Smorgasbord

Literally translated from Swedish, smorgasbord means “buttered bread board.” It came to mean a table filled with an assortment of cold hors d’oeuvres, including sandwiches; cheese; cold cuts; pickled, smoked, cured, or salted fish; meatballs; potato salad; breads; and many other delicacies.

The smorgasbord tradition was brought to the United States by Swedish immigrants at the turn of the twentieth century. The first cookbook published in the United States that had “smorgasbord” in the title was Inga Norberg’s Good Food from Sweden, Including the Smörgåsbord (1939). Smorgasbord did not become a popular part of the American food scene until the 1950s. It was adopted, at least in name, by some “all you can eat” restaurants, and numerous cookbooks have been published on how to prepare and serve smorgasbord dishes. Today, smorgasbord can be a bountiful prelude to a meal, or it can be a meal in itself. American smorgasbord frequently includes hot dishes as well as the traditional cold ones.