Lagom, Aquavit, and the Herring Queen: Scandinavia House Throws the Perfect Party

At Scandinavia House’s Craft Your Own Aquavit event, guests blended their own spirits, argued passionately over dill and caraway ratios, sang Scandinavian drinking songs, and ate enough herring and cloudberry jam to briefly consider moving to Stockholm.

Scandinavia House’s Craft Your Own Aquavit event was a delight. I mean that in the fullest sense. From top to bottom, I was completely enchanted by it. This was the opposite of the institutional programming you usually get: a glass of wine, a lecture, a room full of strangers, and no real opportunity to know anyone or remember much of it three months later except to say, yes, I was at that thing too.

This was a party.

We began with incredible Scandinavian hors d’oeuvres: pâté, salads, and fish prepared several different ways, including some of the best herring I have ever had in my life. Seriously. Fantastic. Guests could grab a drink, wander the outdoor deck, and talk to one another before the formal programming began. That deck, by the way, is going to be heaven this summer, so keep an eye out for events there.

After a brief introduction and a short video collaboration with Spritmuseumet, Stockholm’s Museum of Spirits, guests learned the history of aquavit and then got to make their own blends using dill seeds, caraway, citrus, berries, ginger, elderflower, Swedish candies, and more. Everyone was tasting, laughing, scribbling down spice ratios, comparing bottles, and getting just carried away enough for some general merriment. There were tastings of traditional aquavit, raucous Scandinavian songs, and more beautiful food. The herb sauce on the salmon and the brie bites with cloudberry jam were heaven.

A huge amount of the energy, and all of the fantastic food, came from our host for the event, Ulrika Bengtsson of Björk Café & Bistro, whom I adore. She has the kind of personality that lights up a room the moment she starts speaking. She’s loud, funny, warm, emphatic, and completely without pretense. At one point, laughing about the stereotype of Scandinavian reserve, she said it was a good thing she became a chef because in the kitchen, “It’s a good thing to be loud!” Later, describing her arrival in New York to work at Aquavit, my favorite restaurant in the city, she said, “I’m the most normal person in this city.” Perfect.

There is also something absolutely marvelous about the fact that one of the chefs from Aquavit is now cooking in the more casual, accessible setting of Björk inside Scandinavia House. It feels like a small miracle. The spread at this event offered a taste of what is waiting downstairs at the café: house-cured gravlax, a vivid dill-heavy herb sauce, white asparagus soup topped with smoked trout roe, Jansson’s temptation, and several deeply compelling herring dishes. Bengtsson calls herself “the herring queen,” and after hearing that Russ & Daughters once brought her in to teach staff her herring preparations, I see no reason to dispute the title. Get this woman a crown.

What made the event so successful was the way it turned a foreign tradition into a new local tradition. No pretension, the perfect amount of socializing, delightfully tactile, and utterly joyful. Everyone came together to celebrate Midsummer, light, flavor, and one another. Bengtsson put it best: “Everyone can just sit together and eat and drink. Everyone will come together. No lectures, no war.”

When I asked her how to describe this event, and the ones she hopes to build moving forward, she gave me the perfect word: lagom. “It’s not too much. It’s not too little. It’s just perfect.”

Go to the next event. Go see the exhibitions upstairs. Go sit on that beautiful deck. But above all, go eat Ulrika Bengtsson’s food. Scandinavia House has found something special here, and Björk Café & Bistro is more than worth the visit.

Bengtsson is already thinking ahead. The next program is set for June 6, Sweden’s National Day, and will center food, story, and Swedish culture through the life of Jenny Lind, with music, chocolate, and BonBon candy folded into the evening. After this, I would follow Ulrika Bengtsson into just about any themed cultural experience she wants to build.