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SWEDISH FOOD

How to make Swedish cloudberry parfait

Food writer John Duxbury shares his favourite recipe with The Local.

Published: 13 April 2018 06:59 CEST
How to make Swedish cloudberry parfait
Looks absolutely parfait! Photo: John Duxbury/Swedish Food

This is a gorgeous dessert for a special occasion and has been adapted from a recipe by Carl Jan Granqvist, probably Sweden's most famous culinary authority. (To read an interview with Carl Jan Granqvist click here.)

Although the parfaits take a little time to make, they can be prepared a day or two in advance and assembled at the last moment. You need some hjortronsylt (cloudberry jam) for this recipe, but it is fairly easy to obtain from IKEA, specialist stores or online.

Summary

Makes: 8 portions

Preparation: 20 minutes

Cooking: 30 minutes

Total: 50 minutes + at least 3 hours to set

Tips

– Although this recipe makes 8 portions the parfaits keep well in the freezer, so I never bother making less.

– Cloudberry liqueur can be bought from specialist stores or online if you're not in Sweden, search for “lapponia cloudberry liqueur”. It can be omitted if you can't get any, but it is also a nice drink to serve with the parfaits.

– Occasionally frozen cloudberries are available from online suppliers and they can be used to make an excellent garnish in place of the jam. Although they may defrost in transit, it is fine to refreeze them.

– To make a garnish using cloudberries, add about a teaspoon of caster (superfine) sugar for every tablespoon of berries and stir thoroughly. Cloudberries are a little bitter on their own.

– If you are short of time, you can serve the parfaits without the nut bases!

– To make it easy to remove the parfaits from their moulds, transfer them to a fridge 5-10 minutes before serving or sit them in 2 cm (¾ in) of hot water for 30 seconds.

Ingredients

Parfait

4 egg yolks (note: one egg white is required for the biscuit bases)

120 g (½ cup) hjortronsylt (cloudberry jam)

4 tbsp cloudberry liqueur, optional

50 g (3 ½ tbsp) caster (superfine) sugar

300 ml (1 ¼ cups) whipping cream (heavy whipping cream)

Nut bases

25 g (1 ¾ tbsp) butter

25 g (1 oz) blanched hazelnuts

25 g (1 oz) blanched almonds

12 g (1 ½ tbsp) plain (all-purpose) flour

80 g (6 tbsp) caster (superfine) sugar

1 egg white

Garnish

8 tsp hjortronsylt

60 g (4 tbsp) hjortronsylt, sieved to make a coulis

Method

Parfaits

1. Line 8 ramekins with clingfilm (food wrap), bring a small saucepan of water to the boil and half fill a largish bowl with ice ready for step 3.

2. Place the egg yolks and sugar in a small bowl. Sit the bowl over the boiling water and beat vigorously with an electric whisk on full power for 2 minutes.

3. Remove the bowl and immediately sit it on top of the ice. Continue whisking on full power for 3 minutes. Leave the bowl sitting on the ice while you sieve the jam and whip the cream.

4. Sieve the hjortronsylt and then add the liqueur (optional). Fold into the egg mixture.

5. Whip the cream until it is soft, but leaving a trailing. Fold the egg mixture into the cream, ensuring that it is thoroughly blended.

6. Divide the mixture between the ramekins and place them in the freezer for at least 3 hours.

Nut bases

7. Line a large baking tray with baking parchment and pre-heat an oven to 200C (400F, gas 6, fan 175C).

8. Gently melt the butter for the nut bases and then set aside.

9. Blitz the nuts in a food processor or grinder until thoroughly ground. Mix with the flour and sugar.

10. Whisk the egg white a little and then blend with the melted butter. Add to the nut mixture and mix thoroughly to make an even batter.

11. Spoon the mixture on to two greased baking sheets, creating 8 even piles and leaving room for the mixture to spread when it is baked.

12. Bake until the biscuits are golden brown in the middle and dark brown at the edges, about 10 minutes, and then transfer them to a cooling rack.

13. After a minute or so, trim the nut bases with a sharp knife to match the size of the ramekins.

Assembling

14. Place a biscuit in the middle of a plate, top with a parfait, add a teaspoon of cloudberry jam (or some sweetened cloudberries) and then drizzle the coulis around the parfait.

Recipe courtesy of John Duxbury, founder and editor of Swedish Food.

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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