Björn Frantzén

Frantzén

26, Klara Norra kyrkogata
Stoccolma
Svezia
t. +46 8 20 85 80

Björn Frantzén: where have I heard this name before? The solution is easy: just isolate the surname and then associate it, in succession, to that of Daniel Lindeberg. The people from the 50Best had aroused the curiosity, celebrating the Frantzén/Lindeberg as One to Watch in 2011, the sign you have to keep an eye on in a sea full of luxury-of-simplicity yachts. On closer examination, we discover that the Michelin guide had dug into the chest of the two guys as many stars, one after the other (in 2009 and 2010): a unique series in Swedish history, especially when you think of the year and month when the restaurant opened, that is February 2008.

It was then, that chef Björn and pastry chef Daniel, not yet in their thirties, plucked up courage and launched an 18 place restaurant on Gamla Stan, old Stockholm's small island, the same place which once hosted Fredrik Andersson’s starred Mistral. It is a candid theatre of casual elegance, staging creative dissonances between Nordic and Asian cuisine, led along an inexhaustible research of primary goods: « I spend 75% of my time looking for and talking to producers», says Björn Frantzén as he plays with the pencil behind his ear. This is a way of acting that reaches paroxysm with the lesson of the Danish René Redzepi («a fundamental chef for all of us ») on pureness, sustainability and seasonality. An ingredient fetishism that venerates the kitchen garden following the lesson of Londoner Tom Aikens, Björn’s first teacher, when he was still at the pre-Shane Osborn Pied-à-Terre.

But most of all, this is a way of proceeding which reminds the dictates of Alain Passard, Frantzén's teacher, who spent a lot of time at the Arpege in Paris, a legacy quite evident in the particular awe of excessive fires, in the sadistic passion for lengthy browning, in certain daring vegetable intellectualism. These two guys are running after the utopia of cooking, some day, a dish without any sauce, «a winning post for which we fight, sustained by the work of our suppliers. Without them, we wouldn’t be what we are ». This gratitude emerges every second at the Frantzén/Lindeberg, where every ingredient is exhibited to the client while still alive, at the table, before being martyred on the fire, blanched or ground according to techniques which can draw from the tradition of the Swedish countryside from those of the South Corean “cavemen” (like the incredible garlic re-fermented in the caves).
 

Has participated in

Identità Milano


by

Gabriele Zanatta

born in Milan, 1973, freelance journalist, coordinator of Identità Golose World restaurant guidebook since 2007, he is a contributor for several magazines and teaches History of gastronomy and Culinary global trends into universities and institutes. 
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