this version of sauce tartare. There are two versions here - one with boiled eggs, the gherkin brine, oil and spring onions, and a more complex one with the addition of gherkins, cornichons, herbs, Worcestershire sauce, mustard and cayenne. Open to variation of course, and simpler than ordinary mayonnaise perhaps. But then again, perhaps not because you do have to boil the eggs for a bit a mere 3 minutes, left to stand for another 3, doused with cold water and peeled. Give it a try though next time you have fish and chips - or chicken and chips.

How to make cacio e pepe with a tea towel

I love cacio e pepe and I love Rachel Roddy and her stories about food from her kitchen in Rome. This one is about a less complicated way of making cacio e pepe than the usual one of hot pasta and eggy creamy sauce praying that it doesn't split. Because you simply dump your pasta, with your pepper and cheese on a tea towel, wrap it up and shake it. Or as described by Rachel when she and her partner Vincenzo visited the restaurant Flavio al Velavevodetto whose back walls are built into that hill of pottery shards in Rome:

"He returned with a cloth full of just-cooked tonnarelli, into which he tossed many handfuls of grated 36-month pecorino and black pepper, gathered it up, shook, rubbed and served. The performance was interesting because this is likely to be how shepherds, with their cheese-making apparatus and daily supplies, once made the dish – also how clever innkeepers once got clients to drink more. It was even more interesting because the soft, sandy molecules of cheese clings to the fresh pasta like sand. And it is worth trying: estimate 150g of fresh pasta, 50g of grated pecorino and a heaped teaspoon of freshly smashed pepper per person. Personally I have never enjoyed cacio e pepe more."

Last little bit of information from Rachel's article - which is worth a read:

"cacio, from the Latin word caseus, which may well come from cohaesus (cohesive), describing the transformation of milk into curds. Formaggio came later, from the medieval Latin formaticum (form), which in turn comes from the Greek φόρμος, the name given to the wicker container in which curdled milk was placed in order to drain and shape."

Pretty simple, but not as creamy as some. I might give it a go one day.

Apple custard crinkle cake

It just looked so good - and special - but it's Coles, and so it's not - apples, filo, custard and apple syrup. When the apples begin arriving I might well give this one a go. as well You could slice the apples on a mandoline - or in a food processor probably.

Chicken with leeks, lemon and tarragon

Something from Nigel and his Tender volume 2 - well a slightly modified version - in the book he used parsley - here it's tarragon, which I suspect would be better. In the book it's thighs, here it's breasts - both with bone in - why can't we get that anymore unless we buy a whole chicken and cut it up? He says that it is:

"One of my all-time favourites for a good, easy, midweek supper. What especially appeals is that although, the sauce tastes rich and almost creamy, it has no butter or cream in it at all. Well online he says you can add a little crème fraïche if you like."

A lazy meander around the net, which included a video of a very young and earnest Italian woman - a young girl really - showing how to do the tea towel thing with the cacio e pepe which made me a bit depressed because she spoke so fast - in Italian - that I could understand hardly anything that she said. Not that you needed to. I think she was also rather more thorough than Rachel Roddy's Vincenzo.