Göteborg and the lobster season

If you believe half a million of citizens are few, these are more than enough to make of Göteborg (which Swedes pronounce as “iote” pause “bori”) the second town in kingCarl XVI Gustaf’s Sweden, a country that counts around 10 million people of which one fifth in Stockholm alone.

Göteborg, on the South-Western coast, more or less halfway between Oslo (Norway) and Copenhagen (Denmark), last week hosted the World Food Travel Summit, a congress dedicated to people’s desire to visit a place primarily because of what they will be able to eat there. In Italy we speak about it, abroad they put it into practice. A lecture in particular can represent the others, that of Matt Goulding: the American chef now based in Barcelonaspoke about the success of Noma and René Redzepi: “How a restaurant has changed a nation”, a phenomenon called Nomanomics which should be kept as an example for us Italians too.

Of course, a congress such as this is also the chance to get plenty of gastronomic goodness. Swedish journalist Mattias Kroon, who lives in the far South of the country, in the Skåne region, reminded me that Göteborg is not famous for a lively restaurant scene but for a more classic offer, in line with Michelin precepts, with restaurants that mostly aim at businessmen and corporate meetings. It’s no wonder that there are as many as five starred restaurants here: Fond, Thörnströms Kök, 28+, Kock & Vin and Sjömagasinet. Today the most interesting one is the fourth, namely Kock & Vin. It means Kitchen and Wine and Kroon, who collaborates with Identità, recommended this together with Bhoga, which will debut in the next edition of our guide thanks to the energy of chef Gustav Knutsson. With an opulent setting, the exact opposite to the dominating minimalism, it’s strong point are Sweetbreads with quince apples and turnips, but you’d make a mistake not to stop at the bar and trust the talent of some surprising mixologists.

And again, recommended by the same source, a rustic trattoria called Kometen, while his colleague who lives and writes of food in Göteborg, recommends Bhoga but also two Japanese restaurants, namely Hoze and Vråå. Of course, one could wonder why Japanese food when one is so close to Lapland, but better an excellent foreign cuisine than a mediocre local tradition.

Not only that: all the Swedish people I heard recently recommended to go there in this period because on September 23rd the lobster fishing season was opened. Lobster is excellent at Sjömagasinetbut the real party for palate and mood is tasting it far from luxury hotels, in the small islands offing Göteborg.

This is the lobster fishing season, in the sense that there’s the one to catch mussels or prawns or oysters. Of course, fishing is a different concept for us Italians, it is tied to fish alone, mussels are “picked” for instance, but all people have their traditions and dream with what they have at hand. I remember, for instance, the splendid river-prawn based dinners far North, in the Jämtland when Magnus Nilsson hadn’t even been conceived.

I strongly believe it is stupid not to understand what’s around you and complain because you don’t have what you normally know and have left home. Therefore I recommend to look closely at this website illustrating the various events and to note these down in view of some future holiday when perhaps you’ll even enjoy the local coffee break called fika.