Håkan Stenlund

  • Articles

    46

Arctic homefood

Perhaps the smallest restaurant in the world. In Kaalasjärvi between Kiruna and Nikkaluokta, in the middle of a straight part of the road that feels awfully long, a sign indicates the turnoff for Arct...

28
Culture

2024-06-14

Eating out

You know there is about to be some serious cooking going on when the chef arrives armed with both a wheelbarrow and a spade. Tommi Tuominen from the restaurant Finnjävel in Helsinki stands next to the...

28
Culture

2024-04-02

The chef

The short version The following was overheard in the restaurant at Niehku Mountain Villa in Riksgränsen, as a group having dinner walked over to get some cheese and have a chat with the chefs in the k...

2023-09-17

Bjarke Ingels

The first impression On a sunny day in mid-June, we enter the brand-new room Biosphere at Treehotel. World-famous architect Bjarke Ingels leads the way. It’s his first meeting with the new room too. H...

19
People

2022-11-14

Out on the island

Sounds and sayings travel far on the island. Over my morning coffee, I hear two gentlemen having a conversation in the marina below. It’s still, and the sun has been up since midnight. That’s if it ev...

29
Nature

2022-05-18

The Wood Hotel

Hotel manager David Åberg and restaurateur Carina Brydling are sitting in the magnificent staircase of Sara Kulturhus in Skellefteå. The newly build cultural center that’s part of the entrance to The ...

27
Places

2022-05-17

A night at the museum

What would a museum tell you, if it got the chance? Like in the film Night at the Museum where Ben Stiller plays night security guard Larry Daley, and the Museum of Natural History comes to life durin...

28
Culture

2022-04-23

Arthotel Tornedalen

On a beautiful day in early summer, beautiful as only early summer can be in the Torne Valley, I park my car by a red house in the village Vitsaniemi in the Torne Valley. Gunhild Stensmyr steps out of...

27
Places

2021-10-25

Gourmet hiking

We left a little too late from Björkliden on our hike to Låktatjåkko mountain station. Guidebooks and information usually say it is nine kilometres. But take it with a pinch of salt because it can be ...

2021-06-23

Frida Lind-Oja

“At least it gives you rosy cheeks”, Frida Lind Oja says, laughing. She says that her minimum temperature for the ski track is minus 20, sometimes a bit colder. She also says she is grateful that she ...

2021-05-28

Travelling well

Sand between my toes I step out of the cold Bothnian Bay, surrounded by kilometre-long stretches of sand, the open sea and one of Sweden’s most remarkable campsite stories: Pite Havsbad. Spring has be...

2021-04-22

The embroidered
resistance art

The needle powerfully penetrates the white cloth, almost like a skier moving across untouched, white snow where poles and skis sink into the newly fallen snow to slowly create a pattern. The skier – o...

28
Culture

2020-11-17

The gold of the Bothnian Bay

“Kalix Löjrom makes you happy”, it is as easy as that. Simon Laiti is busy in his food studio at Hemmagastronomi in Luleå. He is creating a three-course Kalix Löjrom testing menu for a dinner party an...

21
Taste

2020-11-13

The land of the Sami

The land of the Sámi

There are indigenous peoples living in 90 countries across the globe, and the Sámi are the indigenous people living in the north of mainland Europe. The land of Sápmi covers parts of Norway, Sweden, F...

28
Culture

2020-10-03

The food story

Filleting fish by a lake called Sårgåjávrre stand Lennart Pittja and chef Johan Eriksson. The morning’s catch will be just enough for the evening meal. A fire has been lit in the old smoking hut. This...

21
Taste

2020-08-23

Stories told with names

The Sámi language is a Finno-Ugric language that is related to both Finnish and Hungarian. It’s a language with many different expressions and synonyms for nature and reindeer husbandry. The Sámi lang...

28
Culture

2020-06-07

The waterways

It is a clear, but slightly chilly early summer morning in the forest. The night mist lingers like minute clouds in the deep valley of the Laisälven river. The rays of the sun have yet to reach all th...

2020-05-19

Running wild

Exclamations, ranging from primal screams to whoops of joy bounce between mountainsides somewhere in the very north of Sweden. This is the setting for BAMM – Björkliden Arctic Mountain Marathon – a co...

2020-04-27

The chef and
the reindeer herder

It’s April in the Mausjaur Sámi district in Arvidsjaur. It’s warm, and the snow is melting. The summer has more or less come crashing into the life of the forest Sámi this year. Streams open up, and s...

21
Taste

2020-04-09

Driving on ice

Eric Gallardo drives fast. The chicane on what’s a perfect copy of the formula-1 track, Paul Ricard, on the metre-thick ice of Lake Uddjaur comes up very quickly. Unlike Eric Gallardo’s own knuckles o...

2020-03-16

The call of the wild

“And through another winter they wandered on the obliterated trails of men who had gone before. Once, they came upon a path blazed through the forest, an ancient path, and the Lost Cabin seemed very n...

2020-03-14

Chad chose Abisko

Chad Blakley’s interest in photography began at an early age. As a teenager, he worked for a local newspaper in a small town outside New Orleans, Louisiana. During his college years, he started a smal...

19
People

2020-03-07

Sweden’s highest mountain station

I’ve been here plenty of times — in summer as well as in winter — and I guess that’s why I’m already thinking about the waffles. I’m trying to decide whether to go for cloudberry or raspberry jam. Sti...

27
Places

2020-01-30

Breaking the ice

Boat trips in summer and early fall are a given part of life for the residents of Piteå, a city in the Bay of Bothnia blessed with a rich archipelago. In the Bothnian Bay archipelago, there are small ...

2020-01-07

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