Cooks from Estonia, Baltic herrings from Sweden

Recently, the best Baltic herring dishes from Estonia were taken to the Swedes for savouring. The seaside restaurant Pontus on the Water in Stockholm was just the right place for serving a Baltic herring menu.

In addition to good food, the Swedes esteem good drinks. Therefore, the one who enters the restaurant, enters a large bar first.

The taste properties of the Baltic herring are capricious. Therefore, local beer and eco-vodka had to be added to wines to find suitable drinks for the five Baltic herring dishes.

Dmitri Fomenko, Veiko Treumann and Roman Zaštšerinski (left to right) prepared the dishes for the Swedes. The menu included dishes which were the winners of the Baltic herring dishes’ competition held last autumn.

Baltic herrings figure on the Swedish tables as often as on Estonian tables. The audience was competent and demanding. A lot of Estonian could be heard in the dining hall.

However, nostalgic and homelike Baltic herring dishes were not served. Each of the dishes provided a surprise rather than a feel of recognition.

The biggest surprise among the dishes was Baltic herring tempura for sure. The dish invented by the chef of Tallink spa hotel restaurant Nero, Andrus Laaniste, is not difficult to prepare. The courageous idea crosses cultural boundaries and provokes a lively discussion.

It becomes obvious that the Baltic herrings in Swedish coastal waters are fattier and taste milder, even though both are caught from the same sea. Thus, the dishes that are cooked in an identical way taste differently on the other side of the sea.

The two chefs Roman Zštšerinski and Jonas Björklund had a lot to talk about. Before starting work in Jonas’s kitchen, Roman gave a presentation about the Estonian cuisine to Swedish junior chefs. Now it is Jonas’s turn to prepare a menu to offer in Tallinn.