Swedish Midsummer - Feast the Night Away!
For weeks on end the sun never sets in Sweden’s summertime. It’s daylight round-the-clock. Every ear, during one of those “white nights” – the Friday nearest the 24th of June – the nation turns out to feast until morning. After long winter months of what seems like never-ending darkness, sun-starved Swedes join the rest of Scandinavia in celebrating the summer solstice – the year’s longest day.
Swedes call the celebration Midsummer Eve. It is more than just a holiday, however. Midsummer Eve, often lasting through Saturday – and sometimes the whole weekend – is the national excuse for the biggest parties of the year. The revelry is non-stop.
I celebrated Midsummer this year in the Pennsylvania countryside, but with fellow Swedes and in typical Swedish fashion. You can create your own "midsummer" party any time this summer, too.
Beginning Friday morning, we gathered to set the scene, setting up a festival atmosphere. Of course, you can grab any tables and set them up outside for your guests - nothing fancy required.
Smorgasbord (pronounced: Smer-gose-board) is a Swedish invention and is literally a table of open-faced sandwiches. Though its origin was a simple array of hors d’oeuvres, smorgasbords today are exhaustive buffet-style spreads, the Swedish version being the best known.
There are appetizers, salads, main courses and desserts. The dishes signal summer’s first harvests: freshly clipped dill, tender root vegetables (see recipe for "Potato and Asparagus Salad in a Lemony Mayonnaise Dressing"), fish and other seafoods, and strawberries grown in the country. There are cured ingredients, as well. Pink rolls of cured salmon (see recipe for "Gravlax," "Swedish Mustard Sauce," and "Gravlax Club Sandwiches") are wrapped around dill sprigs, with yellow mustard sauces and peppercorns alongside. There is marinated herring and coarse salt, as well as dill and other pickles. Dairy products also are important, including eggs, cheese and cream.
The traditional drink is aquavit, Swedish vodka spiced with anise and caraway. It is served in tiny schnapps glasses. The Midsummer toast, which loses something in translation, usually amounts to a unanimous gulp followed by a chant of “rah, rah, rah, rah.”
Desserts often highlight strawberries, the first fruit of the year...
