One of the things I love about travel overseas is exploring foreign supermarkets. Wherever in the world you are, there’s always something very exciting to be found.
Here’s what I discovered in Stockholm.
ALL of the supermarkets I visited in Central Stockholm carried gluten free goods. I found the excellent Swedish produced Fria gluten free bread in the freezer in every shop I visited, along with other gluten free treats.
I found these in a COOP the size of a small Tesco Local store in Gamla Stan:
We found many products from the Finnish brand Semper on sale in this supermarket as well as the other supermarkets we visited.
This was the freezer section in an ICA in Sodermalm:
And THIS is the gluten free section in the basement (lowest level) of the Åhléns City department store. Feast on this, people!:
This is a really big food hall in the Åhléns City department store. At the time I visited the gluten free section was located near aisle number 1 but ask staff if you can’t find, although the ‘Glutenfritt‘ sign was clearly visible from some way distance! From the photos you can see they have an amazing and extensive selection of gluten free goods. These included breads, bread mixes (which are in handy for storage tetra-pack type cartons in the photo above), sweet and savoury biscuits, traditional Swedish crispbreads and interesting looking flours. The freezer contained a large selection of gluten free breads, bread rolls, cinnamon buns (kanelbulle), apple muffins, chocolate brownie cake (kladdkaka), pizza bases and more. Many of these were from the Fria gluten free range.
Somewhat hilariously as I was standing there taking photos, a Swedish couple approached the section and let out the same whelp of delight at the extensive gluten free goods as I had 5 minutes before them. I think the shriek of excitement sounded better in Swedish though!
Essential details:
Details for the stores I visited and found a great selection of gluten free goods.
Åhléns City: Department store located at Klarabergsgatan 50, 111 21 Stockholm. Closest station, T-Centralen
Coop: Branches all over Sweden. Photo above taken in Coop Järntorget 80, 11129 Stockholm. Nearest station, Gamla Stan.
ICA supermarkets. Nationwide chain selling many gluten free lines including Fria gluten free bread.
Finally, no trip to Sweden would be complete without a couple of Plopps:
Have you visited Sweden? Are there any supermarkets or stores you can recommend for a good selection of gluten free goods?
The breadth of products looks amazing. Is it just because it’s *new* and *different* that the GF sections look more inviting in Sweden than they typically look in the UK?
I do hope you had the courtesy to leave the supermarket before you had your Plopp?
Alex
Whoops… had extra comments in square brackets which didn’t come out…
The thought of going for a plopp in stockholm , many of those would be sold to English tourists and football fans . . fantastic information for us gluten free people . thank you
Haha – so true the Plopps would be a hit with English speakers!
If you ever visit Stockholm again, try “Friends of Adam” products. They were first produced because the friends (hence the name) and family of a little boy wanted him to be able to eat appetizing and healthy cakes and bread.
They now have their own shop om Södermalm (south central Stockholm) and sell through some shops in and around Stockholm. There products have no nasty ingredients added and they are delicious.
Hi Alison, many thanks for stopping by and commenting. I had the pleasure of visiting The Friends of Adam and brought some crackers back to London. I posted about them here:
https://glutenfreemrsd.com/2012/01/swedens-gluten-free-bakery-friends-of-adam.html