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Lördagsgodis (Saturday Sweets)
- 0points 1y agoThis is mostly a historic thing. Kids and adults alike today in Scandinavia eat candy whenever they like it. Popular stuff today include - extra large energy drinks (65 cl) - candy tasting vapes and snus
- nxpnsv 1y agoAs a swedish parent i see most parents still restrict kids candy only on Saturday. And parents rarely give their kids sodas and never vapes. Perhaps my observation would differ if my kids were in their later teens…
- black_knight 1y agoI would say that restricting kids to having candy on Saturday or special occasions is still very common in Sweden and Norway. I would expect reactions from other parents if a parent said they let their kids eat candy any day.
- Ma8ee 1y agoNot at all. My wife and I, living in Sweden, are practicing it today with our kids (5 and 8 years old), and my impression is that most families around us do the same. Energy drinks, vapes and snus might be popular among teenagers, but has there ever been a time when you have been able to control what teenagers do to any higher degree.
- triyambakam 1y agoInteresting how well known Sweden seems to be in the world for its population; many countries with way more people but not popular like Sweden. I learned Swedish because I think its cool. Would love to learn other languages with even more speakers but Sweden has so much media and resources it's so easy.
- brabel 1y agoThey’ve got good jeans! Sorry just joking. They were big proponents of Eugenics before Hitler found out about it. But let’s be honest, a land of blondes is much more likely to be given media attention. Just like a war in Ukraine is a lot more talked about than a war in Sudan or Yemen. At least in the Western world.
- mrmlz 1y agoOr you know - the myriad of world changing inventions, Nobel prize, insane amount of popular music, musicians and producers. But yeah keep focusing on skincolor :)
- cess11 1y agoI think most people would consider the Myrdal couple winners in the battle regarding eugenics, which were proponents of a strain of thought they called 'social hygiene' that was the main opposition to the eugenicists. One outcome was that the social democrats started to financially strangle the eugenicist institutions. Swedish diplomats and politicians did quite a bit in international politics during large portions of the 1900s, and the country spawned some quite successful corporations and innovations. Dag Hammarskjöld, Folke Bernadotte, Nobel dynamite, Ericsson telecom, things like that.
- simonask 1y agoThe same concept exists in Danish (lørdagsslik), and I had no idea it had such a dark history. 1959 is surprisingly recent for conducting medical experiments on people without their informed consent - one of the most horrifying things imaginable, in my opinion.
- tephra 1y agoI can highly recommend the radio documentary https://www.sverigesradio.se/avsnitt/vipeholmsanstalten-min-farbrors-hjarna-del-1 https://www.sverigesradio.se/avsnitt/vipeholmsanstalten-min-... it's horrifying (in Swedish of course but hopefully more understandable to a Dane than Danish [to my own detriment and sorrow] is to us Swedes).
- simonask 1y agoThanks, I’ll check it out! And don’t worry - the secret is to just spend a few hours actually trying with native speakers, and ideally some beers, and suddenly it will click. It goes both ways, and only takes a tiny bit of practice in my experience. :-)
- fuglede_ 1y agoI have lived in several parts of Denmark and never once encountered the notion of "lørdagsslik"; that concept sounds completely absurd and laughable. No, in every place I have stayed, kids would only ever have fredagsslik (Friday goodies), to be consumed while watching FredagsTamTam (https://www.dr.dk/drtv/serie/fredagstamtam_357146 https://www.dr.dk/drtv/serie/fredagstamtam_357146).
- simonask 1y agoI think it moved to Friday some time in the 90s.
- MrJagil 1y agoBig in denmark too. My parents always used it as a way to regulate our candy-intake, by postponing all candy until the weekend, so i’m surprised to read the intention was sort of the opposite. I’d also note that Scandinavia is big on “hygge” and being home (unlike countries with warmer climates) and weekend snacks and sweets are an obvious way to make the experience comfy.
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- 4gotunameagain 1y agoThis is one of the things I never understood about Nordic countries. Most of the people are so considerate about what they eat, good ingredients, nice compositions, making it look pretty as well.. ..and then they proceed to shove great amounts of that chemical sugary shit down their throats !
- rasse 1y agoAs a matter of fact, even the good ingredients are 100% chemical.
- boxed 1y agoAs a matter of fact, all ingredients are 100% chemical.
- bravesoul2 1y agoBaryonic diets huh. I've been on one my whole life. With a sprinkle of neutrinos, of course.
- nxpnsv 1y agoI think it mostly isn’t great amounts…
- Alifatisk 1y agoUsing chemicals isn't always a bad thing, I wish people wasn't that scared when they see the word. It is sugary shit though, but Swedish candies are commonly made with natural ingredients, such as plant-based colorings, fruit juice concentrates, and fewer artificial dyes and additives
- 4gotunameagain 1y agoI don't know, after reading about UPF I'm starting to avoid as many chemicals as possible.
- vincnetas 1y ago"and then they proceed to shove great amounts of that chemical sugary shit down their throats" Where do you get that? Is eating normal (whatever that means) amount of candies only on Saturday is triggering you to do such out of proportion comparisons?
- valdiorn 1y agoIceland has this too, Laugardagsnammi :) Go to Hagkaup or Samkaup on a Saturday (or just after midnight on Friday night, where you'll usually bump into a gaggle of teenagers in their pajama bottoms, out on a candy run) and get yourself a massive bag of pick'n'mix for half price. It's one of the few things I miss about Iceland. the pick n mix bars can get pretty huge: https://yummy-iceland.blogspot.com/2025/06/nammidagur.html https://yummy-iceland.blogspot.com/2025/06/nammidagur.html I remember as a kid, I'd get 100 kronur (probably about $3 USD in today's money) on Saturday morning and go to the store to buy sweets. You'd meticulously choose which items to put in the bag to make sure you got the best value for money :)
- web64 1y agoHere is an article in Norwegian that goes a bit deeper into the grotesque history behind the tradition of saturday sweets: https://www.nrk.no/kultur/xl/lordagsgodt-er-typisk-norsk-og-historien-bak-er-grotesk-1.16835728 https://www.nrk.no/kultur/xl/lordagsgodt-er-typisk-norsk-og-...
- cess11 1y agoHere's an article in english about the experiments: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vipeholm_experiments https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vipeholm_experiments
- boxed 1y agoYou mean the grotesque experiments that lead to the scientific knowledge that in turn lead to lördagsgodis. The distinction is pretty important.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- fleebee 1y agoThe intention was to prevent tooth decay by regulating candy intake. But it turns out that mandating a special weekly(!) day for candy consumption had the opposite effect. Children are naturally interested in things that are forbidden from them, and so when the restrictions are lifted they tend to eat large amounts of candy. Furthermore, restrictions and rules are not a good way of teaching moderation. Practices like Saturday candy facilitate an unhealthy relationship with food, which is why it's not longer a recommendation in Finland -- I'm not sure about the other Nordics.
- Ma8ee 1y agoChildren are naturally interested in sweets! You don't need to make them forbidden for that. And just you are allowed to eat sweets only one day of the week doesn't mean that they are allowed to unlimited amounts of it, and, in my experience, interested to overeat it. Why would it foster an unhealthy relationship with food to learn that some things are unhealthy and eaten only at special occasions? An unhealthy relationship with food would rather be to think that you can eat sweets whenever you feel for it.
- imp0cat 1y agoMy limited experience seems to suggest the same thing the op wrote. The more your hide something from kids, the more they crave it. If there is no limit, they will eventually get bored of it.
- Ma8ee 1y agoI guess that's why American kids never eat junk food or drink soda instead of water. I'm sure the 35% of the US population that are obese will get tired of eating badly any day now.
- cristea 1y ago"Lørdagsgodteri" here in Norway was always restricted though. I read your comment as if kids have unlimited access to candy, which I have never heard of. The idea is that the parents give the kids the amount of candy allowed, and they only do that in saturdays.
- impossiblefork 1y agoI too used to eat this. Some of the traditional candies aren't so sweet, but they're sweet enough and these days sugar is for the loon, so you can't really eat candy. I guess I still eat pastries though, including prinsessbakelse.
- TrackerFF 1y agoWhen I grew up (Norway), the portions were quite small. And we didn't have that big of a selection. If you go to the super market today in Norway, you'll likely find tens to hundreds of different flavors. Same in Sweden and Denmark. Interestingly enough, I don't think this kind of candy ("smågodt", which you buy by the weight) is too popular elsewhere? At least I haven't seen it too much in convenience stores when I've been traveling or living abroad. In Norway it is ubiquitous, almost everywhere you go shopping. Also, inflation has really hit chocolate hard here. One small bar of chocolate will easily cost 30-40 NOK, which is equivalent to around €3-€4. The big bars can cost up to €6! But he smågodt / pick'n mix prices have remained quite stable. So a lot of people will just buy chocolate off those. Much, much cheaper.
- christkv 1y agoSuper popular in Spain. We got tons of candy stores that sell by weight. You actually find less candy in super markets.
- MrGilbert 1y agoIn Germany, that‘s usually part of the "Kiosk"-Culture. You can select an assortment of candy for a fixed price (say, 3€), and the owner will ask you what you want and pick it for you in a small bag. At least that was the way it worked when I was younger, some 25-ish years ago.
- flanked-evergl 1y agoWhere I grew up, candy by weight was also popular, but as we seized being a high trust society it just no longer worked and the supermarkets stopped selling candy by weight. The same thing will happen in Norway. Not sure I get why it's a good thing to not have high trust societies but it's been decided that we can't have that anymore. Maybe it reduces obesity … thought that was somehow also less of a problem before.
- tasuki 1y agoCandy-by-weight is available in most supermarkets in Poland, but I've never seen it in the Czech Republic. Perhaps the Baltic states have it too? Or Germany?
- freilanzer 1y ago> ... patients of Vipeholm Hospital for the intellectually disabled in Lund, Sweden, were unknowingly fed large amounts of sweets to see whether a high-sugar diet would cause tooth decay. Nice.