‘I lived off IKEA’s frozen food for a day and everything took under 15 minutes to cook’

Joanne Kendrick visited IKEA’s food market for the first time and discovered some authentic Swedish products from meatballs to fried onions

IKEA might be well known for its bargain flatpack furniture but there’s a whole other side to the Swedish furniture store that some people might not be familiar with.

The Swedish Food Market homes a number of speciality Swedish products, like the famous meatballs, that you won’t find at Tesco or Asda, but as one Birmingham Mail reporter found out, you can live quite happily off.

IKEA is always a bit of a maze when it comes to their homeware and the same can be said for the food section which you’ll need to head directly towards as your come through the door if you want to avoid walking around the showroom for an hour.

Breakfast:

Press coffee (PÅTÅR- £4.25),Oat drink (£1.95),Swedish flatbread (GRÄDDAT- £1.75), Jam(SYLT JORDGUBB – £1.25), Cheese (OST HERRGÅRD – £2.95), Oat biscuits (KAFFEREP – £0.95)

As a self-confessed ‘breakfast-skipper’, Joanne was on the hunt for something similar to bran flakes, cereal or oatmeal they tend to eat but after about 10 circuits around the same three aisles and a quick Google search they discovered that Swedes opt to start their day with bread, coffee, bread and more bread.

A good Swedish breakfast choice will have slices of their finest bread, with all sorts of toppings ranging from marmalade to cheese, ham, and even a fish paste finisher if you dare. They went with three parts jam and then went a little wild with their fourth one and added a bit of cheese, too, before complimenting the plate with a couple of sugar-free oatmeal biscuits to finish.

A good quality coffee is very popular in Sweden, and so IKEA’s premium dark roasts was next. The coffee was lovely with a dash of oat milk.

Lunch:

Hotdogs (KORV – £2.25), Fried Onions (ROSTAD LÖK- £0.95), Swedish flatbread (GRÄDDAT- £1.75)

Hotdogs were the meal of choice for lunch. They’re a popular choice in the takeaway section, only costing 75p per dog. Bread-wise, there were no buns in the store as so flatbread was decided as the bread to accompany the sausage.

They decided to pair the hotdogs up with the ready-made fried onions they had also picked up in the store which were a winner. The sausages were slightly smoky, and the onions had a bit of a sharpness to them, and the combination worked beautifully.

Dinner:

Swedish meatballs (HUVUDROLL – £2.25), Pasta (BÄSTISAR -£1.35), Pasta sauce (Mutti – £1.95), Potato fritters (RÖSTI – £1.25) Elderflower cordial (DRYCK FLÄDER – £2.95)

Now we get to the big one – the IKEA staple…the Swedish meatball. Having never tried the meatballs before Joanne was in for a treat.

They tried the traditional pork and beef meatball, but it is worth adding that there is a meat-free option available, as well as a chicken meatball, too. They were pan-fried and added a little pasta sauce, and they were ready in under 15 minutes.

To go with the meatballs, a couple of potato fritters and a handful of moose-shaped pasta was added, before adding a bit of non-IKEA veg simply to offset the sheer amount of carbs.

The pasta and potato fritters were ok, nothing to write home about really. Once you got over the pretty cute novelty of the pasta being an unusual shape, it was pretty much the same as you would find anywhere, only at a premium price, which is nice as a one-off but not really something I would go back to.

Conclusion :

Joanne found that most of the food she tried was high-quality, tasty stuff. The IKEA staples were certainly winners at home, retaining their taste and providing a bit of the restaurant feel in your kitchen.

Some of the items such as the pasta and potato fritters, while not bad at all, were not justifiable in the extra money that you pay for them, she found. The whole shopping experience felt like you were paying extra for something a little special and different, and while the hotdogs and meatballs gave you that quality.

The winner was unexpectedly the little pot of fried onions, Joanne said. They were full of flavour, easy to add to my meal and have left her curious as to how they would be in other dishes.

The real bonus to the meals was that none of them took more than fifteen minutes to prepare, so if you have a busy schedule or a hectic house, the food from IKEA would be perfect for a no-fuss meal.