Husmanskost: classic Swedish home cooking
Historically in Sweden, the growing season was short and harsh weather conditions made it difficult to transport produce for much of the year. Sweden is sparsely populated and, from tip to tail, makes for quite a trek through the wilderness, particularly in winter. So the country’s eating and cooking habits developed around a reverence for hyper-local, seasonal ingredients and interesting methods of preservation.
For example, each province makes its own trademark variety of cheese (Västerbotten’s is a favourite – you can usually find wedges of it at IKEA). Regions tend to build their go-to menu items around ingredients that are readily available from local farms and forests. Anything that needs to be shipped or stored is cured, dried, pickled or canned.