Swedish · appetizer

Västerbottensostpaj (Västerbotten Cheese Pie)

Name: Västerbottensostpaj (Västerbotten Cheese Pie)
Prep time: 1 h 9 min
Total time: 1 h 54 min
Cuisine: Swedish
Ingredients: all-purpose flour — 150 g; cold butter — 100 g; salt — 3 g; water — 30 g; västerbottensost — 250 g; eggs — 300 g; heavy cream — 200 g; regular milk — 100 g; ground white pepper — 1 g; freshly grated nutmeg — 1 g; bleak roe — 50 g; creme fraiche — 60 g; red onion — 30 g

Västerbottensostpaj (Västerbotten Cheese Pie) reads richness 6.5, umami 4.6 and salinity 4.3 on Palate's 0–10 flavor X-ray — a Swedish appetizer, about 1 hr 54 min. Measured from the recipe itself: ingredients and technique.

The flavor X-ray — six axes, 0–10

Umami & Savory — 5.5 / 10
Sweet & Fruity — 1.8 / 10
Sour & Bright — 3.1 / 10
Bitter & Earthy — 0.6 / 10
Rich & Fat — 7.1 / 10
Aromatic & Spice — 2.1 / 10

The measured notes (of 18)

Richness 6.5 · Umami 4.6 · Salinity 4.3 · Sourness 3.1 · Marine & Briny 3.0 · Allium 1.9 · Nutty 1.9 · Warm Spice 1.7 · Sweetness 1.6 · Funk & Ferment 1.6 · Heat 0.7 · Bitterness 0.6 · Floral 0.5 · Fruity 0.5

What's in it (13)

all-purpose flour — 150 g
cold butter — 100 g
salt — 3 g
water — 30 g
västerbottensost — 250 g
eggs — 300 g
heavy cream — 200 g
regular milk — 100 g
ground white pepper — 1 g
freshly grated nutmeg — 1 g
bleak roe — 50 g
creme fraiche — 60 g
red onion — 30 g

Time & effort: about 1 hr 54 min (1 hr 9 min active) · effort: involved

Nutrition (per 100 g, engine-estimated): 218.2 kcal, 7.5 g protein, 14.6 g fat, 14.4 g carbs

Dietary: Contains meat · Contains seafood · Contains dairy · Contains egg — engine-derived; double-check anything allergy-critical.

How it's cooked (8 steps)

Rub the flour, cold butter and salt together with your fingertips until the mixture looks like coarse breadcrumbs with some flat flakes of butter still visible, about 4 minutes. Add the ice water and press the dough together — do not knead it.
Press the dough evenly into a 24 cm loose-bottomed tart tin, up the sides as well as across the base, and chill it 30 minutes. Pressing rather than rolling suits this dough, which is short and will tear if you fight it.
Heat the oven to 200°C. Line the chilled case with paper and baking beans and blind bake 15 minutes, then remove the paper and beans and bake 5 minutes more, until the base looks dry and sandy.
Beat the eggs with the cream, milk, white pepper and nutmeg. Add no salt: Västerbottensost brings all of it.
Scatter the grated cheese over the warm base and pour the custard over it. Västerbottensost is a hard cow's milk cheese made at a single dairy in Burträsk and matured at least fourteen months; it is granular, sharp and faintly bitter, and the pie is named after it. A young Gruyère or a Cheddar makes a perfectly nice cheese tart, but it is not this dish, so order the real cheese from a Scandinavian grocer.
Lower the oven to 175°C and bake 30 to 35 minutes, until the custard is set at the edge and has only the faintest wobble at the centre. Overbaked, it weeps and turns grainy.
Rest the pie 15 minutes before cutting — it needs to firm up, and it is better warm than hot.
Serve each wedge with a spoonful of crème fraîche, a spoonful of bleak roe and a scatter of red onion. This is the standard opening course at a Swedish crayfish party in August.

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Keep reading: what richness, umami, salinity mean in the flavor lexicon · the world's cuisines, by flavor.

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Every number above is Palate's engine-measured estimate, computed from this recipe's ingredients and techniques — not human-tasted ratings or reviews.