Ekstedt is a One Star Michelin Restaurant in Stockholm That Only Uses Wood to Cook With.
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 21 มี.ค. 2022
- Ekstedt is a One Star Michelin Restaurant in Stockholm That Only Uses Wood to Cook With.
I was visiting Stockholm, Sweden for a week or two. Just about everyone in my chef community that I asked for restaurant recommendations came up with this restaurants name, Ekstedt. It took some doing but eventually I was able to get a reservation through a long lost high school friend of mine.
Having all of these influences pushing me to this restaurant with a fascinating concept to begin with I chose to go in blind with zero research. This lets me experience the meal with no expectations of the dining room or it's most known dishes. It was the right move in retrospect. Everything was a surprise.
From the minute I got there the staff welcomed me. They were gracious enough to let me film my meal and them as they served it. I had a great time and the chefs and waitstaff. They were so friendly and open about me asking questions about every dish. They even offered to give me a tour of the kitchen in all of it's simple, fiery glory.
I had such a great time and I can't recommend this unique experience enough.
Quote from the chef below:
"I grew up in Järpen, a little village in Jämtland, northern Sweden. Like most young people, my attitude to where I came from was to turn my back on it. When I trained as a chef, we had it drilled into us that the Nordic region was not the place to look for good ingredients. I fell in love with Italian olive oil and French poulet de Bresse. When I opened my first restaurant at the age of 21, the focus was on ultratrendy molecular gastronomy, serving dishes such as asparagus cloud and deep-fried rice paper. It couldn’t have been further away from the rustic slow cooking of the Jämtland forests. But one day I felt the urge to return to my roots. What was I going to do? I was 33 and lost. In the eyes of the media and the public I was the lightweight TV chef from “Niklas mat”. Time to do something big. It was now or never… How could I put my own personal stamp on New Nordic Cuisine?
I roamed the land around our summer cottage on Ingarö in the Stockholm archipelago, musing like some melancholic character in a black & white Ingmar Bergman film. I could spend long periods standing stock still, staring at the birches. It was only later that I realised I hadn’t been able to see the wood for the trees. Quite literally! I was supposed to have set up a barbecue that summer, but that never happened. Instead I chopped down some of the birches I’d been staring at so I had some firewood. Then I built a fire pit, like I’d done with my parents in the mountains as a kid. The fire became the family’s kitchen that summer and was kept going almost all the time. I mostly cooked on a grill, but one day I couldn’t wait for the embers, so I pushed a cast iron pan into the flames.
The fire hissed and crackled around the pan. What power, and what flavour! Finally, I felt I was onto something. The idea of a new kind of fine-dining restaurant began to take shape in my mind, a place where everything was cooked over a fire, just like in the old days. My biggest headache: was it practically possible?
Back in town, I took my first head chef Gustav Otterberg to the National Library of Sweden, where we devoured cookbooks from the 18th century. To our delight, we found some fantastic instruction manuals for Swedish cooking before the advent of electricity. I decided that my new restaurant “Ekstedt” on Humlegårdsgatan would be a homage to that time, but also to my childhood and my Jämtland heritage.
Ekstedt opened in November 2011 in central Stockholm, with a fire pit, a wood fired oven and a wood stove. Plenty of people said I’d made things too difficult for myself. But since then I’ve continued to make things more and more challenging for myself and my team. Because that’s what makes us better. And now we also have the stone-age equivalent of a microwave oven, a smoker and extra fires burning. We continue to explore age-old techniques and to learn more about a lost art of cooking."
Niklas Ekstedt
ekstedt.nu/
/ ekstedtrestaurant
/ niklas.ekstedt.3
Amazing restaurant in every way. Totally changed my cooking after visiting here. Best restaurant in Sweden and can't wait to return.
Chef is superb.
Please show menus , prices and bill in your video. The viewers need to know the costs. Thanks
Good I'm glad you liked it! I loved it too, subtle smoke in everything without being over powering. This was one of my first restaurant tours and I didn't include the price.
I did one on Frantzen as well if you want to check that out.
IMO, he should gain at least one more star! Loved this video...
I absolutely agree, it was such an amazing meal on its own but then you add the difficulty and cleverness involved in cooking only with wood!
This was really interesting, and to turn that many tables in that kitchen is a pretty big accomplishment, especially with that level of quality. I’m intrigued with the sourdough, both butter idea, never thought of that. Ton of interesting techniques there… I never thought about a Yakatori style with just bricks… that has me thinking.
It was so good. The simplicity of the Yakatori set up was really cool. All the cooks set it up differently.
Awesome thanks
You're welcome. More to come!
Nice one!
Thanks man!
I'm not a big turnip guy either but everything else look amazing.. Living in California, I am always on the lookout for a new bakery to blow my sourdough mind and I can seriously eat that all day long. It's 0648 and I am now starving.. Thanks! lol
California has a very good food scene, I'm' sure you've got some killer bakeries lined up.
@@OliveOilandGasoline Yes Sir! I unfortunately live in the central valley so it is a little drive for me to hit the bay area but it is worth it. If you've heard of any cool places to hit up, Chef please let me know.. Hope you have a great upcoming week!
At 5:00 was it Storströmming maybe that =, tack but not next time ? It’s only for true Swede’s.., so not for me too.
I had that before it's crazy! I kind of liked it but it's a little hectic.
Some tasty looking dishes at that restaurant.
Absolutely. I can't recommend it enough.
Wowzers, but it begs the though.......
What if Olive Oil and Gasoline & the Yacht Chef had a baby ?
Would the ensuing cuisine be better than this ??
How many Michelins would it be awarded ??
Ian! I don't want to impregnate Dean!!! 😆😆😆
@@OliveOilandGasoline Perhaps TheCrewChef ?? 🤣
@@ianhamilton396 That option is way more anatomically feasible and we're very good friends but she's like a little sister to me.