It's not all meatballs and herring

I like to eat. I'm quite sure that I am not alone in this, but really, what's better than a delicious meal after a long day of class, and, um, sitting around. True to Swedish fashion, I consider it a crime to not at least attempt to represent all the food groups, and though I fail, I console myself by reminding myself that I tried.

Having grown up with a German mother, I know how to cook. While the rest of my friends ate cheaply by devouring fast food, I ate cheaply by cooking. Mostly Italian food, because I am addicted to pasta. Which is cheap.

This has changed with my move. 10 years of living away from Sweden have not changed my appreciation for Swedish food. Although I can't admit to liking herring, I will devour gravad lax (pickled salmon), meatballs with lingonsylt, blodpudding (congealed pork blood pudding), blodkorv (also congealed pork blood, but more solid and shaped like a sausage), falukorv (also sausage), and all the things they come with. Unfortunately, these things are not readily available in Southern California. We tried. We found a German buther willing to cut a ham in something resembling the traditional Swedish Christmas ham. An intricate shopping list was developed for my dad so that he could buy food when in Sweden. Things like Herrgårds ost (a mild cheese), skinkost (spreadable cheese with ham), bilar (candy... delicious, delicious candy) but still.

The point is, suddenly all the foods that I could never really get, are suddenly totally and utterly available. Did I mention the leverpastej? Liver in a spreadable form for my breakfast sandwich!

Last week, I went on my weekly grocery run to ICA, this time accompanied by a friend. Because I am taking a class meant for immigrants, she is Greek. Note that this class is way too easy for me, and my classmates give me many dirty looks. Whoops. Anyway, as we're walking through the store, we're talking, and I am grabbing things off the shelf.

I was standing by the yoghurt, debating which flavor combination I wanted this week (Swedish people, we love our yoghurt. There are approximately four thousand combinations, give or take a few), when my friend E looks at me and says "How the HELL do you know what you want to buy? You glance at a shelf, you grab something, and you are on your way. Every purchase for me is murder. Say I want to buy ketchup. I will find the ketchup, learn that there are 27 different kinds, and I will spend half an hour looking at all of them, trying to pick one."

I was taken aback. I had not even realized. How did I know what I wanted? The food was speaking to me. I was only 9 when I moved away from Sweden, and I had only lived there for 3 years; before that, I had lived in Germany and Poland, though before that I was born in Sweden.... I mean, really. I should have no business knowing what brands existed in Sweden, or what to buy. Yet I did.

I'm still trying to figure that one out. In the meantime, I am going to go enjoy some Sarek tunnbröd with a generous slathering of leverpastej.