Traditional Swedish Christmas Food

Recipes for Swedish Xmas Food

Christmas in Sweden is all about food, and no Christmas buffet is complete without both classic and new dishes. Not everything on the Christmas buffet needs to be homemade, but it’s always fun to serve something you’ve made yourself. In this post, you’ll meet one of our chefs, we’ll share recipes for preparing herring in different ways and cook vegetarian dishes perfect for Christmas, along with a list and map with tips on traditional Christmas feast in Sweden. Whether you love classic flavors or want to try something new and plant-based, you’ll find inspiration here.

Restaurateurs Jesper Taube – 30 Years of Experience

At Stromma, we’re celebrating 30 years of Christmas buffets on M/S Waxholm III, where restaurateurs Jesper Taube has curated the menu for three decades. “It feels almost surreal that it’s been 30 years since I served the first Christmas ham onboard. Countless guests, mugs of mulled wine, and homemade meatballs have been enjoyed over the years,” says Jesper Taube.

This year’s Christmas buffet menu is especially unique as food historian Richard Tellström contributed historical insights, leading to the addition of a forgotten classic, a favorite, and a new item. “The essence of the Christmas buffet has always remained the same – gathering around the table in fellowship,” emphasizes Tellström.

Tip – Book a typical Swedish Christmas buffet dinner or lunch onboard M/S Waxholm III or one of Stromma’s other archipelago boats in Stockholm.

Recipes for Traditional Swedish Christmas Food

Here are recipes for Christmas dishes perfect for a traditional Swedish Christmas meal experience.

• The basis for pickled herring
  One ingredient is of utmost importance when pickling your herring (a dicey way of phrasing it): time. To get the best results, we recommend letting the herring sit in a basis before flavoring it in the next step. But should you be in pickle – pun very much intended - and strapped for time, flavoring it directly and skipping this step works just as well.
  
  12 dl water
  4 dl vinegar essence (12%)
  

  8 dl sugar
  8 bay leaves
  20 kernels Allspice
  10 cloves
  2 Cippolini onions
  2 carrots
  1-1,2 kg dried herring

  Combine the water, vinegar essence, and sugar and boil it for 5 minutes. Peel the onions and carrots and slice them up into thin strips, then boil the onions in water for about 2 minutes. Afterwards, put the onions and carrots into the water, vinegar essence, and sugar mixture and boil it together for an additional 2 minutes. Meanwhile, roast the spices in a dry pan in a glass jar with a screw top. Let the liquid cool off, transfer to the jar with the spices, and refrigerate it.

  Carefully clean your herring I cold water and cut it in 1 cm-wide strips. Strain the refrigerated liquid, pour it into a pan, and let your herring strips marinate in there for about a day while keeping the pan in the fridge. After letting them marinate, take out the herring that’s now ready to be flavored. But make sure to save the liquid!

• Festive lingonberry and Bourbon herring
  2,5 dl basis liquid
  1 shot of flambéed Bourbon
  6 kernels Allspice
  4 bayleaves
  30 g thinly sliced onions
  20 g finely diced carrots
  8 kernels black pepper
  2 tbs. lingonberry jam
  ½ single clove garlic (other garlic works as well)
  3 whole star anis
  About 500 – 600 g of the prepared herring

Combine everything in a glass jar, screw the lid on, and let marinate in the fridge for about three days to make sure that the herring soaks up all the flavors. And don’t worry: pickling herring is not only delicious, it’s also a way of preserving it.

• Baked celery root with browned saffron butter and deep-fried kale chips
  

  1 large unpeeled celery root

  Clean the celery root while warming up the oven to 190˚ Celsius. Bake for circa two hours. The celery root is done when it’s soft all the way through.

  100 g eco butter
  1 tbs. sunflower seeds
  1/3 package saffron

  Combine all ingredients in a large saucepan. Put it medium heat and keep a close eye on it – you don’t want the butter to burn! Shortly after melting, the butter will bubble happily along with white bubbles until a layer of white foam covers the surface. When the white foam turns to amber, take the pan off the heat, and let it sit for an additional five minutes. Stir and you’re all done!

  Clean and dry the kale, then cut or tear it up into small strips. Fill a saucepan with sunflower oil and heat it up to about 175˚ Celsius. To test if the oil is hot enough, toss a small piece of kale in – it should throw bubbles instead of just sputtering a little. When the heat is right, put the kale in and deep-fry it. And make sure to protect yourself against hot oil sputtering out! When the kale is no longer bubbling, after about a minute, use a ladle to get it out and place it in one layer on some paper kitchen towels to soak up the oil and prevent it from getting soggy.

  Cut off the top of the celery root, then take a small spoon to mash up the inner part of the root. Salt lightly and pour in some of the butter. Top off generously with the fried kale and add some more butter. Voila!

Swedish Christmas Meal – Best Tips in Sweden

Looking for the best Swedish Christmas buffets? Whether you want to experience a Christmas buffet on a boat in Stockholm, enjoy traditional food at Vaxholms Kastell, or book a Christmas buffet cruise in Gothenburg, here are our best tips for an unforgettable Christmas meal.

• Christmas dining cruises in Stockholm
• Traditional Christmas buffet at Vaxholms Kastell in Stockholm
• Gothenburg – Christmas dining cruises

Map – Tips on Traditional Christmas Buffets in Sweden

On the map, you’ll find our best tips for Swedish Christmas lunch buffets and dinner buffets in Sweden.