Fika: The Art of The Swedish Coffee Break, with Recipes for Pastries, Breads, and Other Treats (5 page)

On a visit to your grandmother in Sweden, even if it is just a casual afternoon affair, the nice porcelain coffee cups will come out. This comes from a tradition of the older generation, who always had matching sets of cups, saucers, cookie plates, and a porcelain coffeepot to use when company came to visit. Fika was an honored time of day, and the
servingware
reflected that, so a beautiful, complete set was considered as essential to fika as a homemade baked good.

Until the last couple of decades, when more casual coffee culture made its way into Swedish territory, this is how coffee was consumed. Any afternoon coffee gathering, be it at a church or someone’s home, would feature a beautiful porcelain set, as indicative of fika as the English tradition of tea. The typical Swedish method of brewing coffee in the earlier days was
kokkaffe
. This “cooked coffee” is made by placing water and coarse coffee grounds in a kettle and boiling. Because of brewing it in this way, the coffee was often scalding hot, so it was common to pour a little of the coffee from the cup directly onto the saucer and drink it from there. Swedes call this
dricka på fat
, essentially, “drink from the saucer.” Alongside the coffee, you would always find a pitcher of cream and a bowl of sugar cubes, which were often taken with the help of silver tongs. The sugar was put between the teeth and the coffee consumed through it, in Swedish called
dricka kaffe på bit
, literally, “drink coffee on the sugar cube”—a truly vintage style of fika.

Another Swedish coffee tradition that dates to this era is the
kaffegök
, also known as
kaffekask
, a blend of coffee and alcohol, simply made by adding approximately a shot glass of vodka to a cup of coffee.

Perhaps the most well-known visual of the Swedish coffee break are the cups and saucers that Swedish designer Stig Lindberg did for
Gustavsberg. The simple lines and patterns of the many Swedish designers of the 1950s and ’60s have inspired hundreds of variations and unique designs, and have made the original cups the proverbial pot of gold for vintage lovers. Nothing symbolizes the traditional Swedish kitchen of the era like these cups.

Even today, using the classic cup-and-saucer combination heightens the fika experience and gives it an element of celebration. At a Swedish dinner party, an after-dinner cup of coffee is sure to be served in a traditional
mockakopp
, a smaller version of the porcelain cup and saucer.

With the rise of the konditori, coffee in Sweden became synonymous with what it was served with; if people were invited over for coffee, it was practically a social expectation to have something delicious to pair it with. In the middle of the 1900s, the
kafferep
became a commonplace affair for birthdays, funerals, or just a good reason for older ladies to meet and socialize. Similar to fika, a kafferep is a larger and more formal gathering.

The social rules require that a true kafferep include small cookies, buns, and a version of sponge cake. For a bigger celebration, you would even add a torte to the mix. The idea is to always have an abundance of treats.

The cookies of these classic social gatherings are called
småkakor
, literally “small cookies.” Often made from a basic form of sugar cookie dough, what distinguishes småkakor is that they are small and sweet, and you can always expect a variety of them on hand at any typical coffee
gathering. In fact, the traditional
kakfat
, or tiered set of cookie plates that was common at these gatherings, was meant to be filled with a variety of småkakor. Any good hostess would bake these from scratch, a tradition borne out by the name of one of Sweden’s oldest and most classic cookbooks,
Sju Sorters Kakor
, or
Seven Kinds of Cookies
. Today the book is a staple in any Swede’s cookbook collection. And while serving up seven kinds of cookies takes a certain level of ambition and commitment, the concept is ingrained into the Swedish mind-set.

But you never know when someone will arrive and need to be served a cup of coffee, and for that reason, throughout the decades cookies have most commonly been stored in decorative cookie tins. Nowadays, you’ll also find a batch in the freezer, particularly if they are butter based. Because in Sweden, when there’s company, you serve coffee; and serving coffee without something to eat alongside is simply unthinkable.