Swedish Food History

Historical period

A framework: Neolithic and Bronze Age farming in the south; the Iron and Viking Ages; medieval Sweden and the Hanseatic grip on the Baltic trade, with Visby as a Hanseatic town; the Reformation from 1527 and the end of the fasting calendar, which left lutfisk stranded as a Christmas dish; the Swedish Empire of the 17th century and its Baltic and colonial trade; the great 18th-century transformation with the potato, the enclosures and the coffee bans; catastrophic emigration in the 19th century; industrialisation, the cooperative movement and the temperance movement; the folkhem and the institutional kitchen; and the New Nordic turn.