American and Swedish Food, differences and similarities.

I recently spent 2 weeks in sunny L.A. and prior to that I’ve been traveling around a bit, I’ve seen most of the east coast from D.C and up. On the west coast I traveled from San Diego in the south to Oregon in the north. In between this I’ve visited Arizona and New Mexico.

Disclaimer: This has been my observation while traveling, I’m not saying this is a stated fact, I’m broadly generalizing. Feel free to disagree.

People (read: media, doctors, nutritionists, people in general etc) always talk about the bad eating habits of Americans. There are also worries throughout the west world about increased obesity, more cases of cardiovascular disease and other food-related diseases.

Food habits

In general, I’d say the average Swede cooks more food at home, whether pre-prepared to some point or completely from scratch. The average American won’t cook much. The average Swede will eat breakfast at home or at work, lunch at a lunch restaurant/at work and dinner at home.

The Americans I’ve known have eaten most, if not all, meals in a restaurant or as take-away. At times breakfast has been eaten at home, while lunch has been eaten however it’s been most common at the workplace and dinner has been either take-away or eaten at the restaurant.

Take-away food like pizza, sushi, falafel etc is pretty common in Sweden and TV-dinners are more and more common along with frozen pizza. They work well for the stressed mother or father who is on their way home from work and needs to feed their family. It works for the single person who doesn’t feel like cooking for just one person.

In general the habits are quite alike, I’d say Sweden is heading where the U.S is, we are now getting Mc Donalds that serve breakfast, more and more places serving brunch. The Swedes do however not have a breakfast culture like the Americans, in Sweden it’s still breakfast at home (or on the train while commuting or at an early breakfast break at work, but not in a special restaurant) that is the way to go. We don’t have IHOP’s, Grinder’s, Denny’s, Wendy’s etc. If you want scrambled eggs with bacon, pancakes and syrup you have to make it yourself. For lunch and dinner the Swedes tend to be more acquainted with eating out, specially when it comes to business lunches.

Food markets

They’re of course bigger and more diverse in the U.S, in general they have a better assortment, no matter what you want, it’s usually easier to get it in an American supermarket. You often find a wider variety of goods to eat there or bring home. I’m a Whole Foods kinda gal and I love how I in one single place can buy products to cook my own meal, by pre-made frozen or cold food, buy hot food to bring straight home or just eat in the store.

Some of it is available in Swedish food stores, but a sit in part where you can actually eat the food you just bought doesn’t exist in any food store I know of here.

Restaurants

In general I don’t consider Mc Donalds to be a restaurant. The place doesn’t have to have white linen table cloths, but a certain amount of standard is expected. I’d say in general I don’t consider chain eateries to be restaurants (it varies of course) and here is a big difference, in Sweden we don’t usually have chains – beyond the American fast food chains that are spreading (mainly Mc Donalds, Burger King and Subway) and our own chains of the same variety. But other types of chains like Chili’s, Applebee’s, D’Arby’s etc that are supposed to be a bit more, fancy? They just don’t really exist here. There are a few restaurants that are available in a few different cities in the same region, but to call it a chain would be too much.

Health Aspects

Overall I’d say the Swedes are healthier, that isn’t to say that we don’t have bad habits. Obesity and cardiovascular diseases are an increasing problem here as well as the rest of the west world. But overall we have a health care system that promotes well being, dieticians and doctors are available to help taking care of such problems in a clinical way, at low or no fees. I also believe that cooking most (if not all) of your food promotes health as it means you’re very aware of what is actually in the meal you’re eating, if you just eat out, you tend to have less knowledge of what is actually in there.