Swedish Candy

I didn’t know there was a breakfast dish with the beautiful name Idaho Sunrise, but I stumbled upon it and then stumbled upon a variation of it, the result of which you can see above: Hash brown nests filled with eggs, fake bacon (of course you can use real if you, unlike me, eat meat) and eggs. Easy as pie and quite delicious! Serve with avocado.

“Sugar can cure everything”

Sylvia Plath

Ask any Swedish expat what he or she misses most from Sweden, and I guarantee you they’ll say Swedish candy.

There’s just not anything like Swedish candy anywhere else. Swedes know candy and take it seriously. For them (us), candy isn’t just some sugary concoction sold in plastic bags with a funky name on it, candy is a science, dare I say even art?

In Sweden you buy candy in special stores where only candy (and soda and chips) is sold. You buy it by the pound (or kilo, more correctly) and you pick it yourself with plastic tongs into a paper bag. The selection is endless. There’s violet and licorice twirls, strawberry and vanilla-flavored vampire teeth, coca cola snakes as long as your arm, soft, green jelly frogs, sour peach skulls, chewy nougat bites, chocolate-covered banana marshmallows, caramel marshmallows, Turkish-licorice coca cola bottles, peppermint candy… In other words anything your heart desires, the very things sweet dreams are made of.

Imagine my dismay every October when I look into my son’s Halloween basket and find year-old Reese’s peanut butter cups mingled with bland and boring Hershey’s kisses – it’s enough to make me want to cry. If a kid is “lucky” he or she gets candy buttons, which surely must be a joke.

When I first met my husband, I told him about Swedish candy, and he told me about Colombian candy. Then we got our hands on each other’s candy and I can promise you he’s now a convert!

There’s a Swedish candy store in New York, which we sometimes visit. I enter it as I enter church: Solemnly, quietly, and with the deepest sense of gratitude. It’s located in the Village and it’s called Sockerbit, after an iconic Swedish piece of candy that’s been around since, I don’t know, but quite possibly forever. The problem I have with Sockerbit, which in many ways is a little slice of Swedish paradise, is that the candy there is an expensive treat, and besides they don’t always have the things I like. 

Sometimes, I ask my mother to send me some candy and while that’s all good, she doesn’t quite know my taste either. I prefer to pick my own.

Unlike food or wine, which taste better and thus is best enjoyed in the company of others, candy is something for the person who is home alone. Candy is for when you’re reading a good book, for those rainy, thunderous evenings when the rest of the family is magically scattered on activities outside the house. And since it’s sugary, candy is perfect for when you’re studying.

In Sweden, candy used to be a treat given on Saturdays only and was then called “Saturday candy” or “lördagsgodis”. Or you’d get it for when you went to the movies. In fact, Swedes used to buy candy, not pop corn, when going to the movies.

The “tradition” to consume candy on nearly a daily basis began with the opening of the first candy stores, in 1985. Buckets and buckets filled with candy led to Sweden becoming one of the most candy-consuming people in the world. Today, Swedes eat 15 kilos, or 33 pounds, of candy a year, beaten only by the Danes, who eat 36 pounds a year.

That must make for a whole lot of sweet Swedes!

Swedish candy galore in my favorite red candy bowl.