Gubbröra

Gubbröra, or Gentleman’s Delight, is a traditional Swedish dish which is great served as a canapé or light lunch.

And there’s a Swedish saying that can be translated into “a dear child has many names” (kärt barn har många namn). Some “dear children” seem to have a rather unnecessary amount of names—and gubbröra is one of them.

How many names can a simple egg and sprats salad deserve, anyway?

In the newspaper Svenska Dagbladet in March 1923, a reader writes about this dish, considering it “a familiar and generally appreciated dish on smörgåsbordet… whether it is followed by a shot [snaps] or not”. The reader, called C., has gathered 13 different names of the salad and asks whether there are any more.