In the late 1980’s, I spent a few weeks in Sweden almost every Summer and had the delicious pleasure of tasting Smörgåstårta for the first time during one of the Midsummer celebrations. It’s very popular in Scandinavia and you see it served at just about any function. This delicious centerpiece is a layered sandwich cake with an assortment of different fillings which can include shrimp salad, smoked salmon, smoked eel, liver pate, caviar or caviar spread, very thinly sliced pieces of cold cuts, cucumber and tomatoes. This is the cold version but there is a warm version too that is layered and baked in the oven.
I was so impressed with how beautiful it was and also how versatile it is in feeding so many people. Since then, I have made it many times with different fillings depending on the crowd I am feeding and the things they enjoy. If it is a mostly European crowd, I usually stick to the Swedish version and serve it with some ice cold vodka or akvavit, but if I’m feeding my American friends, I generally try to include things like egg salad, cold cuts and assorted veggies, but anything goes really…
The ‘icing’ for the cake is a combination of cream cheese, sour cream and some homemade mayo. When you make the icing, make sure to keep it quite thick so that it stays on the cake and does not run down the sides. Once you have all of the components, this comes together in a flash. Then you can simply leave it in the fridge for a few hours until everyone arrives…
Traditionally rye bread or white bread is used, but I have also used alternating layers of white and wheat bread. Try to find an unsliced loaf of bread and slice it yourself lengthwise. This will yield a more sturdy product and will look nicer when you slice it. I happened to find some sliced club sandwich bread, trimmed the edges and laid the pieces of bread side by side. It’s not the ideal way, but it works. I prefer to mold mine in a rectangular shaped ice cream mold that I have, because it comes together much faster. I then chill it for an hour or so before I decorate it and then just leave it in the fridge until it’s time to serve. Today I used shrimp salad, egg salad, oven roasted tomatoes, red peppers and cucumbers. If you prefer to use all cold cuts, then by all means do that…if you prefer to make a vegan or vegetarian version, then that’s fine too.
The goal is to make something pretty and tasty that you can use as the centerpiece to your table. Mine is quite small, but take a look at some of the ones on this link …truly beautiful and delicious!
Smörgåstårta
I loaf of bread sliced lengthwise
Fillings of your choice
Double recipe homemade mayo
Thinly sliced cucumbers, cherry tomatoes (I used oven dried tomatoes), black or green olives, fresh dill
You can also use bib lettuce for garnish or micro greens
Savory Cream Cheese icing
3-8oz packages cream cheese
4-6 tablespoons homemade mayo to taste
1 ½- 2 cups very thick sour cream, like Daisy brand
Begin by preparing all of the fillings you would like to use. I used egg salad and shrimp salad. For this particular size, I used 4 hard boiled eggs and a few tablespoons of the homemade mayo. For the shrimp salad I used about 1 ½ cups of the very tiny shrimp and a few tablespoons of mayo…nothing difficult at all. Then I made the savory icing by adding the cream cheese to the bowl of my stand mixer and creaming it until smooth. I slowly added the sour cream and scraped down the sides of the bowl each time. Last I added the homemade mayo…you can add a little more mayo of you like, but remember it should not be too runny. Feel free to add other spices to compliment your fillings if you like.
Next, if you have found an unsliced loaf of bread, then slice it lengthwise and trim off the crusts. Place it on your serving dish and begin layering.
I used an ice cream mold that I have, which made the process much easier. As you can see, I put the ‘icing’ in a pastry bag and piped a wall of it around the bread and then added the fillings. I only had slices of bread which I lay side by side for each layer.
I finished layering the whole thing and then decorated the top with some oven dried tomatoes that I had made the night before along with some shrimp, cucumbers and dill.
If you are using a mold, allow it to chill in the mold for about an hour and then remove from the mold, decorate the top and place back in the refrigerator until service.
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