The Swedish avant-garde

Danyel Couet and Paul Svensson will present their cooking talents in Hangar-7, Salzburg, in December. A portrait of both Ikarus guest chefs from Stockholm.

Sweden is a country where trends become apparent very early – and quickly find followers. This explains the fact that there are so many lovers of avant-garde cookery in Stockholm. One of the hottest addresses is the restaurant F12 belonging to Danyel Couet, which is housed in a wing of the Academy of Arts. The name F12 suggests technical modernity, but it is simply an abbreviation of the address, Fredsgatan 12. A second meaning would, however, also apply just as well: Fantasy. Because this is to be found everywhere here, not just on the plates. The decor is in sympathy with the Scandinavian design of the 1970s, with lamps over the tables in the shape of champagne glasses, long comfortable settees and subdued lighting.

At the F12, the French-Swedish executive chef Couet has established a contemporary cuisine which is full of freshness and elegance. He has a masterly understanding of how to extract the quintessential flavour of any product, whether it comes from Sweden, France or Japan. All the ingredients merge brilliantly into a harmonious whole, without the combination looking artificial or deliberate in any way. He conjures traditional Swedish dishes such as liver with apples into a foie gras terrine with a glaze-like coating of apple gelée, accentuated by a dab of ginger sorbet.

Old-fashioned dishes offer a welcome provocation to Couet to deconstruct their shapes and colours and recreate them in a new guise. What is described on the menu simply as beetroot turns out to be a granita, refined with precious Iranian Osetra caviar and smoked eel. A glance at his repertoire is enough to show that Couet’s imagination knows almost no bounds: King prawns on a bed of lettuce and taioka, “Tom Kah Gai” – langoustine with coriander and chilli, ravioli filled with lemon and calamari, turbot with champagne gelée and an exquisite pigeon with apple and caviar.

No wonder then, with such scintillating creativity, that after ten years the F12 still remains at the spearhead of avant-garde cuisine in Sweden. But Couet can do other things too: Cosy, traditional and yet unusual and exciting. As well as the F12, which has been honoured with a Michelin star, Danyel Couet has also created the restaurant Grill with his business partner Melker Andersson – along with a unique concept. The interior decoration of the Grill changes every six months.

New interiors are constantly being developed in cooperation with the Swedish furniture manufacturer FOGIA. And there is also an unusual invitation to the restaurant: “Our living room is yours.” Or to be precise, in fact there are ten living rooms with an eating area, lounge and bar, all furnished differently. Five different grill cultures are on offer here: The open kitchen provides the crossover from the wooden oven, the American barbecue smoker, a French rotisserie or the coal grill. Version number five is located directly at the table, in the form of Asiatic table grills. After eating, you can make your way to the sofa where it feels … just like home.

From a "smutje" to a starred chef

Danyel Couet is also supported in the kitchen of the Ikarus by his chef de cuisine at F12, Paul Svensson, who looks back on a glittering career as well. He started as a chef with the Swedish navy, and then set about expanding his knowledge in all the starred kitchens of London, including a year in Marco Pierre White’s Quo Vadis in Soho. After a further year in Tuscany, in 1998 Svensson went back home to the starred restaurant Bon Lloc, where over the following eight years – including five in the position of head chef – he was to leave a permanent mark on the cooking tradition. Since 2006 he has been managing the culinary operations of the F12 together with Danyel Couet.