A box of mac 'n cheese costs 8-9 USD depending on the exchange rate. <gasp> Though it has never been my thing, few would argue that Kraft's mac 'n cheese is a staple, and yes, the cheesiest. A while back I wrote about the convenience store-like selection of American goods at the big nearby supermarket.
I have seen this same selection, including the bizarre selection of generic brand items from U.S.stores I have never been frequented. That's the American food that some people here think that Americans want to eat. Then Dave and I got to talking and wondered what sort of American foods are everywhere here, and which ones get labeled American.
Philadelphia cream cheese is everywhere here. The plain stuff, the light stuff, the flavored stuff. Every grocery store has it, and the bagel cafe down the street advertises that they use Philly. This is also one of the only places in Stockholm where we have managed to get a relatively decent bagel.
Then we started noticing something for sale in the supermarkets and hot dog stands around the city:Bostongurka. Gurka means cucumber (or pickle), and Bostongurka is sweet relish. Why Boston? Your guess is as good as mine. Turns out the stuff was "invented" by a Swedish company based on a Hungarian recipe, at least according to the wikipedia entry.
We started wondering what other foods might be labeled as American delicacies or staples. And then, today at the store, we stumbled upon this new product with a prominent advertisement in the supermarket:
Sure, they don't say that this is an American product but they do decorate it like it is and it isn't called Johan's hamburgare sauce. I was willing to accept a similar older product of theirs as American dressing, some version of a fastfood secret sauce. But, bernaise? Given how much bernaise sauce they put on food here, and the fact that they sell tons of it in the supermarkets, it should be called Johan's or Anders' or Björn's bernaise.
