Semlor

The story

The semla is a cardamom-scented wheat bun with its top cut off, filled with almond paste and whipped cream and dusted with powdered sugar. Its day is fettisdagen, Shrove Tuesday, the last Tuesday before Lent, which falls on February 9, 2027. The name comes from the Latin simila, fine wheat flour. According to the grocery chain ICA, Swedes have eaten an older form before Lent since the Middle Ages: the hetvägg, a bun served in a bowl of warm milk, a habit some people keep today. In the 1800s the bun came to be called fastlagsbulle or fettisdagsbulle, and the version with almond paste and whipped cream spread in the 20th century. King Adolf Fredrik is said to have died in 1771 after eating 14 hetväggar. In 1952 bakers in Malmö were fined for selling semlor before Christmas, yet today Swedish bakeries sell them from January, sometimes even December, until Easter. ICA estimates that Swedes eat around 50 million semlor in a season, about 6 million of them on Shrove Tuesday alone. Bake the buns a day ahead or pull them from the freezer, then fill them within an hour of serving, while the cream is cold.