Swedish and international cuisine

Finally, the post about what we ate on our summer vacation in Sweden. As I mentioned in my first post on Gotland, our first dinner in Visby wasn’t anything to write home about. It was a portion of fish & chips that swam in grease. Luckily, we managed to find far better places for lunch and dinner the next day. For lunch we stopped at Familjen Jessens Saluhall & Bar where we enjoyed an exquisite fish soup with sourdough bread. Hubby accompanied his soup with a beer, and I opted for a grapefruit lemonade. While strolling around the old town we found a nice outdoor café Krönet overlooking the sea and decided to sit down and enjoy a cocktail and the view. I had googled around for the best restaurants in Visby the night before, which lead us to a pizzeria called Mille Lire that serves Roman style pizza. We had a starter of bruschette miste, which was essentially a selection of their various pizza toppings on small slices of bread made from the pizza dough. The bruschette were delicious and really put our hopes up for the pizza, and I can tell you the pizza did not disappoint. I had a classic Tonno e cipolle pizza (tuna, red onion & mozzarella) and hubby enjoyed the Diavola (spicy salami & mozzarella). I enjoyed a glass of rose wine with my pizza while hubby stuck to beer. I can highly recommend this restaurant if you are in the mood for a tasty pizza.

The next day we ended up having a late lunch at the café at Lummelundagrottan where hubby ate a sandwich and I had a savory waffle with goat’s cheese. Both were nice and worked well for lunch. In the evening we had plans to have burgers at Brooklyn Burgers ‘n Bar but the place was packed, so we eventually ended up having burgers at Brygghuset Bar & Kök where we had nice burgers accompanied by local beers. For some reason I forgot to take pictures of the burgers, which were nice enough, although not the best I’ve ever had. Before dinner we had a refreshing drink at Bolaget. On our last day on Gotland we had pizza for lunch at Carlssons Restaurang & Vedugnspizzeria. For dinner we headed to Brooklyn Tacos ‘n Tequila. Here we started with some tacos; Camarones en taco and Baja Fish taco that we shared as they were served in pairs. As we ended up waiting for a server to come and take our order for quite some time, they also served us a third set of tacos, Taquito de langosta for free as an apology (a nice touch, as we had not even complained). After the tacos we shared a nacho plate with beef, cheese, corn, tomatoes & guacamole. We drank beer with the food and had margaritas for dessert. The tacos were super delicious, and the nachos were of average quality. I can recommend this place for the tacos and margaritas.

Once we were in Stockholm, we googled for a restaurant near the hotel for the first evening and ended up at a place called Taste of Vietnam roughly a block away from the hotel. Both of us chose a salad to start, mine was a mango salad and hubby’s a glass noodle salad, both were super delicious and suitably hot. For my main I had fried rice noodles with scampi and hubby had an entrecote wok. The mains were tasty but not nearly as good as the starters. I drank a house-made juice drink with lime and once again hubby had a beer. The following day we had lunch at Östermalms Saluhall which at the moment is undergoing a huge renovation and is housed in a temporary building. We ate at Tysta Mari where I ate fish soup with shrimps served with aioli accompanied by a glass of white and hubby enjoyed the Toast Skagen with a beer, both were excellent. For dinner I had booked a table at a place called Den Gamle och Havet (The old man and the sea), which is an Italian seafood restaurant. My starter was Scampi in Padella con Burro (lobster with roasted garlic, butter, and parsley) and hubby had the Carpaccio di Tonno (tuna carpaccio). Both were absolutely delicious as were the mains; Pappardelle e Funghi Trifolati (pasta with various mushroom, rosemary, white wine, garlic, pepperoncini, olive oil and parsley) and Spaghetti alle Vongole (pasta with Venus clams, garlic, pepperoncini, cherry tomatoes, olive oil and parsley). We both enjoyed a glass of white wine with dinner. The pastas were tasty, and the restaurant was a nice experience as a whole. If you are in the mood for good Italian food with a focus on seafood, I can certainly recommend Den Gamle och Havet.

On our last day in Stockholm we had a quick lunch at Gallerian at Café Coppola. We had a dinner reservation at Restaurant Pelikan. This is a traditional Swedish restaurant with a history of 110 years. The restaurant is housed in a big hall with high ceiling vaults and arched windows. The hall was nice but a bit noisy and the service was friendly. We started with a potato pancake with bleak roe, red onion and creme fraiche and Toast Skagen with bleak roe. These were followed by pan fried arctic char with crayfish & potato croquettes and trout roe sauce and Biff Rydberg (diced and fried tenderloin, potatoes, onion, mustard cream & egg yolk). Once again, I enjoyed white wine with my dinner while hubby had a beer. All the food was super tasty so based on the food, atmosphere and service I can wholeheartedly recommend Pelikan to anyone looking for traditional Swedish food while visiting Stockholm.

This Friday we head to Tallinn for one night to celebrate hubby’s birthday so a post on that will follow, but I might post another wine & food review before that.