For an outsider swedish julbord might seem unorganised but it’s not. Usually a family eat the same food every Christmas and there is a structure it’s organised.
You usually put whatever you want on your plate, everything is voluntary. But if you follow tradition, you eat in a certain order: Plate 1: Herring and sturgeon. Plate 2: Salmon and other fish (grilled, cold-smoked/cooked salmon, fish pâté, eggs). Plate 3: Cold cuts (Christmas ham, pâtés, sausages and pig's feet). Plate 4: Warm (meatballs, prince's sausage, Jansson's temptation, ribs, dip in the pot, lute fish). Plate 5: Cheeses (cheeses such as stilton and cheddar belong to Christmas). Plate 6: Dessert (rice à la Malta, fruit salad, rice porridge). Plate 7: Christmas sweets (crackers, marzipan, marmalade, polka dots. Anything sweet you can find).
Thank you! Was about to post this myself, but you've already done it. The only thing I have to add is, the food is sometimes indulged during "Kalle Ankas Jul" (Donald Duck's Christmas) - a TV-show that somehow became a tradition - and the kids are allowed to take their plates to the TV to watch it. :)
Exactly!! Thank you for this!!! I didn't put as coherent and clear, thank you for this! I got a bit upset at the remarks that is was basically what we had home without any red thread to it.
@@robbalobba Hehe, kanske något att prova. Men du har rätt, baltic herring (strömming) var det meningen att det skulle vara. Jag skyller på google translate ;)
• Our Julbord, what we eat on Christmas, is definitely not just a mix of "what ever you like!" It's a very specific system both in what you serve, the specific dishes you serve on the table, and also the order you eat them in. -Even though it's a julbord (Christmas Smorgårdsbord) all foods are there at the same time, think a bit "Starter(s), Main Courses, Side Dishes, Desert." We begin with the cold fish, like haring and smoked salmon, and a devils eggs, and cusses and mixes that goes with that. First Starter no 1 with the fishes, then Starter no 2, it's the cold cuts meat, with the sauce and the mixes that suits with them. Special type of bread with both starter dishes. The cold cuts comes next and is of course also the big ham someone have spend ages on to do. and some mixes with those too. Then the "main meal" all that is warm on the table, the meatballs, the prince sausages, the ribs, the Jansons Frästelse, and so on, and the side dishes, that you add to all of them. Many mixes we don't eat at any other point during the year. And Dopp i Grytan, and different kind of Jule-bread and Jule-beer and Julemust. So our Christmas food is very much a "pre planned" dinner, with the same thing everywhere, it's just how grand scale it is that is different, no matter if you eat at home, eat at relatives or friends or goes to "JULBORD" with you partner in a cosy restaurant during the December months, or with your work, they all have basically the same, but it changes in quality, quantity depending on the place. But there is most definite s red thread and an order and an etiquette on how to eat it, when to eat it, that every place have, from restaurants to home. -I actually took a bit of offence at this part: "where we said they basically throw everything they have in the house", about 09:00 in. It really really isn't how he said at all. Quite opposite it's a specified type of food we usually only eat at Christmas and it takes a lot of planing. So we might have a bunch of dishes, but they are basically the same year after year after year. And many if them only on Christmas.
Yes!! It’s traditional food.. Every family, has different things besides the tradition ones.. Some maybe want to have a certain bread, some wants a curtain salmon dish.. or what ever.. But people normally have the basic traditional food and then some of the other types you are used to in your family..
Like...I understand what he means with the British food since it's one set meal. However, no need to take offence. The reason to why there are so many different dishes in Sweden is because it was the years biggest celebration so one served the fanciest food one could find in the middle of winter. So it's a LITTLE bit like whatever you have at home - but fancier😂
If you join a julbord/Christmas dinner at a restaurant your eating order is 1. Pickled herring 2. Cold fish (like salomon) 3. Cold food, like ham, brawn 4. Warm food like meatballs, sausage, red cabbage, green cabbage, rice porridge, lutfisk 5. Desert And off coarse you get a new plate for every step. So even if everything is in order on the buffet. You never mix everything up on the same plate. For a newcomer at our buffets it looks like we break the line when get next step of eating. But it just looks like this. That’s the right way to do it. There is a system in how everything is eaten.
Christmas dinner is eaten in a certain order in Sweden too. You eat herring and fish first, then meat dishes. And then hot meat dishes. After that, it's desserts.
You’re quite right. First the fish dishes , then meat dishes, then hot dishes and last dessert. And even though all sorts of food are on the table, you eat it in that order.
It's also a bit of a missconception that swedes eat pickled herring year round these days. Most people I now only eat it during major holidays like christmas and midsummers eve. There's a lot of other dishes on the julbord that are also rarely (if ever) eaten at other times of the year like Janssons Frestelse, Jellied veal (Kalvsylta), Fårfiol, Sillsallad etc. The list goes on. :D
We sort of do that as well in my family. Fish courses are the starters, then meat and veggies and finally the desserts including risgrynsgrot (Christmas porridge). Then after all the unwrapping of presents the sweets and fruit are on the table and sometimes a board game can appear.
The reason why we always celebrate on eves, like Christmas Eve, Easter Eve, Midsummer Eve and so on is because back in the old days we used to count time differently. Each new day began at sunset which means Christmas began at sunset on the 24th.
Thank you! You are the only one in any comment section ever I have seen stating this! The lack of knowledge on the matter outside a very specific field is absolutly disheartening. So thank you for spreading it!
@@Mattiasthesecond Ok, days beginning at midnight... :D What color is the sky in your world? (But more seriously, the problem here is that English lacks a word for dygn, i.e. the 24h period consisting of day+night.)
He forgot to add that the whole santa thing is different here in Sweden aswell. Here he actually comes home to you and give you the presents. No coming down the chimney. He knocks on your door and is let it in and then leaves once all the presents are given out. My dad played santa when I grew up lol. He deserved an oscar! He went all out with the make up(no creepy mask that some families have with their santa), the clothes, which was grey and not the traditional red, and he put on a different voice and dialect and all that. He was great. And before santa came dad of course went out to buy sonething that he'd forgotten. Obviously when you grow older you become suspicious. So here santa is not an unseen mystery thing but somone you actually meet, and maybe talk to if you're brave.
If we want to be a little picky, grey IS the traditional "tomte" colour, like in Viktor Rydberg's poem "Tomten". He turned red some time in the early 20th century.
@@christopherx7428 if im not mistaken , the red color became a widely known thing from the Coca cola commercials that gave santa their trafitional red colors from their company.
One time when my uncle was Santa I asked him why he was wearing a mask and he said that it was to hide a disturbing face wound. I was a bit scared of Santa after that lol
The Swedish Julbord (Yule table) is like a Swedish Smörgåsbord Christmas special. You eat it for lunch or dinner. You kan eat it befor X-mas, under X-mas and left overs after X-mas.
Yule är inte direkt kopplat till enbart Sverige ,utan till germanska folket (nordeuropa folket) som är 1 av flera sammelnamn på en rad olika stammar i norra Europa hos romarna. Norge och Sverige var ett och samma område/stam och ej 2 länder (med tid även en bit av Danmark men som i största del hörde till tyskland) som i sin tur hade yule. Den som levt i längst tradition med det är Norge. Det är missvisande att kalla svenskt julbord för yule table då Norge är den som lever till större del efter tradition och inte Sverige.
@@NaeniaNightingale Sweds have Christmans only foods, like grisfötter (pigs feet), dopp-i-grytan (dunk in the pot) and lutfisk (lye fish), but the younger generations don't like it, so it's rarely served.
It is due to the fact that there are so few red days in England. In England you have 9 red days, In sweden we have 21 red days. And on top of that squeeze days and to round it up 5 weeks of vacation so you can gather up some days to spend during christmas. For example this year you can spend 3 days of vacation 27-29 and have 10 days off work. In 2024 you can spend 3 vacation days and get 12 days off... :)
Not everyone gets "klämdagar" (squeeze days) though. Some also get half days before any free days too. Where I work, we sadly don't get either, just red days and the Eve days are off.
In Sweden, most holiday celebrations are celebrated on Eve. In Swedish it is called "Afton". So we have Julafton (Christmas Eve), Nyårsafton (New Year's Eve), Påskafton (Easter Eve), and Midsommarafton (Midsummer Eve). I might have forgotten some more.
Pingstafton, used to be a red holiday but this was removed to make May 1 a red day instead. Trettondagsafton, the day is actually called, although you usually just say "trettondagen". Allhelgonaafton, the day is actually called, although you usually just say "allhelgona".
@@LasseEklofEh... no. The Second day of Pingst or pentecost used to be a holiday until 2004 when they made june 6th a holiday instead. Pentecost eve are always on a Saturday.
Hello! :D First! :D About the swedish traditional christmas food, I want to point out a few things. There are actually some set customs in what order to eat the different dishes. We often start out with the cold dishes and the fish. So herring, salmon, the eggs with skagen on top (shrimp sallad) are dishes that will be eaten first. After that we eat the meat dishes, like meatballs, sausage, the roasted ham etc. So we don't usually eat the herring together with the ham or meatballs. Some of the side dishes, like the beat sallad for instance will go with a certain dish. In this case, the meatballs. So there are some "rules" or customs to follow. :) With that said, the random buffet experience may be due to the younger generation not being that strict on how to combine all the different dishes. It may be a new thing, but traditionally you don't have the ham on the same plate as the herring or salmon. Maybe someone will have more examples to add to this? :)
@@johananas8407 Not truly skagen, no. Just an easier way to explain for anyone non-scandinavian to understand. I usually have roe mixed with sourcream and mayo, and then topped with a shrimp and some fresh dill. :)
He missed out on dancing around the christmas tree, Santa coming to give out the gifts and watching Donald Duck at 15:00 every. damn, christmas! 😢 Those are standard swedish christmas traditions.
You dance and sing on the 24th? We do it on tjugondag knut after christmas when we all gather, eat, dance and sing, the kids get candy hanging from the christmastree and after we all dance and sing around the tree we gather and fysically throw it outside, to signify christmas being over.
And "sagan om Karl-Bertil Jonssons julafton (1975)" and maybe also Fanny & Alexander (but that might be too dark +its like 3 hours so it might be too long)
He forgot to mention that the 25:e (christmas day) is a huge party night for young people returning to their home towns for christmas celebrations! We call it ”hemvändarkväll” and it loosely translates to "coming-home-night".
Watching Donald Duck is a Swedish Christmas Tradition. Every Christmas Eve, at 3 o´clock, over three million Swedes gather in front of their TVs to enjoy an hour of Disney cartoons.
The reason we celebrate christmas eve is that in the pagan days we used to celebrate Midwinter solstice on the evening of 21st or 22nd December. So when the nordic countries became Christians it was an easier transition to the new celebrations. It is simply a way to make christmas a bit of a mix between the old religion and the new one.
Well, we don't know. We didn't actually celebrate the winter solstice before the missionaries up here in the north. We celebrated "midwinter", and noone knows anymore when it was exactly... propably somewhere in december or january. But as soon as we got Christian Kings it all moved to the 24th/25th.
@@SteamboatW the solstice was celebrated at the actual solstice, the longest night of the year, and that is mainly 21-22 December. On rare occassions 20th. Same as midsummer solstice is 20-23 June
@@tobiasnordberg4792 Well, if you define "pagan days" as 17th century, so yes, but before the 12th? Well, in the Nordics, nobody knows except that they didn't celebrate the solstice, but "midwinter" which propably happened in January. The Romans did celebrate at solstices, but that's hundreds of years before written accounts in the North.
@@SteamboatW it is not for sure that the pagans knew exactly when the soltice took place, however the vikings being able to navigate the high seas according to the sun does indicate they did know the movement of the sun very well
I'm swedish and my christmas starts actually on the 23'd with bingo night, everyone sitting down on uppesittarkvällen (stay-up-night / the day-before the-day. And watch Bingolotto and play, and play the kids play boardgames and the adults drink glögg and eat saffronbuns (lussebullar). Then we go home and sleep. Wake up on the 24th, sit down and watch the 24th and last episode of the christmas calender tv show they made for this year, the exciting finale everyone has been waiting for. then we sit down, eat riceporridge that has simmered through the night (with ONE hidden almond in it for a lucky finder), light the fourth advent christmas candle, you get to open one gift from your stocking, from the elf that has been staying at your house all december. After the porridge and stut (homemade bread with butter, christmas ham, applesauce and mustard) everyone gets dressed for the weather and head outside to sled down the slopes, adults and kids, togheter playing in the snow. Then we go inside, and start setting up for the julbord (christmas-table buffet). kids are playing, and then everyone gathers around the tv to watch donald ducks christmas special (a bunch of disney shows that are in no way shape or form especially christmassy, all clips are the same every year except the final 1-2 clips that are usually a new movie that will air next year from disney). the show is always presented at first by a famous swede that gives a speech and lights a candle. After donald duck, some people stay by the tv, chatting with relatives, some go play, some finish cooking and then we all sit down to eat the buffét. noramlly it's christmas ham, different kinds of bread, meatballs, potatoes, herring, janssons frestelse, eggs and oven-omelettes, red beatsallad, raw spiced salmon, brown sauce (gravy), salamis, tiny sausages called princesausages, honeyglaced ribs, lutefish, green cale sallad, brussel sprouts, cheeses and different toppings. we eat for a long time and then after, kids go play, adults clear the table. then santa comes, my explanation has been far to loong but he hands the gifts out and then people read rhymes and open the presents. that's about it in a great sense.
The "potatoes with fish" is called Janssons frestelse. You have No cheese on or in it. The sausage is a special one "prinskorv" (princesausage) and you only eat that sausage at Christmas & Easter. The special ham you only eat at Christmas. In my home you don't drink any alcohol at Christmas because it's the childrens day.
Eating a "julbord" is a tradition that has followed us ever since the Viking Age when the expression "drinking Yule" was coined. During the Middle Ages, the Christian celebration of Christmas came to Sweden, and because it was a Roman Catholic custom, people fasted during Advent. It meant a ban on eating meat, and dinner instead consisted of salted fish and porridge. During the day, dips in the pot were often served between all the chores on the farm and in the home. The fast was first broken on Christmas Day (longer back in time, probably on Christmas Eve) when people were finally allowed to feast on meat of various kinds. For most people in the old farming community, these days were the most solemn of the year. In summary, it can be said that today's "julbord" consists of dishes that are partly connected to the fasting rules of the Middle Ages, partly associated with the traditional slaughter of the Christmas pig before Christmas and partly a remnant from the preservation methods of the time such as pickled herring.
If I got it right, in the old days you start at 24th with eating, presents, and games. It continued thru the night and you end it by going to church in the morning. The morning service is called Julotta.
A traditional South Sweden Christmas table for me is basically 2 different orientations. It is common to take them in a certain order. First up are different kinds of pickled herring, boiled egg halves, Jansson's Frestelse, which is a gratin of potatoes+onions+anchovies+cream and crust flour, herb bread, sauerkraut, different kinds of toppings such as different hard cheeses, different smoked sausages, smoked. /regular liver sausages etc. When you've let that sink in, it's time for the main course. It is cooked ham that is grilled with mustard and crust flour, dip in stew (not so common anymore, you save the ham spade that was left after you cooked the ham and use it to dip the herb bread in. Great with brown cabbage ) brown cabbage, red cabbage, meatballs, prince sausage, grilled ribs, various mustards, etc. After eating, about 1 hour later, rice porridge with fruit cream or juice soup and cinnamon is served. I'm sure I've forgotten a few, but this is roughly what I usually eat for Christmas. Now you're so full you're about to burst, but damn it's so good. So yes, 3 kg more on the scale and you usually have food left for a couple more days. 🎅🎄🎁💝Merry Christmas & Happy New Year everyone! 🍾🥂🎆🎇✨✨
Much on the chrismas table today are basicly throwbacks to the earlier days when people were poorer. In the autumn they did slaughter a pig or three, and made ham, sausages and so on from it - basicly foods that could store well by beeing salted and/or dried, same with breads and cheese. And also just comming of fasting. There is a "eating order" first you eat herring/eggs and things like that, then comes cold cutes (ham, sausges, pigs feet Brawns and Ham and stuff like that, then comes the hot parts (small hot dogs called prince sausges if translated), meatballs, Lutfisk, Jasons frestelse (potaoe grateng with anjovis) and other warm dishes, after that time for dessert So a lot on the chrismas table are things that we dont normaly eat under a year (like Lutfisk, sure some eats it but in general it is for the chrismas table), swedish julbord dont normaly/traditionaly has a turkey on it (you might find mutton and deer/boar/elk on it) Herring was a cheap thing back then (and not as many differnt varieties) samr with Brawn (i had never heard that word but is seems to be right), Dopp i gryta: “Dip in the pot” where you dip dark bread in the fat from the ham.
He forgot to mention one thing on the food table, thats only exist on that day? "Dopp I Grytan". Because that special bread and sausage only exist for Christmas. You usually start with it, before you dig in to the buffé. And he also forgot to mention a tradition we have on TV, since many years "Julkalendern" (Christmas calendar). It's a saga in 15 minutes episode that's aired every day from 1-24th of December. It's a tradition since 1960
@@wyrmhand I agree. No Christmas without "Dopp-I Grytan". I think either he forgot about it or his girlfriend's family never told him about that tradition
The reason we celebrate it on the 24th instead of the 25th is actually due to historical reasons in how time was measured. In Sweden, the day "ended" when it got dark and work for the day is done. So essentially, the day ended when it got dark on the 24th, and people celebrated Christmas. Nowadays, the day ends at midnight, but we still keep the tradition of celebrating it on the 24th as that is what we are accustomed to. We don't call it "Christmas technically, we call it"Julafton", "Jul" meaning "Christmas" and "Afton" meaning "Eve", because we used to celebrate it at night. As for replacing the days that falls on a weekday, that's up to the employer. Some companies to offer that, some do not. There's no law around it.
Swedish Christmas tables, I guess, have become pretty universal over the years, but part of the reason there are so many different dishes is because our country is quite big landmass wise, giving lots of different areas that yield different resources, different crops to be grown, animals to raise, fish to be fished etc., so an inland Christmas table might historically have been more heavy on the red meat, while a costal one would have more fish, and over the years it has gotten more mixed together and streamlined, leaving the typical assortment you see today. Also I don't think a lot of people do their own personal tables as extensive as the ones you see in restaurants, you pick a handful of favorites and go for those. As for the actual dishes they are all about making the most of what you have and using up the things you preserved earlier in the year, in the time before modern refrigeration and all year round produce. You have pickled food and salted food and jams and fruit preserves and as for the meat you use all the parts. When you killed that one pig you'd saved for Christmas you didn't want anything go to waste, that's why there is ham and pork sausages, meatballs, spare ribs and also "head cheese" and even the pigs feet can be found on many Christmas tables, though some of the details, like pigs feet, has lost popularity over the years.
In Sweden the christmas food is quite historical. As he said, it comes from when we were poor. We slaghtered the pig and made all sorts of food from it. And much food/bread containes exotic spicies that were rare and expencive back then (saffron, ginger, cinnamon, clove), dried fruits (raisins, figue, dates) and oranges.
We have quite a few “holidays” throughout the year. When we get time off from work. Some years a lot of them happens to be on the weekend. Which we call “The employers year. And some years it’s the opposite, called “The employees year”
The reason for why we have meat in all different forms, ham, meatballs, sausages etc is because due to the climate and before invention of fridges, the livestock was used as the pantry in a way. When nothing grows in the frozen landscape, the meat became the primary food due to them being kept alive by dried food, hay, pellets etc. so even if you didn’t have access to vegetables, you had access to meat. And they slaughtered the pig for the celebration. Having potatoes for Christmas is due to the potatoes being able to be stored for the whole winter in underground storage (jordkällare) and the reason for why fish is included is because traditions got mixed up after going from Catholicism to being Protestants. The Catholics were fasting before Christmas so instead of meat they would eat fish and then the tradition just got mixed up and the fish was included for Christmas. The tradition of the Luciatåg is from paganism though, and symbolizes the change where it starts to get brighter (solstice) and historically a lot of Christmas traditions come from really brutal stuff from the paganism and the Vikings. Even the reason for why the Christmas tree ornaments were primarily red balls comes from the Vikings slaughtering British people. But since religions have changed a lot, from pagans to Catholics to Protestants, they have just combined different stuff from different eras and that’s why the traditional Christmas feast includes all that it does. But to pinpoint every single food or recipe it would take up a whole book I think, because it’s too much and so many different reasons for everything that is included. It’s not just a buffet. It’s a connection to how our ancestors were living thousands of years ago.
So yes we play a lot of boardgames on Christmas eve , at least in my family's tradition. We don't watch TV on Christmas eve it's spent with family eating, opening gifts, talking etc. And the eating is in different sittings. You start with fish foods cold cut. Next is the warm meat portion of Christmas food and last ris ala Malta, dessert. Later it's coffee and cake and Christmas sweets and chocolate and fruit with the boardgames. And lots of julmust.
The things we eat on christmas is not things we would have normally anyway. Some stuff is, like meatballs, sausages and potato. But most other stuff like the herring, Dip in the pot, Grav lax, roasted ham, are not things we eat normally, not in the way they are prepared on christmas. They may seem random, but they arent, Sweden used to be extremely poor once upon a time, and winters were long and hard, so people saved the best food that they could and used Christmas to feast on that food. Sausages, Herring, ham, may seem normal to us today but that is because production and storage of it is so much easier...In the past, you had to slaughter pigs to get the ham and sausages, it was a lot of work since everything had to be done from scratch and the food spoiled fast. Its very much focused on the basics because thats what existed back then... They didnt have tomatos, spaghetti, chili, and other fancy imported foods, they had to deal with what they could get. Meat overall was a luxury.
You realy need someone to explain the history and background of the julbord to understand. There IS a very obvious red tread and structure around it but maybe we let those up a bit at home. Most of us just have what we love now and defenitly not enough room to hold a perfect cristmas buffé. "Julbord".
The "Smörgåsbord" like Julbord is actually quite new and it came after the smörgåsbord became popular. Back in the day they slaugthered a big fat pig and then most dishes was made out of that. We still see that in diffrent sausages, liver paté, ham, pig feets, ribs, pork belly etc. Back in the day the would also use the blood and use it in to both soup and bread as well as bloodsausage. It was also not uncommon to use the pigs head as decoration on the table (the classic image is with an apple in its mouth). However salted herring was a staple food and not at all fancy. So was porridge and bread. Belive it or not, along the big rivers salmon was also everyday food and not all fancy either. So if you were poor and had no pig to slaugther chances were that your Yule food would be more focused on porridge, herring and salmon. One traditional food is "bread in ham/sausage broth" aka "dopp i grytan" (dip in the pot) or "blöta" (being wet). This too were poor peoples food. One of the most important part of the Yule food was tve beer. In old laws it is even stating a minimum of beer that should be brewed. This beer was "magical" and protected the people from the malicovant beings and spirits that was belived to roam the land during the Yule-time (especially the christmas night). So drinking beer was almost a sacred action. Yule beer is still very important to many, and they who do not drink beer often drink a beer deriven soda called "Julmust" (not too many know it's connection to beer brewing though). If you combine all these "rich peoples food" with the "poor peoples food" and beer as well as some deserts, and you got the Swedish Yule food today.
He missed one important difference: That Santa, The Christmas Elf actually often comes to deliver the presents on Christmas Eve to the kids in person. Usually meaning someone in the household dress up as Santa and deliver the gifts, in various levels of disguise, maybe just a red hat, maybe a full costume.
A fun fact that often is overlooked and maybe forgotten even in Sweden (the nordic countres), is our strong ties with our more... lets say ancient heritage from norse mythology and folklore. I believe a lot of the differences between how we celebrate are sprung out of our ancestors not really being so easily persuaded to convert to christianity. The matter of fact is that we technically don't celebrate "Christmas" but instead we celebrate "Yule" and Yule as a nordic tradition has it's roots in celebrating "the return of the light" as in the sun coming back, since it's so dark all the time. That might also be a reason to why we have more of a buffet because of the "Yuleblot", a sacrifice to the norse gods with slaughter of livestock. This is not a fact just a guess on my part, but somehow it makes a case as to why it's not as similar to other countries that have a celebration with a stronger foundation in christianity. We just can't shake our urge to plunder. 🤣
im swedish my husband is english AND has his birthday on christmas day so when he moved here he had his birthday on his own, so to speak, for the first time in his life, as we celebrate on the 24th :) but we do english christmas aswell on the 25th but celebrating his bd first :)
If you are a child of divorced parents, you celebrate December 24th and 25th. Maybe not everyone but that's what I know is normal. What we only eat at different in Christmas is Christmas ham. Someone might eat salted fish, someone might eat dip in the pot. It's when you dip a loaf of bread in spa after the ham spa. It's a Viking recipe =) The rest of the food is pretty much like what we eat at midsummer. This is only my opinion.
yes, even maybe if your parents are not divorced, like with your moms relatives on the christmas day then with your dads relatives on the 25th. Or with your dad+mom+siblings on the 24 then with other relatives on the 25h
And if you’re in a relationship with someone who also has divorced parents you get 4 christmases 😅 me and my ex celebrated the 23rd, 24th and 25th going from house to house celebrating with all our parents and their families.
One more common thing in Sweden, is that 25'th is for rest, or if you have the energy that's the day for hitting the pub. Basically 24'th is usually for celebrating with your family, and the 25'th is often spent celebrating with your friends (or just resting). I know some people do Christmas with family and New year's with friends as well.
Here in Finland we celebrate as well on 24th. my girlfriend is Italian and they celebrate at 25th. so i get to celebrate two fricking days too!!! it is fricking awesome 😄
Some companies here in Sweden close during Christmas and New Year. So we work until December 22-23 and starts working again on January 2-3 depending on which day Christmas and New Year fall on. So some of us don't work during the days in between Christmas and New Year.
I been to traditional Skånsk (the south of Sweden) Christmas table where we have a lot of danish dishes ( roast pork, roast pork, eel, duck, goose, jams and pies and cabbage of various kinds) to so it can be up to 70 different dishes. So you have a difference depending on where in Sweden you are. And yes in the evening when you just had all you can take of family you go out to the pub, bar or a club. Also, the 23’d it is a tradition down here to go out to the pub or a restaurant and meet all the friends that have returned to the homecity to have Christmas with family.
@@Hpmanenz in the 80’s there vas a place called Spångens Gästgiveri (known from movies from the 30’s) that had this monster Julbord, with way over 100 different dishes. I don’t think that any restaurant in the right mind would do that today. (Ål, fläskestek, spegelsteak, you only find down in the south on a Julbord.
Greetings from Finland! That movie is propably National Lampoons Christmas Vacation (from 1989) where Chevy Chase is the father of the Griswold family. Also some movies that comes christmas time on television is every year Home Alone 1 & 2 and then the Brittish legend (actually this comes 24th day usually) Snowman. So every one here knows the song "Walking in the air" and that´s the reason why Nightwish made cover from that song. Some evening there propably come at least one of the Die Hard and Unknown soldier (Tuntematon sotilas). That is also tradition in Finland that 25th day kids watch Donald Ducks Christmes that has same things every year. Well originally Nordic christmas is pagan celebration that vikings celebrated at the darkst time of the year and were called Jul. It was basicly eating, drinking and having fun with all those people that were special and important and everybody gathered to celebrating. Main meat were pork, but there were also other meats and fish as well. It was kind of "new year" celebration as well becouse after that the days began to get lighter again. Jul were the most important celebration in viking culture and even when vikings started to become christians they still didn´r gave up Jul. So the cathollic church got the idea that they would change and remove them own Christmas from earlier autumn to same time as viking Jul to celebrate Christmas and combine these two things togetger. In Norway where the sea is open there were fresh salmon and dried fish, but in Sweden and Finland our sea is under ice cover we had more of pickeled fish like herring and lutefisk at the table. Those are still part of some peoples tradition, but these days at least in my (family) own tradition we eat salmon as well. Still the king of the table is Christmas ham of course. And yes, like he said on the video Swedes eat Christmas sausages and meatballs (they always eat meatballs in every celebration) Finland has Karelian stew that has some cow and pork meat chunks. We eat so much sausages commonly that isn´t part of our tradition. And i don´t know how other countries and different parts even in Finland general, but at least in north raindeer and moose is important part at the table too. Of course we have potatoes and different kinds of sallads, gravy that is made from the grease of the ham, propably some peas and lingonberries. Bread is usually malty and sweet "joululimppu" (in Finland) "jul limppa" (in Sweden), I don´t does they eat that in Norway too. Before the big dinner we traditionaly eat some of rice porridge. Some eat that with cinnamon, sugar and butter, when some eat it it with kissel that is made from dried apricots, plums, pears and apples. We call it "sekahedelmäsopppa" that is mixed fruit soup translated. This tradition is very different depending from the are that where you live in Finland, but in my home city at the evening of 25th people are going drink, melt the ham (that is in the stomach) and see some friends in to the city centrum bars. It is crazy how much people there are at that time and people are happy and in Christmas mood. No fighting that night at the bars. Everybody are comftable and grumpyness isn´t part of the night at all. Here in Tampere where i live now isn´t as seddle. Of course many have Christmas spirit, but not as many.
At some families, Snata Claus visit them around 6.00-7.00 pm, drinking some julmust and gives the christmas gifts to the family members that are in his christmas bag or under the christmas tree before leaving again.
There is a pattern to what we put on the x-table. It is just very complicated. You will only find stuff associated with Christmas normally. A lot of that are pretty meat from pigs. These are all fine, though some are far more common than others: Porkchops, sausages, meat balls, ribs, blood sausage or pudding, liver patty, head cheese, ham, and so on. There is also the pickled herrings. Boiled potatoes. A potato casserole flavored with a fish that has been spiced with sandal wood. Cream stewed kale. Apple sauce and mustards for the ham. Gravlax. Mustard based sauce for the gravlax. Rehydrated dried cod that has been cured in lye. Christmas bread. Knäckebröd. Cheese. Butter.
Traditional southern Christmas table consists of seven plates. Pickled herring, other fish, cold cut meats, ham, the warm dishes, porridge, dessert. All with bread and cheese. And lots of variations in each category (except the rice porridge)
This is the basics for a Julbord. Everyone will not have everything on here, and some have added even more in the same line as these, but there it is: Cold fish dishes on the Christmas table: Pickled herring, different kinds Baltic herring Herring salad Egg halves, Devils eggs Caviar Salmon: gravlax, cold smoked, hot smoked Baltic herring box (Eel used to be a thing but now it's endangered) Beetroot salad Skagen mayo with prawns Salads: red cabbage salad, kale salad Cold cut meats: Christmas ham Leg of mutton Brawn: calf brawn, roll brawn, press brawn Reindeer Moose Cold cut roast beef Sausages Pig's feet Liver paste Pate Hot dishes on the Christmas table: Jansson's Temptation Prince sausage Meatballs Christmas sausage Noisette Cabbage: red cabbage, kale, brown cabbage Brussels sprouts Ribs Dip in the pot Dopp-i-Grytan Potato Lutefisk or Lye fish Add ons and side Mustard, different kinds Herb bread Christmas crackers Dark rye bread Butter Christmas cheese Stilton or Cheddar Dessert cheeses Grav salmon sauce Cumberland sauce Pickled cucumbers Pickled Beetroot Drinks on the Christmas table: Mulled wine Christmas beer - with and without alcohol Snaps, different kinds Christmas must Red wine Mumma (couldn't find a translation) Svagdricka (couldn't find a translation) Water Coffee Tea The sweet: Truffles Pannacotta Raisins & almonds (for mulled wine) Rice porridge Rice à la malta Fruit sallad Gingerbread cookies Saffroncake or buns Butterscotch Ice chocolate Caramel Polka pigs Marmelades Clementines Dates Nuts Fig And you eat it like a 3 or 5 or 7 course meal, in a specific order.
Christmas dinner is like a Smorgasbord, with a few items added. We add ham, red cabbage, and a lot of items from pork. This is because by tradition a pig was slaughtered and you have use it up because you had problems store pork. But we ate all from the pig. From nose to tail to pigs feet. Depending on what region you lived in you had different fish dishes. One that started on west coast was Jansons temptation. Potatoes, full cream, onions and ansjovis. But now is mandatory in all Sweden.
Some more things we do to prepair for christmas is ”Ljusdoppning” where we make our own candles using melted wax. We also make ”lussebullar”, gingerbead, and also build gingerbread houses and decorate them with candy. We also have ”uppesittarkvällen” the night before christmas ”23rd”. Idk if u have it in UK but we also have someone dress up as Santa that knocks on the door and hands out the presents to everyone. There’s probably some more things I’ve missed but yes, we do have alot of traditions.
In my Swedish family christmas eve is for family and board games or at least card or dice games like Poker or Yatsy or "fia med knuff" (ludo) is very common, christmas day is usually the party day when we go to the pub, 2nd day for christmas was usually work (double salary) then grandma's birthday dinner. Another peculiar tradition in Sweden might be new years day (Sylvester), it's Pizza + Ivanhoe (the movie), perfect hangover remedy.
Why we celebrate on Christmas Eve instead of Christmas day goes back to (as usual) our pagan days. The new day started at sundown, not at midnight. That's why we celebrate it at Christmas Eve. The sun goes down at 2-3 pm up here!
The Christmas julbord/buffet certainly is not random and has a long history. There is only one correct way to consume it. You take 5 - 6 helpings in a strict order. 1 herring, 2 fish dishes, 3 cold meats, 4 warm meats, 5 warm dishes & 6 sweets
For my family, on Christmas Eve for lunch we a big meal (this is the big celebration) and have all white foods which include white fish, potatoes, and lutfisk, and end with risgrynsgröt. Then after lots of dancing, we have sort of a “grab and go” dinner (we don’t sit down for a formal meal) with ham, cheese, and our seven types of cookies! And finally, to end the night Jul Tomte comes and pays us a visit!
After eating, opening presents etc we usually just hang out and chill, we watch christmas programs and movies, play music, dance....if there is snow we will go outside and play in the snow etc, in my family we love when it's a white christmas cause we have snowball fights. Also on Christmas day we usually go to the cinema.
We also get 5 weeks paid vacation each year and it’s customary to take four of those during the summer and the last during the winter holiday - which with some calendar luck or extra hours saved up can mean up to two full weeks all in all
In my family we have the exact same things on our julbord every single year. You can also tell by some of the dishes where in Sweden we come from, which I think is pretty cool. It's not Christmas without my grandma's skörost :')
Since most Swedes have 5-6 weeks of vacation per year many takes 3 days and then can be off work from (this year) the 23 of december to 2 January. (By just using 3 vacation days.)
That Christmas Day lunch is the last remainder of Medieval way of dining 😊 Well, in Denmark it's fish first (quite a variety of them), then meat (again lots), cheese, a special Christmas dessert, sweets and fruit.
Here in Norway, we also have Christmas Day brunch in this way. On Christmas Eve we have a full, traditional dinner with side dishes - in some families they have several main courses with side dishes, but that's because they come from different traditions and don't want to choose just one. At our place, we set the lunch table several days in a row, and sometimes in the evening too if we don't feel like cooking dinner. There may be a little too much food. However, we do not have a tradition for the order in which we should eat the various dishes, at least not in my family. I usually take the herring after the meat because it sticks to the plate, and then I get away with a little less washing up.
WRONG!!! There's "...a clear pattern..." as far as particular, Swedish food on Christmas Eve (Julafton...) - as well as on Christmas Day (Juldagen...) is concerned. Just because Swedes enjoy a Julbord (Christmas Buffet...) with a vast assortment of dishes, doesn't mean that all of these dishes are eaten 365 days of the year. And, there's either a huge Christmas ham (or Christmas goose...) that's served, as well - instead of a regular Sunday roast.
We also get January 6th off, 13th day of Christmas. Most swedish holidays are on a specific day of the week, and not on a specific date. It's very noticeable around Christmas though, since you get 2-6 days depending on what week day the 24th is on. I think it's like 4.3 days on average.
A long time ago the new day began when the sun set the day before. In Sweden in December that is early afternoon on Christmas Eve. That is the easy explanation for why it's celebrated on the 24th.
So the thing about celebrating on the 24th versus the 25th actually has a pretty interesting origin story. We go back to a time before the standardized time gained foot during the 19th century, this because that was when it was decided that the day will switch at midnight. Before this the day ended at sundown. Subsequently making the eve the first part of the next day. This is why celebrating on the 24th versus the 25th actually are two interpretations of the same idea. " celebrate the eve of the 25th" Thanks for reading all of that. Merry Christmas and happy new year from a finnish historian.
We also go to the pub or nightclubs but on Christmas Day instead and its called hemvändardagen (homecoming day). Old friends meet up because you usually are home in the city you grew up in over Christmas to be with family.
Where most people work in Sweden the default is having holiday over christmas. Where i work we're off from dec 23rd-jan 2nd this year. On the christmas party with work i had 3 types of pickled herring, potato gratin, charamelized ribs, meatballs, sausage and cold cuts like: ham, roast beef, turkey, salami. There were alot of things i didnt pick like salmon, beetroot sallad, mushroom omelette and others.
OK. I grew up in San Diego, California. Our Christmas “dinner” on the evening of December 24 featured whatever leftovers were available from the evening dinner the day before plus “luxuries” like peanut butter filled dates. For those of you who are gagging at the mere concept of such a blasphemy as peanut butter filled dates, I say “Don’t knock-’em till you’ve tried ‘em!”. DELICIOUS! We opened our presents on the morning of December 25th. After our massive, at least it always felt so, present opening, we gorged on my mother’s extraordinary home made cinnamon buns for breakfast. Christmas Day dinner consisted of baked ham, candied yams, mashed potatoes and ham gravy. I am unutterably sorry that none of you could be blessed by my mother’s ham gravy. 😔 Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! 💥🌟💫
Its what you are used to. For me Christmas dinner in Sweden makes perfect sense and taste great together. I love Christmas food, and we only eat it on christmas and in my family we eat the same on easter. And its always the same things with sometimes some items missing and another time other items missing, with some key items always there every year.
Look at all that Christmas food! ..... Now imagine being the family chef, setting out to feed 20+ people the single most important, revered lunch/dinner of the year. Now imagine being crazy enough to make your own sausages, picked herring, butter, cheese, bread, candy, meatballs etc, etc. Yeah, I started cooking Christmas lunch a week ago.
Not everyone is free on the 24th, many people are still working before they're going to spend the evening with the family. I think that is one of the reasons to why we celebrate on the 24th. Then 25th and 26th are red days where most people are not working. And grocery stores that are open usually closes a few hours earlier, but then on the contrary, retailer stores are open normal times because christmas sales is a thing and us swedes go on a crazy shopping spree for a few weeks.
And the same goes for New Years Eve. The eves aren't bank hollidays, but the stores close earlier. Some eves the banks close earlier, and at the bigger f.e. Christmas and Midsummer they are always closed.
If we go further back in time, when Sweden was a farmer-society, you get more pattern and context for the different foods on a traditional ”julbord”. It was middle of winter so fresh produce was scares. So you have things to eat that you were able to preserve. Pickled herring, salted fish, root wegetables, green chard, possably winter appels. To get a feast, and well needed nutrition, a pig was slaughterd and prepared. And you used every part of that pig. So ham, sossages, ribs, jellied meat, the liver, feet and even head of the pig was carefully prepared or presserved. Salmon, may have been eaten near the northern rivers. Otherwise - that and other additions are modern ajustments. Restaurants often go overboard compeating with each others buffets nowdays.
In Sweden the 25th dec is one off the most common day to go to the pub or club. People that are at their child hometown meet up and celebrate that xmas is over. =) The food is Julbord but the most common foods that every julbord have is Herring, Meatballs, Ham, ribs, potatoes, salmon and Janssons Frestelse rice porrige and Lutfisk.
When you have all this food you often get a bit uncomfortable full, so now days my family mostly eat the random Christmas food spread out around the Christmas days (of course I would not say no to the Christmas desert table my working place gives to all the employees). On Christmas eve my family always eat lutefish with mustard sauce, green peas and boiled potatoes. Then rice-porrage with fruit sauce as desert before the candy and coocies.
Actually is is only two red days, Christmas day and boxing day. Christmas Eve is still a normal day, however this year Christmas Eve is Sunday, and Sundays are allways a red day in the calendar
The reason we celebrate on christmas eve, is because a long time ago, the day was considered to end when the sun came down and the next started right after. So for the people back then, christmas day "technically" started on the afternoon of the 24:th. And since the sun goes down veeery early this time of year, at about 4pm, christmas day got celebrated then. When following the modern day clocks and calendars became more important (industrialised society etc) , and the 24:th didn't end until midnight, the tradition to celebrate in the evening became a tradition to celebrate the 24:th. What was an early christmas day celebration turned slowly into a christmas eve celebration. So there you go, that's why.
Would love to see you react to another swedish christmas tradition. Every year they show Karl Bertil Jonssons julafton, written and narrated by the iconic comedian Tage Danielson. It has great music, wounderful animation and a heartwarming story. You can find it on RUclips, both with subtitles and a dubbed version (Christopher's christmas mission)
We don't have any compensation for weekend Christmases, but if the national day, June 6th, is on a weekend we get an extra vacation day to spend, so we're not totally foreign to the concept.
There are a lot of Swedish xmas specific foods. I think this is more a case of the guy not realizing that they are. In fact from what you are saying so don't UK have that many xmas specific ones, but rather serve generic UK staples.
I get the best of two worlds on Christmas eve. I’m born in Sweden to Finnish parents and I live in Sweden. My julbord is a mixture of Swedish julbord-dishes and Finnish joulupöytä-dishes. Now that I’m an adult living with my husband, I have taken over my moms responsibilities of making the foods for Christmas and I started preparing yesterday for this sundays Christmas eve dinner. (Finland celebrates Christmas on 24th to).
What the guy in the video means is that in Sweden we do things during the whole of the December: lighting a candle (four in total) every Sunday. Drinking glögg (warm, sweet spiced whine) eating gingerbread cookies with friends at the weekends before Christmas and other stuff. It’s just a bigger build up in Sweden.
In Finland many offices are closed between 27-30. So 2024 we are off 24th Monday, then many take 2 vacation days (28-29) and then comes weekend and new year on Monday. This makes 8 days off paid .
When You smell "Janssons Frestelse and lussebullar" on Christmas you know its christmas for real! Santa cant be wrong. This Cold Dark Cosy Calm Winter landscape with moutains, frosen lakes, large forests , Polarnights, Twilight, Northen lights, Reindeers, Wolfes, Bears, Moose. Its like a magic fairytale for Christmas.
![Lethal Company Music Video 🎵 "Follow The Orders" [VERSION A]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/QeooZB4Z7RA/mqdefault.jpg)
For an outsider swedish julbord might seem unorganised but it’s not. Usually a family eat the same food every Christmas and there is a structure it’s organised.
You usually put whatever you want on your plate, everything is voluntary.
But if you follow tradition, you eat in a certain order:
Plate 1: Herring and sturgeon.
Plate 2: Salmon and other fish (grilled, cold-smoked/cooked salmon, fish pâté, eggs).
Plate 3: Cold cuts (Christmas ham, pâtés, sausages and pig's feet).
Plate 4: Warm (meatballs, prince's sausage, Jansson's temptation, ribs, dip in the pot, lute fish).
Plate 5: Cheeses (cheeses such as stilton and cheddar belong to Christmas).
Plate 6: Dessert (rice à la Malta, fruit salad, rice porridge).
Plate 7: Christmas sweets (crackers, marzipan, marmalade, polka dots. Anything sweet you can find).
Thank you! Was about to post this myself, but you've already done it.
The only thing I have to add is, the food is sometimes indulged during "Kalle Ankas Jul" (Donald Duck's Christmas) - a TV-show that somehow became a tradition - and the kids are allowed to take their plates to the TV to watch it. :)
Exactly!! Thank you for this!!! I didn't put as coherent and clear, thank you for this! I got a bit upset at the remarks that is was basically what we had home without any red thread to it.
This is absolutely correct.. It is food upon food upon food.
Sturgeon??
Har aldrig hört att man äter Stör på julen? Inte under mina 47 år i alla fall??
@@robbalobba Hehe, kanske något att prova. Men du har rätt, baltic herring (strömming) var det meningen att det skulle vara. Jag skyller på google translate ;)
• Our Julbord, what we eat on Christmas, is definitely not just a mix of "what ever you like!" It's a very specific system both in what you serve, the specific dishes you serve on the table, and also the order you eat them in.
-Even though it's a julbord (Christmas Smorgårdsbord) all foods are there at the same time, think a bit "Starter(s), Main Courses, Side Dishes, Desert."
We begin with the cold fish, like haring and smoked salmon, and a devils eggs, and cusses and mixes that goes with that.
First Starter no 1 with the fishes, then Starter no 2, it's the cold cuts meat, with the sauce and the mixes that suits with them. Special type of bread with both starter dishes. The cold cuts comes next and is of course also the big ham someone have spend ages on to do. and some mixes with those too. Then the "main meal" all that is warm on the table, the meatballs, the prince sausages, the ribs, the Jansons Frästelse, and so on, and the side dishes, that you add to all of them.
Many mixes we don't eat at any other point during the year. And Dopp i Grytan, and different kind of Jule-bread and Jule-beer and Julemust. So our Christmas food is very much a "pre planned" dinner, with the same thing everywhere, it's just how grand scale it is that is different, no matter if you eat at home, eat at relatives or friends or goes to "JULBORD" with you partner in a cosy restaurant during the December months, or with your work, they all have basically the same, but it changes in quality, quantity depending on the place. But there is most definite s red thread and an order and an etiquette on how to eat it, when to eat it, that every place have, from restaurants to home.
-I actually took a bit of offence at this part: "where we said they basically throw everything they have in the house", about 09:00 in. It really really isn't how he said at all. Quite opposite it's a specified type of food we usually only eat at Christmas and it takes a lot of planing. So we might have a bunch of dishes, but they are basically the same year after year after year. And many if them only on Christmas.
Yes!! It’s traditional food.. Every family, has different things besides the tradition ones.. Some maybe want to have a certain bread, some wants a curtain salmon dish.. or what ever.. But people normally have the basic traditional food and then some of the other types you are used to in your family..
Like...I understand what he means with the British food since it's one set meal.
However, no need to take offence.
The reason to why there are so many different dishes in Sweden is because it was the years biggest celebration so one served the fanciest food one could find in the middle of winter.
So it's a LITTLE bit like whatever you have at home - but fancier😂
We've never eaten the food in order, we just pick whatever we like.
If you join a julbord/Christmas dinner at a restaurant your eating order is
1. Pickled herring
2. Cold fish (like salomon)
3. Cold food, like ham, brawn
4. Warm food like meatballs, sausage, red cabbage, green cabbage, rice porridge, lutfisk
5. Desert
And off coarse you get a new plate for every step. So even if everything is in order on the buffet. You never mix everything up on the same plate.
For a newcomer at our buffets it looks like we break the line when get next step of eating. But it just looks like this. That’s the right way to do it. There is a system in how everything is eaten.
Christmas dinner is eaten in a certain order in Sweden too. You eat herring and fish first, then meat dishes. And then hot meat dishes. After that, it's desserts.
Det visste inte ens jag. Aldrig gjort.
You’re quite right. First the fish dishes , then meat dishes, then hot dishes and last dessert. And even though all sorts of food are on the table, you eat it in that order.
It's also a bit of a missconception that swedes eat pickled herring year round these days. Most people I now only eat it during major holidays like christmas and midsummers eve. There's a lot of other dishes on the julbord that are also rarely (if ever) eaten at other times of the year like Janssons Frestelse, Jellied veal (Kalvsylta), Fårfiol, Sillsallad etc. The list goes on. :D
We sort of do that as well in my family. Fish courses are the starters, then meat and veggies and finally the desserts including risgrynsgrot (Christmas porridge).
Then after all the unwrapping of presents the sweets and fruit are on the table and sometimes a board game can appear.
This is HIGHLY dependant on the region and even the family you belong too.
The reason why we always celebrate on eves, like Christmas Eve, Easter Eve, Midsummer Eve and so on is because back in the old days we used to count time differently. Each new day began at sunset which means Christmas began at sunset on the 24th.
A new day still begins at sunset, at least in my world.
Thank you! You are the only one in any comment section ever I have seen stating this! The lack of knowledge on the matter outside a very specific field is absolutly disheartening. So thank you for spreading it!
Thanks @oOLiLjAOo , I was just about to write this. It goes for most Germanic countries.
@@herrbonk3635what world is that, I thought most countries had days begin 0.00 (12 at night)
@@Mattiasthesecond Ok, days beginning at midnight... :D What color is the sky in your world?
(But more seriously, the problem here is that English lacks a word for dygn, i.e. the 24h period consisting of day+night.)
He forgot to add that the whole santa thing is different here in Sweden aswell. Here he actually comes home to you and give you the presents. No coming down the chimney. He knocks on your door and is let it in and then leaves once all the presents are given out. My dad played santa when I grew up lol. He deserved an oscar! He went all out with the make up(no creepy mask that some families have with their santa), the clothes, which was grey and not the traditional red, and he put on a different voice and dialect and all that. He was great. And before santa came dad of course went out to buy sonething that he'd forgotten. Obviously when you grow older you become suspicious. So here santa is not an unseen mystery thing but somone you actually meet, and maybe talk to if you're brave.
If we want to be a little picky, grey IS the traditional "tomte" colour, like in Viktor Rydberg's poem "Tomten". He turned red some time in the early 20th century.
@@christopherx7428 if im not mistaken , the red color became a widely known thing from the Coca cola commercials that gave santa their trafitional red colors from their company.
@@Nevolet Yep, that is what I have heard too. Traditionally, the "tomte" in Swedish mythology (i.e. NOT Santa Claus) was grey.
One time when my uncle was Santa I asked him why he was wearing a mask and he said that it was to hide a disturbing face wound. I was a bit scared of Santa after that lol
The Swedish Julbord (Yule table) is like a Swedish Smörgåsbord Christmas special. You eat it for lunch or dinner. You kan eat it befor X-mas, under X-mas and left overs after X-mas.
Yule är inte direkt kopplat till enbart Sverige ,utan till germanska folket (nordeuropa folket) som är 1 av flera sammelnamn på en rad olika stammar i norra Europa hos romarna. Norge och Sverige var ett och samma område/stam och ej 2 länder (med tid även en bit av Danmark men som i största del hörde till tyskland) som i sin tur hade yule. Den som levt i längst tradition med det är Norge. Det är missvisande att kalla svenskt julbord för yule table då Norge är den som lever till större del efter tradition och inte Sverige.
Sweds and Brits both have in common the fact neither have christmas ONLY foods, the foods you eat you also eat around the year. BORING
@@NaeniaNightingale Sweds have Christmans only foods, like grisfötter (pigs feet), dopp-i-grytan (dunk in the pot) and lutfisk (lye fish), but the younger generations don't like it, so it's rarely served.
@@pucktholinder3692I eat Dopp i grytan all year.
And even when watching X-Men. 🙏☮
It is due to the fact that there are so few red days in England. In England you have 9 red days, In sweden we have 21 red days. And on top of that squeeze days and to round it up 5 weeks of vacation so you can gather up some days to spend during christmas. For example this year you can spend 3 days of vacation 27-29 and have 10 days off work. In 2024 you can spend 3 vacation days and get 12 days off... :)
Not everyone gets "klämdagar" (squeeze days) though. Some also get half days before any free days too. Where I work, we sadly don't get either, just red days and the Eve days are off.
@@ellalella1 True it is entire up to the employer and their branch. But all squeeze days are usually already earned throgh the normal workhours.
In Sweden, most holiday celebrations are celebrated on Eve. In Swedish it is called "Afton". So we have Julafton (Christmas Eve), Nyårsafton (New Year's Eve), Påskafton (Easter Eve), and Midsommarafton (Midsummer Eve). I might have forgotten some more.
Valborgsmässoafton 😄
Yes, Valborgsmässoafton. Celebration of Spring 30th of April, or 1st of May in many countries.
Pingstafton, used to be a red holiday but this was removed to make May 1 a red day instead.
Trettondagsafton, the day is actually called, although you usually just say "trettondagen".
Allhelgonaafton, the day is actually called, although you usually just say "allhelgona".
Same here in Finland. :) The Eve is for party, and the actual day is to relax (or recover).
@@LasseEklofEh... no. The Second day of Pingst or pentecost used to be a holiday until 2004 when they made june 6th a holiday instead.
Pentecost eve are always on a Saturday.
Hello! :D First! :D
About the swedish traditional christmas food, I want to point out a few things. There are actually some set customs in what order to eat the different dishes. We often start out with the cold dishes and the fish. So herring, salmon, the eggs with skagen on top (shrimp sallad) are dishes that will be eaten first. After that we eat the meat dishes, like meatballs, sausage, the roasted ham etc. So we don't usually eat the herring together with the ham or meatballs. Some of the side dishes, like the beat sallad for instance will go with a certain dish. In this case, the meatballs. So there are some "rules" or customs to follow. :)
With that said, the random buffet experience may be due to the younger generation not being that strict on how to combine all the different dishes. It may be a new thing, but traditionally you don't have the ham on the same plate as the herring or salmon.
Maybe someone will have more examples to add to this? :)
I think you describe it well.
Jansson's frestelse (temptation) should never be missed!
Nor dopp-i-grytan (dip in the pot).
Tack för din förklaring. Jag var på väg att skriva ungefär detsamma.
I’ve never had deviled eggs with skagen (shrimp salad). We usually have mayo and stenbitsrom (fish roe) with one or two shrimps on top.
@@johananas8407 Not truly skagen, no. Just an easier way to explain for anyone non-scandinavian to understand. I usually have roe mixed with sourcream and mayo, and then topped with a shrimp and some fresh dill. :)
He missed out on dancing around the christmas tree, Santa coming to give out the gifts and watching Donald Duck at 15:00 every. damn, christmas! 😢 Those are standard swedish christmas traditions.
You dance and sing on the 24th? We do it on tjugondag knut after christmas when we all gather, eat, dance and sing, the kids get candy hanging from the christmastree and after we all dance and sing around the tree we gather and fysically throw it outside, to signify christmas being over.
@@Nevolet yeah, we do it on the 24th 😊 most that I know around Västmanland does 🤔
You should watch "Tomten är far till alla Barnen" Santa is the father to all the children. That is a Christmas classic!
And "sagan om Karl-Bertil Jonssons julafton (1975)" and maybe also Fanny & Alexander (but that might be too dark +its like 3 hours so it might be too long)
Yep, not a Christmas without some turmoil! 🤣
In my family, we dont watch tv at christmas eve.
It's an overrated movie
He already watched it on Patreon
He forgot to mention that the 25:e (christmas day) is a huge party night for young people returning to their home towns for christmas celebrations! We call it ”hemvändarkväll” and it loosely translates to "coming-home-night".
And originally we celebrated on Chrismastmas day but to many people was pregaming it and we changed the day.
Watching Donald Duck is a Swedish Christmas Tradition. Every Christmas Eve, at 3 o´clock, over three million Swedes gather in front of their TVs to enjoy an hour of Disney cartoons.
In swedish schools, we get christmas dinner when the christmas break is coming closer. In my high school, we get julmust to drink aswell
Same at my job
Visst och ni dricker samma must under påsken, har ni ingenting originellt?
Ni? Vart är du ifrån då? xD@@NaeniaNightingale
My family is an unholy mix of Swedish, Finnish, Austrian, English and Jamaican so our Christmas dinners are even more chaotic lol
Nice!
What a nice mix haha! Love it :)
The reason we celebrate christmas eve is that in the pagan days we used to celebrate Midwinter solstice on the evening of 21st or 22nd December. So when the nordic countries became Christians it was an easier transition to the new celebrations. It is simply a way to make christmas a bit of a mix between the old religion and the new one.
Well, we don't know. We didn't actually celebrate the winter solstice before the missionaries up here in the north. We celebrated "midwinter", and noone knows anymore when it was exactly... propably somewhere in december or january. But as soon as we got Christian Kings it all moved to the 24th/25th.
@@SteamboatW the solstice was celebrated at the actual solstice, the longest night of the year, and that is mainly 21-22 December. On rare occassions 20th. Same as midsummer solstice is 20-23 June
It also makes sense to celebrate the longest night at the evening rather then the day.
@@tobiasnordberg4792 Well, if you define "pagan days" as 17th century, so yes, but before the 12th? Well, in the Nordics, nobody knows except that they didn't celebrate the solstice, but "midwinter" which propably happened in January. The Romans did celebrate at solstices, but that's hundreds of years before written accounts in the North.
@@SteamboatW it is not for sure that the pagans knew exactly when the soltice took place, however the vikings being able to navigate the high seas according to the sun does indicate they did know the movement of the sun very well
I'm swedish and my christmas starts actually on the 23'd with bingo night, everyone sitting down on uppesittarkvällen (stay-up-night / the day-before the-day. And watch Bingolotto and play, and play the kids play boardgames and the adults drink glögg and eat saffronbuns (lussebullar). Then we go home and sleep. Wake up on the 24th, sit down and watch the 24th and last episode of the christmas calender tv show they made for this year, the exciting finale everyone has been waiting for. then we sit down, eat riceporridge that has simmered through the night (with ONE hidden almond in it for a lucky finder), light the fourth advent christmas candle, you get to open one gift from your stocking, from the elf that has been staying at your house all december. After the porridge and stut (homemade bread with butter, christmas ham, applesauce and mustard) everyone gets dressed for the weather and head outside to sled down the slopes, adults and kids, togheter playing in the snow. Then we go inside, and start setting up for the julbord (christmas-table buffet). kids are playing, and then everyone gathers around the tv to watch donald ducks christmas special (a bunch of disney shows that are in no way shape or form especially christmassy, all clips are the same every year except the final 1-2 clips that are usually a new movie that will air next year from disney). the show is always presented at first by a famous swede that gives a speech and lights a candle. After donald duck, some people stay by the tv, chatting with relatives, some go play, some finish cooking and then we all sit down to eat the buffét. noramlly it's christmas ham, different kinds of bread, meatballs, potatoes, herring, janssons frestelse, eggs and oven-omelettes, red beatsallad, raw spiced salmon, brown sauce (gravy), salamis, tiny sausages called princesausages, honeyglaced ribs, lutefish, green cale sallad, brussel sprouts, cheeses and different toppings. we eat for a long time and then after, kids go play, adults clear the table. then santa comes, my explanation has been far to loong but he hands the gifts out and then people read rhymes and open the presents. that's about it in a great sense.
The "potatoes with fish" is called Janssons frestelse. You have No cheese on or in it. The sausage is a special one "prinskorv" (princesausage) and you only eat that sausage at Christmas & Easter. The special ham you only eat at Christmas. In my home you don't drink any alcohol at Christmas because it's the childrens day.
the theme of swedish christmas dinner is "Winter Slaughter" and "What preserved Food must Go before it Goes"
Aka “let’s eat food that we eat all year round and join the BORING group”
Pretty sure someone already commented in it but 24th and 30th ARE NOT red days/bank holidays although we treat them like they are. Confusing, I know 😊
Eating a "julbord" is a tradition that has followed us ever since the Viking Age when the expression "drinking Yule" was coined. During the Middle Ages, the Christian celebration of Christmas came to Sweden, and because it was a Roman Catholic custom, people fasted during Advent. It meant a ban on eating meat, and dinner instead consisted of salted fish and porridge. During the day, dips in the pot were often served between all the chores on the farm and in the home.
The fast was first broken on Christmas Day (longer back in time, probably on Christmas Eve) when people were finally allowed to feast on meat of various kinds. For most people in the old farming community, these days were the most solemn of the year.
In summary, it can be said that today's "julbord" consists of dishes that are partly connected to the fasting rules of the Middle Ages, partly associated with the traditional slaughter of the Christmas pig before Christmas and partly a remnant from the preservation methods of the time such as pickled herring.
If I got it right, in the old days you start at 24th with eating, presents, and games. It continued thru the night and you end it by going to church in the morning. The morning service is called Julotta.
The old days choose 24 to take over Midvinterblot from the old gods.
A traditional South Sweden Christmas table for me is basically 2 different orientations. It is common to take them in a certain order. First up are different kinds of pickled herring, boiled egg halves, Jansson's Frestelse, which is a gratin of potatoes+onions+anchovies+cream and crust flour, herb bread, sauerkraut, different kinds of toppings such as different hard cheeses, different smoked sausages, smoked. /regular liver sausages etc. When you've let that sink in, it's time for the main course. It is cooked ham that is grilled with mustard and crust flour, dip in stew (not so common anymore, you save the ham spade that was left after you cooked the ham and use it to dip the herb bread in. Great with brown cabbage ) brown cabbage, red cabbage, meatballs, prince sausage, grilled ribs, various mustards, etc. After eating, about 1 hour later, rice porridge with fruit cream or juice soup and cinnamon is served. I'm sure I've forgotten a few, but this is roughly what I usually eat for Christmas. Now you're so full you're about to burst, but damn it's so good. So yes, 3 kg more on the scale and you usually have food left for a couple more days.
🎅🎄🎁💝Merry Christmas & Happy New Year everyone! 🍾🥂🎆🎇✨✨
Much on the chrismas table today are basicly throwbacks to the earlier days when people were poorer. In the autumn they did slaughter a pig or three, and made ham, sausages and so on from it - basicly foods that could store well by beeing salted and/or dried, same with breads and cheese. And also just comming of fasting.
There is a "eating order" first you eat herring/eggs and things like that, then comes cold cutes (ham, sausges, pigs feet Brawns and Ham and stuff like that, then comes the hot parts (small hot dogs called prince sausges if translated), meatballs, Lutfisk, Jasons frestelse (potaoe grateng with anjovis) and other warm dishes, after that time for dessert
So a lot on the chrismas table are things that we dont normaly eat under a year (like Lutfisk, sure some eats it but in general it is for the chrismas table), swedish julbord dont normaly/traditionaly has a turkey on it (you might find mutton and deer/boar/elk on it) Herring was a cheap thing back then (and not as many differnt varieties) samr with Brawn (i had never heard that word but is seems to be right), Dopp i gryta: “Dip in the pot” where you dip dark bread in the fat from the ham.
He forgot to mention one thing on the food table, thats only exist on that day? "Dopp I Grytan". Because that special bread and sausage only exist for Christmas. You usually start with it, before you dig in to the buffé. And he also forgot to mention a tradition we have on TV, since many years "Julkalendern" (Christmas calendar). It's a saga in 15 minutes episode that's aired every day from 1-24th of December. It's a tradition since 1960
Havent gotten that far so I dont know know if he mantions kalle anka but we always eat it before watching that
Dopp-i-grytan are our oldest documented still ongoing Christmas tradition. Not bad.
No Christmas without "Dopp I Grytan" and Christmas ham.
@@wyrmhand I agree. No Christmas without "Dopp-I Grytan". I think either he forgot about it or his girlfriend's family never told him about that tradition
The reason we celebrate it on the 24th instead of the 25th is actually due to historical reasons in how time was measured. In Sweden, the day "ended" when it got dark and work for the day is done. So essentially, the day ended when it got dark on the 24th, and people celebrated Christmas.
Nowadays, the day ends at midnight, but we still keep the tradition of celebrating it on the 24th as that is what we are accustomed to.
We don't call it "Christmas technically, we call it"Julafton", "Jul" meaning "Christmas" and "Afton" meaning "Eve", because we used to celebrate it at night.
As for replacing the days that falls on a weekday, that's up to the employer. Some companies to offer that, some do not. There's no law around it.
Swedish Christmas tables, I guess, have become pretty universal over the years, but part of the reason there are so many different dishes is because our country is quite big landmass wise, giving lots of different areas that yield different resources, different crops to be grown, animals to raise, fish to be fished etc., so an inland Christmas table might historically have been more heavy on the red meat, while a costal one would have more fish, and over the years it has gotten more mixed together and streamlined, leaving the typical assortment you see today. Also I don't think a lot of people do their own personal tables as extensive as the ones you see in restaurants, you pick a handful of favorites and go for those.
As for the actual dishes they are all about making the most of what you have and using up the things you preserved earlier in the year, in the time before modern refrigeration and all year round produce. You have pickled food and salted food and jams and fruit preserves and as for the meat you use all the parts. When you killed that one pig you'd saved for Christmas you didn't want anything go to waste, that's why there is ham and pork sausages, meatballs, spare ribs and also "head cheese" and even the pigs feet can be found on many Christmas tables, though some of the details, like pigs feet, has lost popularity over the years.
In Sweden the christmas food is quite historical. As he said, it comes from when we were poor. We slaghtered the pig and made all sorts of food from it. And much food/bread containes exotic spicies that were rare and expencive back then (saffron, ginger, cinnamon, clove), dried fruits (raisins, figue, dates) and oranges.
We have quite a few “holidays” throughout the year. When we get time off from work. Some years a lot of them happens to be on the weekend. Which we call “The employers year. And some years it’s the opposite, called “The employees year”
The reason for why we have meat in all different forms, ham, meatballs, sausages etc is because due to the climate and before invention of fridges, the livestock was used as the pantry in a way. When nothing grows in the frozen landscape, the meat became the primary food due to them being kept alive by dried food, hay, pellets etc. so even if you didn’t have access to vegetables, you had access to meat. And they slaughtered the pig for the celebration. Having potatoes for Christmas is due to the potatoes being able to be stored for the whole winter in underground storage (jordkällare) and the reason for why fish is included is because traditions got mixed up after going from Catholicism to being Protestants. The Catholics were fasting before Christmas so instead of meat they would eat fish and then the tradition just got mixed up and the fish was included for Christmas. The tradition of the Luciatåg is from paganism though, and symbolizes the change where it starts to get brighter (solstice) and historically a lot of Christmas traditions come from really brutal stuff from the paganism and the Vikings. Even the reason for why the Christmas tree ornaments were primarily red balls comes from the Vikings slaughtering British people. But since religions have changed a lot, from pagans to Catholics to Protestants, they have just combined different stuff from different eras and that’s why the traditional Christmas feast includes all that it does. But to pinpoint every single food or recipe it would take up a whole book I think, because it’s too much and so many different reasons for everything that is included. It’s not just a buffet. It’s a connection to how our ancestors were living thousands of years ago.
So yes we play a lot of boardgames on Christmas eve , at least in my family's tradition. We don't watch TV on Christmas eve it's spent with family eating, opening gifts, talking etc. And the eating is in different sittings. You start with fish foods cold cut. Next is the warm meat portion of Christmas food and last ris ala Malta, dessert. Later it's coffee and cake and Christmas sweets and chocolate and fruit with the boardgames. And lots of julmust.
The things we eat on christmas is not things we would have normally anyway. Some stuff is, like meatballs, sausages and potato. But most other stuff like the herring, Dip in the pot, Grav lax, roasted ham, are not things we eat normally, not in the way they are prepared on christmas. They may seem random, but they arent, Sweden used to be extremely poor once upon a time, and winters were long and hard, so people saved the best food that they could and used Christmas to feast on that food. Sausages, Herring, ham, may seem normal to us today but that is because production and storage of it is so much easier...In the past, you had to slaughter pigs to get the ham and sausages, it was a lot of work since everything had to be done from scratch and the food spoiled fast. Its very much focused on the basics because thats what existed back then... They didnt have tomatos, spaghetti, chili, and other fancy imported foods, they had to deal with what they could get. Meat overall was a luxury.
Even as a Dane, the Swedish Christmas food was quite a cultural shock 😮
Don’t forget the snaps!!! Very important! And the oldest thing at the julbord is the julöl, christmasbeer.
Merry Christmas 🎅🏼🎄🎅🏼
Christmas dinner is not normal food. It is a red thread with the food. There is cold fish, cold meats, warm food and sweets..
As fare as I know -I'ts the same, in Finland, Denmark, Norway, Czech Republik, Estonia -They celebrate Christmas eve
17:17 I just say Karl-Bertil Jonssons Julafton has been shown since 1975 in Sweden TV1 19:05 .
You realy need someone to explain the history and background of the julbord to understand. There IS a very obvious red tread and structure around it but maybe we let those up a bit at home. Most of us just have what we love now and defenitly not enough room to hold a perfect cristmas buffé. "Julbord".
About strange traditions: “Ivanhoe” on the telly every New Year’s Day. No idea why. Good movie though.
The typical Swedish Christmas Eve "dinner" is basically a 3 or 4 course meal.
The "Smörgåsbord" like Julbord is actually quite new and it came after the smörgåsbord became popular. Back in the day they slaugthered a big fat pig and then most dishes was made out of that. We still see that in diffrent sausages, liver paté, ham, pig feets, ribs, pork belly etc. Back in the day the would also use the blood and use it in to both soup and bread as well as bloodsausage. It was also not uncommon to use the pigs head as decoration on the table (the classic image is with an apple in its mouth).
However salted herring was a staple food and not at all fancy. So was porridge and bread. Belive it or not, along the big rivers salmon was also everyday food and not all fancy either. So if you were poor and had no pig to slaugther chances were that your Yule food would be more focused on porridge, herring and salmon. One traditional food is "bread in ham/sausage broth" aka "dopp i grytan" (dip in the pot) or "blöta" (being wet). This too were poor peoples food.
One of the most important part of the Yule food was tve beer. In old laws it is even stating a minimum of beer that should be brewed. This beer was "magical" and protected the people from the malicovant beings and spirits that was belived to roam the land during the Yule-time (especially the christmas night). So drinking beer was almost a sacred action. Yule beer is still very important to many, and they who do not drink beer often drink a beer deriven soda called "Julmust" (not too many know it's connection to beer brewing though).
If you combine all these "rich peoples food" with the "poor peoples food" and beer as well as some deserts, and you got the Swedish Yule food today.
He missed one important difference: That Santa, The Christmas Elf actually often comes to deliver the presents on Christmas Eve to the kids in person. Usually meaning someone in the household dress up as Santa and deliver the gifts, in various levels of disguise, maybe just a red hat, maybe a full costume.
the "pattern" of the food is that it is the same as last year (and the years before that) aka "tradition" :D
A fun fact that often is overlooked and maybe forgotten even in Sweden (the nordic countres), is our strong ties with our more... lets say ancient heritage from norse mythology and folklore. I believe a lot of the differences between how we celebrate are sprung out of our ancestors not really being so easily persuaded to convert to christianity. The matter of fact is that we technically don't celebrate "Christmas" but instead we celebrate "Yule" and Yule as a nordic tradition has it's roots in celebrating "the return of the light" as in the sun coming back, since it's so dark all the time.
That might also be a reason to why we have more of a buffet because of the "Yuleblot", a sacrifice to the norse gods with slaughter of livestock. This is not a fact just a guess on my part, but somehow it makes a case as to why it's not as similar to other countries that have a celebration with a stronger foundation in christianity.
We just can't shake our urge to plunder. 🤣
im swedish my husband is english AND has his birthday on christmas day so when he moved here he had his birthday on his own, so to speak, for the first time in his life, as we celebrate on the 24th :) but we do english christmas aswell on the 25th but celebrating his bd first :)
If you are a child of divorced parents, you celebrate December 24th and 25th. Maybe not everyone but that's what I know is normal. What we only eat at different in Christmas is Christmas ham. Someone might eat salted fish, someone might eat dip in the pot. It's when you dip a loaf of bread in spa after the ham spa. It's a Viking recipe =) The rest of the food is pretty much like what we eat at midsummer. This is only my opinion.
yes, even maybe if your parents are not divorced, like with your moms relatives on the christmas day then with your dads relatives on the 25th. Or with your dad+mom+siblings on the 24 then with other relatives on the 25h
And if you’re in a relationship with someone who also has divorced parents you get 4 christmases 😅 me and my ex celebrated the 23rd, 24th and 25th going from house to house celebrating with all our parents and their families.
One more common thing in Sweden, is that 25'th is for rest, or if you have the energy that's the day for hitting the pub. Basically 24'th is usually for celebrating with your family, and the 25'th is often spent celebrating with your friends (or just resting). I know some people do Christmas with family and New year's with friends as well.
Here in Finland we celebrate as well on 24th. my girlfriend is Italian and they celebrate at 25th. so i get to celebrate two fricking days too!!! it is fricking awesome 😄
Some companies here in Sweden close during Christmas and New Year. So we work until December 22-23 and starts working again on January 2-3 depending on which day Christmas and New Year fall on. So some of us don't work during the days in between Christmas and New Year.
I been to traditional Skånsk (the south of Sweden) Christmas table where we have a lot of danish dishes ( roast pork, roast pork, eel, duck, goose, jams and pies and cabbage of various kinds)
to so it can be up to 70 different dishes. So you have a difference depending on where in Sweden you are.
And yes in the evening when you just had all you can take of family you go out to the pub, bar or a club. Also, the 23’d it is a tradition down here to go out to the pub or a restaurant and meet all the friends that have returned to the homecity to have Christmas with family.
I'm from Skåne and I've never heard of any of these foods on a julbord. Still fun to see people have different traditions.
@@Hpmanenz in the 80’s there vas a place called Spångens Gästgiveri (known from movies from the 30’s) that had this monster Julbord, with way over 100 different dishes. I don’t think that any restaurant in the right mind would do that today.
(Ål, fläskestek, spegelsteak, you only find down in the south on a Julbord.
Greetings from Finland!
That movie is propably National Lampoons Christmas Vacation (from 1989) where Chevy Chase is the father of the Griswold family. Also some movies that comes christmas time on television is every year Home Alone 1 & 2 and then the Brittish legend (actually this comes 24th day usually) Snowman. So every one here knows the song "Walking in the air" and that´s the reason why Nightwish made cover from that song. Some evening there propably come at least one of the Die Hard and Unknown soldier (Tuntematon sotilas).
That is also tradition in Finland that 25th day kids watch Donald Ducks Christmes that has same things every year.
Well originally Nordic christmas is pagan celebration that vikings celebrated at the darkst time of the year and were called Jul. It was basicly eating, drinking and having fun with all those people that were special and important and everybody gathered to celebrating. Main meat were pork, but there were also other meats and fish as well. It was kind of "new year" celebration as well becouse after that the days began to get lighter again. Jul were the most important celebration in viking culture and even when vikings started to become christians they still didn´r gave up Jul. So the cathollic church got the idea that they would change and remove them own Christmas from earlier autumn to same time as viking Jul to celebrate Christmas and combine these two things togetger.
In Norway where the sea is open there were fresh salmon and dried fish, but in Sweden and Finland our sea is under ice cover we had more of pickeled fish like herring and lutefisk at the table. Those are still part of some peoples tradition, but these days at least in my (family) own tradition we eat salmon as well. Still the king of the table is Christmas ham of course.
And yes, like he said on the video Swedes eat Christmas sausages and meatballs (they always eat meatballs in every celebration) Finland has Karelian stew that has some cow and pork meat chunks. We eat so much sausages commonly that isn´t part of our tradition. And i don´t know how other countries and different parts even in Finland general, but at least in north raindeer and moose is important part at the table too.
Of course we have potatoes and different kinds of sallads, gravy that is made from the grease of the ham, propably some peas and lingonberries. Bread is usually malty and sweet "joululimppu" (in Finland) "jul limppa" (in Sweden), I don´t does they eat that in Norway too.
Before the big dinner we traditionaly eat some of rice porridge. Some eat that with cinnamon, sugar and butter, when some eat it it with kissel that is made from dried apricots, plums, pears and apples. We call it "sekahedelmäsopppa" that is mixed fruit soup translated.
This tradition is very different depending from the are that where you live in Finland, but in my home city at the evening of 25th people are going drink, melt the ham (that is in the stomach) and see some friends in to the city centrum bars. It is crazy how much people there are at that time and people are happy and in Christmas mood. No fighting that night at the bars. Everybody are comftable and grumpyness isn´t part of the night at all.
Here in Tampere where i live now isn´t as seddle. Of course many have Christmas spirit, but not as many.
At some families, Snata Claus visit them around 6.00-7.00 pm, drinking some julmust and gives the christmas gifts to the family members that are in his christmas bag or under the christmas tree before leaving again.
There is a pattern to what we put on the x-table.
It is just very complicated.
You will only find stuff associated with Christmas normally.
A lot of that are pretty meat from pigs.
These are all fine, though some are far more common than others:
Porkchops, sausages, meat balls, ribs, blood sausage or pudding, liver patty, head cheese, ham, and so on.
There is also the pickled herrings.
Boiled potatoes.
A potato casserole flavored with a fish that has been spiced with sandal wood.
Cream stewed kale.
Apple sauce and mustards for the ham.
Gravlax.
Mustard based sauce for the gravlax.
Rehydrated dried cod that has been cured in lye.
Christmas bread.
Knäckebröd.
Cheese.
Butter.
When you eat Julbord, you should go from light to heavy. Fish, light meat, heavy meat all the way to sweets.
Traditional southern Christmas table consists of seven plates. Pickled herring, other fish, cold cut meats, ham, the warm dishes, porridge, dessert. All with bread and cheese. And lots of variations in each category (except the rice porridge)
This is the basics for a Julbord. Everyone will not have everything on here, and some have added even more in the same line as these, but there it is:
Cold fish dishes on the Christmas table:
Pickled herring, different kinds
Baltic herring
Herring salad
Egg halves, Devils eggs
Caviar
Salmon: gravlax, cold smoked, hot smoked
Baltic herring box
(Eel used to be a thing but now it's endangered)
Beetroot salad
Skagen mayo with prawns
Salads: red cabbage salad, kale salad
Cold cut meats:
Christmas ham
Leg of mutton
Brawn: calf brawn, roll brawn, press brawn
Reindeer
Moose
Cold cut roast beef
Sausages
Pig's feet
Liver paste
Pate
Hot dishes on the Christmas table:
Jansson's Temptation
Prince sausage
Meatballs
Christmas sausage
Noisette
Cabbage: red cabbage, kale, brown cabbage
Brussels sprouts
Ribs
Dip in the pot Dopp-i-Grytan
Potato
Lutefisk or Lye fish
Add ons and side
Mustard, different kinds
Herb bread
Christmas crackers
Dark rye bread
Butter
Christmas cheese
Stilton or Cheddar
Dessert cheeses
Grav salmon sauce
Cumberland sauce
Pickled cucumbers
Pickled Beetroot
Drinks on the Christmas table:
Mulled wine
Christmas beer - with and without alcohol
Snaps, different kinds
Christmas must
Red wine
Mumma (couldn't find a translation)
Svagdricka (couldn't find a translation)
Water
Coffee Tea
The sweet:
Truffles
Pannacotta
Raisins & almonds (for mulled wine)
Rice porridge
Rice à la malta
Fruit sallad
Gingerbread cookies
Saffroncake or buns
Butterscotch
Ice chocolate
Caramel
Polka pigs
Marmelades
Clementines
Dates
Nuts
Fig
And you eat it like a 3 or 5 or 7 course meal, in a specific order.
Christmas dinner is like a Smorgasbord, with a few items added. We add ham, red cabbage, and a lot of items from pork. This is because by tradition a pig was slaughtered and you have use it up because you had problems store pork.
But we ate all from the pig. From nose to tail to pigs feet.
Depending on what region you lived in you had different fish dishes. One that started on west coast was Jansons temptation. Potatoes, full cream, onions and ansjovis. But now is mandatory in all Sweden.
Some more things we do to prepair for christmas is ”Ljusdoppning” where we make our own candles using melted wax. We also make ”lussebullar”, gingerbead, and also build gingerbread houses and decorate them with candy. We also have ”uppesittarkvällen” the night before christmas ”23rd”. Idk if u have it in UK but we also have someone dress up as Santa that knocks on the door and hands out the presents to everyone. There’s probably some more things I’ve missed but yes, we do have alot of traditions.
In my Swedish family christmas eve is for family and board games or at least card or dice games like Poker or Yatsy or "fia med knuff" (ludo) is very common, christmas day is usually the party day when we go to the pub, 2nd day for christmas was usually work (double salary) then grandma's birthday dinner.
Another peculiar tradition in Sweden might be new years day (Sylvester), it's Pizza + Ivanhoe (the movie), perfect hangover remedy.
Why we celebrate on Christmas Eve instead of Christmas day goes back to (as usual) our pagan days.
The new day started at sundown, not at midnight. That's why we celebrate it at Christmas Eve. The sun goes down at 2-3 pm up here!
The Christmas julbord/buffet certainly is not random and has a long history. There is only one correct way to consume it. You take 5 - 6 helpings in a strict order. 1 herring, 2 fish dishes, 3 cold meats, 4 warm meats, 5 warm dishes & 6 sweets
For my family, on Christmas Eve for lunch we a big meal (this is the big celebration) and have all white foods which include white fish, potatoes, and lutfisk, and end with risgrynsgröt. Then after lots of dancing, we have sort of a “grab and go” dinner (we don’t sit down for a formal meal) with ham, cheese, and our seven types of cookies! And finally, to end the night Jul Tomte comes and pays us a visit!
After eating, opening presents etc we usually just hang out and chill, we watch christmas programs and movies, play music, dance....if there is snow we will go outside and play in the snow etc, in my family we love when it's a white christmas cause we have snowball fights.
Also on Christmas day we usually go to the cinema.
We also get 5 weeks paid vacation each year and it’s customary to take four of those during the summer and the last during the winter holiday - which with some calendar luck or extra hours saved up can mean up to two full weeks all in all
In my family we have the exact same things on our julbord every single year. You can also tell by some of the dishes where in Sweden we come from, which I think is pretty cool. It's not Christmas without my grandma's skörost :')
Since most Swedes have 5-6 weeks of vacation per year many takes 3 days and then can be off work from (this year) the 23 of december to 2 January. (By just using 3 vacation days.)
That Christmas Day lunch is the last remainder of Medieval way of dining 😊 Well, in Denmark it's fish first (quite a variety of them), then meat (again lots), cheese, a special Christmas dessert, sweets and fruit.
Here in Norway, we also have Christmas Day brunch in this way. On Christmas Eve we have a full, traditional dinner with side dishes - in some families they have several main courses with side dishes, but that's because they come from different traditions and don't want to choose just one.
At our place, we set the lunch table several days in a row, and sometimes in the evening too if we don't feel like cooking dinner. There may be a little too much food. However, we do not have a tradition for the order in which we should eat the various dishes, at least not in my family. I usually take the herring after the meat because it sticks to the plate, and then I get away with a little less washing up.
WRONG!!!
There's "...a clear pattern..." as far as particular, Swedish food on Christmas Eve (Julafton...) - as well as on Christmas Day (Juldagen...) is concerned.
Just because Swedes enjoy a Julbord (Christmas Buffet...) with a vast assortment of dishes, doesn't mean that all of these dishes are eaten 365 days of the year.
And, there's either a huge Christmas ham (or Christmas goose...) that's served, as well - instead of a regular Sunday roast.
We also get January 6th off, 13th day of Christmas. Most swedish holidays are on a specific day of the week, and not on a specific date. It's very noticeable around Christmas though, since you get 2-6 days depending on what week day the 24th is on. I think it's like 4.3 days on average.
A long time ago the new day began when the sun set the day before. In Sweden in December that is early afternoon on Christmas Eve. That is the easy explanation for why it's celebrated on the 24th.
So the thing about celebrating on the 24th versus the 25th actually has a pretty interesting origin story. We go back to a time before the standardized time gained foot during the 19th century, this because that was when it was decided that the day will switch at midnight. Before this the day ended at sundown. Subsequently making the eve the first part of the next day. This is why celebrating on the 24th versus the 25th actually are two interpretations of the same idea. " celebrate the eve of the 25th"
Thanks for reading all of that.
Merry Christmas and happy new year from a finnish historian.
We also go to the pub or nightclubs but on Christmas Day instead and its called hemvändardagen (homecoming day). Old friends meet up because you usually are home in the city you grew up in over Christmas to be with family.
Where most people work in Sweden the default is having holiday over christmas. Where i work we're off from dec 23rd-jan 2nd this year.
On the christmas party with work i had 3 types of pickled herring, potato gratin, charamelized ribs, meatballs, sausage and cold cuts like: ham, roast beef, turkey, salami.
There were alot of things i didnt pick like salmon, beetroot sallad, mushroom omelette and others.
OK. I grew up in San Diego, California. Our Christmas “dinner” on the evening of December 24 featured whatever leftovers were available from the evening dinner the day before plus “luxuries” like peanut butter filled dates. For those of you who are gagging at the mere concept of such a blasphemy as peanut butter filled dates, I say “Don’t knock-’em till you’ve tried ‘em!”. DELICIOUS! We opened our presents on the morning of December 25th. After our massive, at least it always felt so, present opening, we gorged on my mother’s extraordinary home made cinnamon buns for breakfast. Christmas Day dinner consisted of baked ham, candied yams, mashed potatoes and ham gravy. I am unutterably sorry that none of you could be blessed by my mother’s ham gravy. 😔 Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! 💥🌟💫
Nice to hear how you celebrate in UK. At least in my family, we used to play board games too. My mother always won in china chess...
Its what you are used to. For me Christmas dinner in Sweden makes perfect sense and taste great together. I love Christmas food, and we only eat it on christmas and in my family we eat the same on easter. And its always the same things with sometimes some items missing and another time other items missing, with some key items always there every year.
Most of Europe celebrate on the 24th. A big chunk in the east celebrates 13 days later... and the UK on the 25th.
Look at all that Christmas food!
.....
Now imagine being the family chef, setting out to feed 20+ people the single most important, revered lunch/dinner of the year. Now imagine being crazy enough to make your own sausages, picked herring, butter, cheese, bread, candy, meatballs etc, etc.
Yeah, I started cooking Christmas lunch a week ago.
Yes, Donald Duck on Christmas and Ivanhoe on New Years Day! ^_^
It is interesting how things can be so different between countrys at Christmas
Not everyone is free on the 24th, many people are still working before they're going to spend the evening with the family. I think that is one of the reasons to why we celebrate on the 24th. Then 25th and 26th are red days where most people are not working.
And grocery stores that are open usually closes a few hours earlier, but then on the contrary, retailer stores are open normal times because christmas sales is a thing and us swedes go on a crazy shopping spree for a few weeks.
And the same goes for New Years Eve. The eves aren't bank hollidays, but the stores close earlier. Some eves the banks close earlier, and at the bigger f.e. Christmas and Midsummer they are always closed.
1a turen: Sill & strömming.
2a turen: Lax & övrig fisk.
3e turen: Kallskuret.
4e turen: Småvarmt.
5e turen: Ostar.
6e turen: Dessert.
7e turen: Julgodis.
If we go further back in time, when Sweden was a farmer-society, you get more pattern and context for the different foods on a traditional ”julbord”.
It was middle of winter so fresh produce was scares. So you have things to eat that you were able to preserve. Pickled herring, salted fish, root wegetables, green chard, possably winter appels. To get a feast, and well needed nutrition, a pig was slaughterd and prepared. And you used every part of that pig. So ham, sossages, ribs, jellied meat, the liver, feet and even head of the pig was carefully prepared or presserved. Salmon, may have been eaten near the northern rivers. Otherwise - that and other additions are modern ajustments. Restaurants often go overboard compeating with each others buffets nowdays.
I usually get 1 or 2 weeks off on winter. It’s not only for Christmas but also a winter break.
I loved this. It's allways fun to watch your reactions. Merry Christmas to you!❤
In Sweden the 25th dec is one off the most common day to go to the pub or club. People that are at their child hometown meet up and celebrate that xmas is over. =) The food is Julbord but the most common foods that every julbord have is Herring, Meatballs, Ham, ribs, potatoes, salmon and Janssons Frestelse rice porrige and Lutfisk.
Maybe not really christmas related but every year alot of ppl in Sweden and Norway is watching the English Dinner for One :)
When you have all this food you often get a bit uncomfortable full, so now days my family mostly eat the random Christmas food spread out around the Christmas days (of course I would not say no to the Christmas desert table my working place gives to all the employees).
On Christmas eve my family always eat lutefish with mustard sauce, green peas and boiled potatoes. Then rice-porrage with fruit sauce as desert before the candy and coocies.
Actually is is only two red days, Christmas day and boxing day. Christmas Eve is still a normal day, however this year Christmas Eve is Sunday, and Sundays are allways a red day in the calendar
Hi from Sweden , but now on sunday is the 24 dec …. And our advent is 🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️ is finish.. i love it ♥️
The reason we celebrate on christmas eve, is because a long time ago, the day was considered to end when the sun came down and the next started right after. So for the people back then, christmas day "technically" started on the afternoon of the 24:th. And since the sun goes down veeery early this time of year, at about 4pm, christmas day got celebrated then. When following the modern day clocks and calendars became more important (industrialised society etc) , and the 24:th didn't end until midnight, the tradition to celebrate in the evening became a tradition to celebrate the 24:th. What was an early christmas day celebration turned slowly into a christmas eve celebration.
So there you go, that's why.
Would love to see you react to another swedish christmas tradition. Every year they show Karl Bertil Jonssons julafton, written and narrated by the iconic comedian Tage Danielson. It has great music, wounderful animation and a heartwarming story. You can find it on RUclips, both with subtitles and a dubbed version (Christopher's christmas mission)
We don't have any compensation for weekend Christmases, but if the national day, June 6th, is on a weekend we get an extra vacation day to spend, so we're not totally foreign to the concept.
There are a lot of Swedish xmas specific foods. I think this is more a case of the guy not realizing that they are. In fact from what you are saying so don't UK have that many xmas specific ones, but rather serve generic UK staples.
I get the best of two worlds on Christmas eve. I’m born in Sweden to Finnish parents and I live in Sweden. My julbord is a mixture of Swedish julbord-dishes and Finnish joulupöytä-dishes. Now that I’m an adult living with my husband, I have taken over my moms responsibilities of making the foods for Christmas and I started preparing yesterday for this sundays Christmas eve dinner. (Finland celebrates Christmas on 24th to).
There sure is a unspoken pattern in which order to eat the julbord. First fish, cold meats, warm dishes, dessert cheese, desserts and candy.
What the guy in the video means is that in Sweden we do things during the whole of the December: lighting a candle (four in total) every Sunday.
Drinking glögg (warm, sweet spiced whine) eating gingerbread cookies with friends at the weekends before Christmas and other stuff. It’s just a bigger build up in Sweden.
In Finland many offices are closed between 27-30. So 2024 we are off 24th Monday, then many take 2 vacation days (28-29) and then comes weekend and new year on Monday. This makes 8 days off paid .
When You smell "Janssons Frestelse and lussebullar" on Christmas you know its christmas for real! Santa cant be wrong.
This Cold Dark Cosy Calm Winter landscape with moutains, frosen lakes, large forests , Polarnights, Twilight, Northen lights, Reindeers, Wolfes, Bears, Moose.
Its like a magic fairytale for Christmas.