The Restaurant at Fotografiska
Chefs Paul Svensson & Christofer Ekman
Place Stockholm, Sweden
Paul Svensson, head chef at The Restaurant at Fotografiska in Stockholm, Sweden, offers diners a green gastrononomic experience, where his focus is on the freshest, most peak-season produce, with animal products when desired as a flavorful condiment.
Paul Svensson started his chef carrier in the navy, and shortly after worked with Marco Pierre White in London, and Mathias Dahlgren at Bon lloc in Stockholm. Paul Svensson has written four cookbooks, three which were rewarded “Best cookbook of the year”. He is a well-known TV-chef in several shows, including Top Chef. Svensson’s food philosophy has a sustainable and no waste focus.
Paul Svenssson is currently running the Fotografiska in Stockholm, a plant based restaurant, which according to Leading Culture Destinations Award 2016 for the world’s second best restaurant in a museum, and White Guides honorable ”Terroir of The Year” in 2017.
60 minutes cook/prep
1) Set the oven to 190°C (374°F).
2) Rinse onions. Mix compost with coarse salt in an ovenproof tray. Line up onions in compost with the root downwards. Oven-bake onions until they reach a core-temperature of 93°C (199°F). Leave onions in room temperature to cool. Cut in half and fry on cutting surface with a blowtorch until lightly blackened.
3) Pick layer for layer of onion bowls. Keep moist under cline film.
4) Finely chop the heart-bites of the onions and keep for mushroom ragu.
5) Slice 2/3 of the Jerusalem artichoke super thinly. Deep-fry in 150°C (302°F) until light golden and crisp. Drain on kitchen paper and season with salt.
6) Cut the rest of Jerusalem artichokes into “julienne strips”.
7) Fry mushrooms, chopped onions and Jerusalem artichoke julienne in butter. Deglaze with veal stock and cook until stock is dissolved into mushrooms. Season with salt, black pepper, sherry vinegar and parsley.
8) Reheat onion bowls. Fill with mushroom ragu, truffle sabayon and crispy Jerusalem artichokes.
1) Melt butter in a pan and add onions.
2) Sauté until onions are super tender without getting color.
3) Strain and fry the mushrooms in onion butter.
4) When the mushrooms start to get color, add onions and keep on stirring for another minute. Blend mushrooms with truffle until smooth texture.
Preheat brown butter to 70°C/ 158°F. Add eggs and egg-yolk to mushroom pure and then slowly add brown butter to the mixture.
5) Season with salt, black pepper, sherry vinegar and truffle oil.
6) Fill a large sized siphon bottle and add 2 capsules. Keep in bain-marie at 60°C/140°F until serving.
His approach
We are in for the search of perfect proportion for pleasure, health and environment. Our main goal is to be part of saving the planet. And to provide food and drink experiences that describe a place, time of the year, a specific flavor and quality of products from our region and climate zone.
What would be your advice to a young and upcoming chef. How could they move towards plant-forward menu concepts?
To focus on acquiring knowledge about nature and to familiarize yourself with natural cycles. It`s all about taste and the ability of a product to taste delicious. It is therefore important to think seasonal which will positively influence the taste of the ingredient.Basically it's about understanding that humans are part of nature and including more value-based cooking.
How do you proceed working towards a plant-forward menu concept?
The simplest way is to initially remove all animal products and instead apply all the knowledge and techniques that we have about animals and apply them on vegetables instead. The most important thing is to think about the future and understand that each and every plant has its own prime season where their flavor is at its most intense.
If you can say three, which plant-based food products do you have to have in your kitchen?
Algiers, olive oil and onion.