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I finally picked up a frozen bag of the famed IKEA meatballs about a year ago. As a Swedish meatball enthusiast, I was excited to try them, but honestly they we

by floren 4y ago

I finally picked up a frozen bag of the famed IKEA meatballs about a year ago. As a Swedish meatball enthusiast, I was excited to try them, but honestly they were pretty disgusting--spongy, weird texture, bad flavor. Are the ones served in the cafeteria different? My mother makes them every Christmas, just using ground pork and a packet of premixed seasoning, and they are far superior. To really go to the next level, https://www.themeateater.com/cook/recipes/wild-game-meatballs-recipe https://www.themeateater.com/cook/recipes/wild-game-meatball... is a solid recipe that works well with ground elk meat or pork sausage. All the meatballs I ate when I visited Sweden were fine, of course, it's just that IKEA's were bad.

Xevi 4y ago
I'm a Swede so I think I'm qualified to answer this. Yes the meatballs served at IKEA fits your description. They are really low quality meatballs.
- anitil 4y ago
  Do you have a recipe you can recommend? I'd love to try making some fresh
  - ninjin 4y ago
    I feel like every Swedish family has a recipe of their own that is passed down and gently modified by each generation. Here is a link to a good “baseline” which aligns very well with my family one if you remove the sugar [1]. It is in Swedish though, but translation engines tend to do a good job with “simple” text like recipes. [1]: https://www.ica.se/recept/klassiska-kottbullar-712807 https://www.ica.se/recept/klassiska-kottbullar-712807 (Swedish) Now, I prefer to have them with boiled potatoes (some prefer mashed), lingonberries (not lingonberry jam though, just boiled gently with a tiny touch of sugar and leave the berries intact if you can), pickles (we have a family recipe for that as well), and of course creamy “brunsås” gravy. Here is a baseline recipe for the gravy [2], I have never used butter myself though and make sure to make it after the meatballs so that you can use whatever flavour you have left in the frying pan as additional stock for the sauce (this is not mentioned in the recipe – despite it being gravy – and should also remove the need to add salt and pepper). I also prefer to make the gravy thick and sticky, so that it will stick to the boiled potatoes if you want to go down that route. [2]: https://www.ica.se/recept/brunsas-720341 https://www.ica.se/recept/brunsas-720341 (Swedish) Happy cooking!
    - anitil 4y ago
      Thankyou!
- nisse72 4y ago
  I seem to recall they used to serve Scan meatballs (well known Swedish brand) but outsourced to someone else a few years ago as a cost saving measure. Or maybe that was just in Sweden, no idea really. I used to occasionally visit the IKEA near the Sydney airport to get sweets and biscuits from home, but last time I was there it was all home-brand stuff, not quite the same as I was hoping for. As for the meatballs, these days I just make my own and freeze them. Homemade are always better anyway.
smoldesu 4y ago
I mostly ate it for the gravy, which was pretty solid. The meatballs themselves were fine; their only saving grace was that you could get quite a few of them for a reasonable price, which made them attractive after checking out 50 models of bedroom furniture for 2 and a half hours.
robonerd 4y ago
> spongy, weird texture, bad flavor. That describes every store bought frozen meatball I've ever had, sponginess particularly. But if I make meatballs myself and freeze them, they come out fine. Something about the way factories make meatballs just isn't right.
- prawn 4y ago
  Is it likely to be extra breadcrumbs or similar used as a bulking agent, but with an increased ratio to cut costs?
thematrixturtle 4y ago
Having eaten at IKEAs on four continents, the meatballs are prepared (semi-)locally and have wide variation in taste and texture. The ones in Australia, for example, used to be quite good until they loudly trumpeted a price reduction, probably achieved by replacing most of the meat with cardboard. In Singapore, on the other hand, I'm pretty sure one of the local extra ingredients is soy sauce.

by floren 4y ago

Xevi 4y ago

I'm a Swede so I think I'm qualified to answer this. Yes the meatballs served at IKEA fits your description. They are really low quality meatballs.

anitil 4y ago
Do you have a recipe you can recommend? I'd love to try making some fresh
- ninjin 4y ago
  I feel like every Swedish family has a recipe of their own that is passed down and gently modified by each generation. Here is a link to a good “baseline” which aligns very well with my family one if you remove the sugar [1]. It is in Swedish though, but translation engines tend to do a good job with “simple” text like recipes. [1]: https://www.ica.se/recept/klassiska-kottbullar-712807 https://www.ica.se/recept/klassiska-kottbullar-712807 (Swedish) Now, I prefer to have them with boiled potatoes (some prefer mashed), lingonberries (not lingonberry jam though, just boiled gently with a tiny touch of sugar and leave the berries intact if you can), pickles (we have a family recipe for that as well), and of course creamy “brunsås” gravy. Here is a baseline recipe for the gravy [2], I have never used butter myself though and make sure to make it after the meatballs so that you can use whatever flavour you have left in the frying pan as additional stock for the sauce (this is not mentioned in the recipe – despite it being gravy – and should also remove the need to add salt and pepper). I also prefer to make the gravy thick and sticky, so that it will stick to the boiled potatoes if you want to go down that route. [2]: https://www.ica.se/recept/brunsas-720341 https://www.ica.se/recept/brunsas-720341 (Swedish) Happy cooking!
  - anitil 4y ago
    Thankyou!
nisse72 4y ago
I seem to recall they used to serve Scan meatballs (well known Swedish brand) but outsourced to someone else a few years ago as a cost saving measure. Or maybe that was just in Sweden, no idea really. I used to occasionally visit the IKEA near the Sydney airport to get sweets and biscuits from home, but last time I was there it was all home-brand stuff, not quite the same as I was hoping for. As for the meatballs, these days I just make my own and freeze them. Homemade are always better anyway.

smoldesu 4y ago

I mostly ate it for the gravy, which was pretty solid. The meatballs themselves were fine; their only saving grace was that you could get quite a few of them for a reasonable price, which made them attractive after checking out 50 models of bedroom furniture for 2 and a half hours.

robonerd 4y ago

> spongy, weird texture, bad flavor. That describes every store bought frozen meatball I've ever had, sponginess particularly. But if I make meatballs myself and freeze them, they come out fine. Something about the way factories make meatballs just isn't right.

prawn 4y ago
Is it likely to be extra breadcrumbs or similar used as a bulking agent, but with an increased ratio to cut costs?

thematrixturtle 4y ago

Having eaten at IKEAs on four continents, the meatballs are prepared (semi-)locally and have wide variation in taste and texture. The ones in Australia, for example, used to be quite good until they loudly trumpeted a price reduction, probably achieved by replacing most of the meat with cardboard. In Singapore, on the other hand, I'm pretty sure one of the local extra ingredients is soy sauce.