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THE LOCAL RECIPES

RECIPE

How to make Swedish Västerbotten pie

Västerbotten is a place in northern Sweden famous for producing the king of Swedish cheese dishes - Västerbottensostpaj. John Duxbury shares his favourite recipe with The Local.

Published: 12 June 2015 04:00 CEST
Updated: 12 June 2015 08:00 CEST
How to make Swedish Västerbotten pie
Västerbotten cheese pie. Photo: John Duxbury/Swedish food
Västerbottensostpaj is a Swedish classic. The cheese is usually available at supermarkets and delicatessen counters, although if you can't track it down you can use mature cheddar cheese instead.
 
Ingredients
 
125 g (1 cup) plain (all-purpose) flour
 
A pinch of salt
 
100g (7 tbsp) butterm, cut into small cubes
 
2 tbsp cold water
 
225g (8oz) Västerbottensost or mature (sharp) Cheddar cheese, grated
 
3 eggs
 
200 ml (¾ cup) whipping cream or double (heavy) cream
 
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
 
Method
 
1. Add the flour and a pinch of salt to a food processor. Whizz briefly.
 
2. Add the butter and process for ten-15 seconds until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Sprinkle on the water and process for 20-30 seconds until the pastry clings together and forms a ball. Remove the pastry from the machine and knead it lightly to form a small ball. Wrap in cling film (food wrap) and refrigerate for 30 minutes (or up to 24 hours).
 
3. Preheat the oven to 200°C (400°F, gas mark 6, fan 180°C). Roll out the pastry on a lightly floured surface and line a deep 20cm flan tin (pan). Line the pastry with a sheet of greaseproof (waxed) paper and fill with baking beans. Bake blind for ten minutes until the pastry has set.
 
4. Carefully remove the baking beans and greaseproof paper then return to the oven for a further five minutes until the base is dry.
 
5. Meanwhile, beat the eggs and cream together, add the cheese and season to taste, bearing in mind that the cheese is very salty.
 
6. Remove the flan from the oven and pour in the cheese mix. Bake for about 30 minutes until it is set and golden brown.
 
7. Allow the pie to cool in the tin (pan) and serve warm or cold.
 

Västerbotten in northern Sweden where the famous cheese comes from. Photo: Staffan Widstrand/Image Bank Sweden
 
Tips
 
– The pie is also nice served slightly warm with new potatoes and salad
 
– It goes well with onion marmalade or löjrom (bleak roe), crème fraîche and chopped chives
 
– These make delicious individual pies for a picnic.
 
– Add some fried onion and chanterelle mushrooms to make “Västerbottens-paj med kantereller”, but reduce the cooking time by about ten minutes.

This recipe was originally published on food writer John Duxbury's Swedish Food website.

FOOD AND DRINK

OPINION: Are tips in Sweden becoming the norm?

Should you tip in Sweden? Habits are changing fast thanks to new technology and a hard-pressed restaurant trade, writes James Savage.

Published: 5 April 2024 13:59 CEST
OPINION: Are tips in Sweden becoming the norm?

The Local’s guide to tipping in Sweden is clear: tip for good service if you want to, but don’t feel the pressure: where servers in the US, for instance, rely on tips to live, waiters in Sweden have collectively bargained salaries with long vacations and generous benefits. 

But there are signs that this is changing, and the change is being accelerated by card machines. Now, many machines offer three preset gratuity percentages, usually starting with five percent and going up to fifteen or twenty. Previously they just asked the customer to fill in the total amount they wanted to pay.

This subtle change to a user interface sends a not-so-subtle message to customers: that tipping is expected and that most people are probably doing it. The button for not tipping is either a large-lettered ‘No Tip’ or a more subtle ‘Fortsätt’ or ‘Continue’ (it turns out you can continue without selecting a tip amount, but it’s not immediately clear to the user). 

I’ll confess, when I was first presented with this I was mildly irked: I usually tip if I’ve had table service, but waiting staff are treated as professionals and paid properly, guaranteed by deals with unions; menu prices are correspondingly high. The tip was a genuine token of appreciation.

But when I tweeted something to this effect (a tweet that went strangely viral), the responses I got made me think. Many people pointed out that the restaurant trade in Sweden is under enormous pressure, with rising costs, the after-effects of Covid and difficulties recruiting. And as Sweden has become more cosmopolitain, adding ten percent to the bill comes naturally to many.

Boulebar, a restaurant and bar chain with branches around Sweden and Denmark, had a longstanding policy of not accepting tips at all, reasoning that they were outdated and put diners in an uncomfortable position. But in 2021 CEO Henrik Kruse decided to change tack:

“It was a purely financial decision. We were under pressure due to Covid, and we had to keep wages down, so bringing back tips was the solution,” he said, adding that he has a collective agreement and staff also get a union bargained salary, before tips.

Yet for Kruse the new machines, with their pre-set tipping percentages, take things too far:

“We don’t use it, because it makes it even clearer that you’re asking for money. The guest should feel free not to tip. It’s more important for us that the guest feels free to tell people they’re satisfied.”

But for those restaurants that have adopted the new interfaces, the effect has been dramatic. Card processing company Kassacentralen, which was one of the first to launch this feature in Sweden, told Svenska Dagbladet this week that the feature had led to tips for the average establishment doubling, with some places seeing them rise six-fold.

Even unions are relaxed about tipping these days, perhaps understanding that they’re a significant extra income for their members. Union representatives have often in the past spoken out against tipping, arguing that the practice is demeaning to staff and that tips were spread unevenly, with staff in cafés or fast food joints getting nothing at all. But when I called the Swedish Hotel and Restaurant Union (HRF), a spokesman said that the union had no view on the practice, and it was a matter for staff, business owners and customers to decide.

So is tipping now expected in Sweden? The old advice probably still stands; waiters are still not as reliant on tips as staff in many other countries, so a lavish tip is not necessary. But as Swedes start to tip more generously, you might stick out if you leave nothing at all.

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