"Do you need help eating more salad? Say hello to my browned miso butter," says Arvid Kronvall on Tiktok. He is not alone in using the big flavors to help in cooking. Every second recipe is now launched as "an umami explosion" or "spicy". The food should be sweet, sour, strong or fresh and herbal. Creamy, crispy and crunchy. Truffle bean is one of the staples, as is sriracha mayo.
For a long time, traditional Swedish cuisine was very discreetly seasoned. Salt, allspice and dill were common spices, and the sweet and sour – as in dill meat and gherkins – added a golden edge. Strongly spiced food was considered right up until the end of the 19th century as something to be careful with because of the "medicinal effects".
Perhaps it was in the 1980s that the starting shot went for what can be described as taste maxxing. The arrival of Texmex food opened up a wave of chili flavors and scoville degrees suddenly became a word to throw around. The star chefs talked about "high flavors" and the range of flavorings exploded.
Jessica Frej, now TV chef and cookbook author, had an insight when she competed in "Sweden's Master Chef" in 2011.
- The jury was on us the whole time that we have to taste the food more. And I didn't understand what they meant. But then it was as if the token fell. You want to be right on the edge before it gets too salty, too sweet or too sour.
She thinks she got a lot better at cooking when she cracked that nut.
- Because then you got this wow feeling.
Jessica Frej is currently studying to become a dietitian. And she has also seen the flip side of the taste-maxxing.
- Before, we might have skimmed butter on the fish. Now it should be browned butter. Everything has to be pulled to its peak, which has meant that we have had much better food. But it also becomes much more difficult to eat properly.
Johan Swahn is a researcher in sensory marketing at Örebro University and focuses on how to measure people's sensory experiences.
- Complex flavors, like in a good broth, can lead to you needing less to be satisfied, he says.
Jessica Frej agrees. At least on a theoretical level. She refers to what is usually called the buffet syndrome, meaning that you eat more because there are so many different things and flavors to choose from.
- The challenge is that today we eat so varied, which is good in many ways. But if you're in a restaurant and eat a lot of small dishes where each dish is really tasty, but in different ways, it's always a new taste. I think it drives more eating because you don't get bored.
So how far can you push the taste maxxing - surely there must be a limit when the mouth says stop?
Jessica Frej and Johan Swahn see two different paths forward.
- So far we have only scratched the surface of different food cultures, says Jessica Frej. There are any number of flavors to discover in different parts of the world.
Johan Swahn strikes a blow for other senses.
- Texture and sound are other properties that can be used to maximize the experience, he says. Crispy chips taste better and today's chefs have gotten better at playing with the sense of taste.
Is there any value in trying to find your way back to the milder flavors?
- In the same way that you can get used to salt, you can also step down, says Johan Swahn and continues:
- It has long been a trend in fine dining. To strive for the pure taste and to let the raw material take its place.
Jessica Frej doesn't think it's an end in itself to quit Smakmaxxa.
- The food I eat in a restaurant can be like a symphony orchestra, blow me off my chair. Reading old cookbooks makes me so glad to be alive now. God, how boring some of the food was then!
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