Be careful man.

I'm not kidding. Stop, you're scaring me.

Munchies Guide to Sweden.

New Nordic Cuisine.

Back in 2004, Claus Meyer,

chef and co-founder of Copenhagen's Noma

restaurant.

Together with top chefs form the Nordic region,

came together to write the new

Nordic Kitchen Manifesto.

And the food revolution was born.

The main focus of the new Nordic is fresh,

seasonal, simple, and

most importantly, local ingredients.

This approach has

encouraged chefs to explore new flavors.

And Sweden's food scene has exploded in

recent years.

It's quickly becoming Europe's culinary star.

Exciting new restaurants are opening

across Stockholm,

inspired by the new Nordic philosophy.

At Restaurant Ekstedt, Chef Niklas is employing

traditional Nordic cooking techniques.

Restaurant Ekstedt.

Stockholm, Sweden.

So, Niklas. Ivar Berglin, Munchies.

Yeah. Where are we?

Well, you're at my place.

Niklas Ekstedt. Owner, Ekstedt.

Yeah.

This is my restaurant.

Yeah. And this is like,

kind of like, if you you say flagship restaurant.

How many restaurants do you have now?

Three But

this is your little baby, right?

This is my baby, yeah.

But this one is a little different,

because this one focus on the open fire and

the old Scandinavian cooking techniques.

So tell me about the,

the basics of the new Nordic cuisine.

The new Nordic cuisine is basically

if you'd like explain it simply,

it's like flipping the map upside down.

The European map.

I mean originally every-.

What do you mean by that?

Originally, the chefs in, in the Nordic countries

used to look south for inspiration.

You looked into the like, like French gastronomy,

Italian gastronomy, Spanish gastronomy.

And then you kind mixed it up a little bit with

the Nordic ingredients, and

then that was fine dining high-end cuisine.

Mm-hm. But in the like,

in the mid-90s and the end, end of 90s,

there were a few chefs in the Nordic countries that

got together and said like,

why don't we work 100% with the Nordic products.

So they started sourcing ingredients and

products only from the Nordic countries, Norway,

Sweden, Denmark.

So in terms of like the new Nordic Cuisine,

we're, we're like, we're more focused on the

technical aspect of it than the product aspect.

What you wanna do? What do you like,

fish, meats?

What's your favorite?

That's what I want to do.

Turbot and lobster.

Fish, fish and lobster,.

Fish and lobster.

Great.

We get you an apron.

Great.

There we go.

That felt better.

Oh, my god.

We don't have a size for you.

Oh, you're so-.

Oh, well, you didn't do it the proper way.

You're so skinny.

Is this like the beginning of the show?

Isn't that really hot?

No, it's not actually.

Okay, you wanna compete?

Okay.

Okay. One, two, three.

I think you'll have a heart attack.

Ouch. Ahh.

You are mad.

Oh, yeah.

What's that?

I think you add about that much, right?

Boom, in with you.

This is basically how all our cooking starts.

Just a cast iron pan.

Boom. Into the fire and

then we just put in some lobster into the cast

iron pan.

I just like to move things around like this

because it makes me feel like a pro.

It's really, oh.

See? Try and flip it.

Oh, watch out.

Let, let, yeah.

Ivan, let, you put that up.

Hang it up on top of the fire.

And now the fish is all yours.

Oh, they're in? There?

Yeah. When you fry shellfish,

it's really, really quick.

So you just sear it a bit.

And then we hang it up here to give a little

flavor from the birch wood.

The birch is like the, the original way of

cooking in the Nordic cuisine.

I wanted the restaurant to be very old style,

technically wise.

But I wanted the plate to be contemporary.

Mm-hm. I wanted the,

the plating and the food to compete with the best

restaurants in the city.

This is the, this is the flambadou.

Seriously?

Yeah, no joke, this is extremely hot.

Oh, it was extremely hot in there.

No, no, no, no, no.

It's extremely hot in here. No, no, no.

This is really. Don't, I mean,

I'm not kidding.

Okay. Don't burn yourself.

Safety first kids.

Yeah. Okay.

So what we're doing is like we're taking the,

the, the tool out of the fire.

Mm-hm. And

then we adding fat into the, to the,

to the glowing metal.

All right, sounds yummy.

And that, the, the fat will burn and

then land on the hay.

And the hay will burn down

in this meat in the bottom of the hay.

Was that a butter?

Oh, that's cool.

Is there any butter coming out of there?

Whoa.

Blow it out? It's really warm here,

Niklas, come on.

This is totally medieval.

Oh, I missed the flame.

Blow it out.

Oh, I've got smoke in my eyes.

Don't burn yourself.

Oh, blow that one out.

I was blowing on this thing.

I might have burnt it just slightly there,

huh, Niklas?

I think it looks delicious.

Oh, you cut it.

No, you cut it.

You do the honors.

No, you cut it. Oh, that looks so nice.

It's perfect.

It's like Swedish sashimi.

The flambodou, it's my new thing.

I'm getting one for home.

So what's different about this restaurant compared

to your other restaurants?

Well, my other restaurants I tried to

make money.

Oh.

There you go.

It always comes down to that.

It takes so

much longer to run a restaurant like this.

It's actually pretty stupid.

It sounds stupid, yeah.

Can you tell me something that's

not stupid about the restaurant you own?

The food tastes amazing.

Yeah.

So, the next dish is the lobster that we

cooked earlier.

Hm, the one, the one I did.

Yep. But I'm not getting

the one I did.

It is, it is the one you did.

Oh, really? Yeah.

Mm.

This is your lobster with some brioche and

turbot with some pickled mushrooms on top.

And actually, my little

thing there looks pretty good.

Taste it.

Come on, taste it.

See if you like it.

A subtle smokiness, isn't it?

It's not bad.

No. It doesn't punch you.

Cuz that's the most the,

that's most important point.

Both from the,

both from the tail of the lobster and, and

with the bread.

You're having a bread in there as well hanging?

Yeah, deep fried in the coaster and pan.

Really sweet, the, the mushrooms, huh?

Yeah.

You're the skinniest guy we've ever had in here.

Just throw that, I'm not-.

Sorry.

Why, you can keep on feeding me.

I have no problem with that.

But this movement isn't limited to Sweden's

capital.

It's growing across the country.

So my next stop was Koka in Goteborg.

Koka. Goteborg, Sweden.

Which I'd heard was one of the best

restaurants in Sweden.

In Goteborg, and being on the west coast,

seafood is a big thing.

And it's a big thing here as well, right?

Johan Bjorkman. Head Chef, Koka.

We have like an expression that you dig

where you stand.

So here is the sea,

the sea is just outside the door.

So we can get fresh seafood alive every day,

and that the quality is super good.

Like, people are talking about new Nordic cuisine.

Like to make great food, you need to,

to take what you have in your area.

Yeah.

But you're going,

you cannot find everything here.

But we try to, to take like 30 Swedish miles,

and work with that.

So we got Ugglarp with the vegetables.

And you got the producer of lamb and

cheese and milk and everything here.

It's all locally sourced.

Yeah.

I'm just waiting for my first course.

So here's the first course on the menu.

We got crab.

The claw meat is underneath.

And we got some thin-sliced carrots, and

a, a pate made of crab,

flavored with a horseradish, and

then frozen.

Another hard day at work.

Mm.

The thing is, this thing is awesome.

I mean horseradish usually just like

takes over a whole thing.

It's just there, like subtle.

So nice.

It's like a crab, like a crab salad but

more refined.

We think that if you come here to Goteborg and eat

it's not that interesting to eat haupia.

It's much more fun to eat something that we

have here.

Yeah.

If you want Hupia, you can go to Spain.

They serve it perfect.

But here, it's better to serve

something that's in our blood.

We have Swedish squid.

Potatoes pure of leeks and parsley,

and then whisk egg yolks with apple vinegar.

Wow, this is the best.

I need to do this with a spoon.

It's just like a spoon full of gooey greatness.

This is my favorite for sure.

So eating in Koka right now was bloody amazing.