Happy Swedish Shopping
I had a fun time shopping yesterday in my nearby neighborhood of Andersonville or as I like to call it Pretend Sweden. Despite the snow and cold, the stores and restaurants were crowded but most people seemed filled with holiday cheer.
Before we started shopping, we ate at our favorite Swedish brunch place, Svea, and had Swedish pancakes and a popeye omelette. Svea is only open until 3pm but they do offer two very large dinners, one of which includes marinated lutefisk. When it was brought out to someone who ordered it yesterday, one I can only presume is the owner of the place (although he’s usually behind the scenes) came out from the back with a booming voice, asked who had ordered the lutefisk and treated the entire restaurant to a booming rendition of a song which is probably entitled “O Lutefisk,” which was sung with the exact same melody as the popular holiday jingle, “O Christmas Tree” and ended with the words. “O Lutefisk O Lutefisk You make me feel so young again!” I swear by every Swedish fish in the sea he had a small tear of joy sliding down his cheek as he walked back behnd the counter again.
After eating, we bought some gifts for my mom and my Swedish grandma at the Swedish American Museum (I’d show you a pic but my mom reads this blog and I don’t want to ruin her xmas.) and at Wikstrom’s. Wikstrom’s has a great bumper sticker. It says “I Break For Lutefisk.” I was very very tempted to buy it.
(now playing: The Moonbabies: War on Sound mini album)