While skiing Vasaloppet, your body uses up nearly 8,000 kcal, which corresponds to nearly four normal days’ energy intake. Skiing Vasaloppet is a great effort and it can also be tough on the stomach. Ekström’s blueberry soup is a perfect perfect fit for Vasaloppet, as the soup gives energy while also being soothing to the stomach. Blueberries contain a lot of antioxidants that protect the cells in the body and help keep us healthy. The antioxidants in blueberries are particularly good for eyesight and new research suggests that blueberries can help lower cholesterol, according to Orkla Foods Sweden, manufactures of Ekströms.
The Ekströms brand has a long history that spans more than a century and a half, and they have launched many products that Swedish households see as real classics today. The company Ekströms started in Örebro as early as 1848, though at that time the company did not sell food, but rather moustache wax, boot wax and ink. Since 1995, the Ekströms brand has been part of Procordia Food AB, which changed its name to Orkla Foods Sverige AB in January 2014. Ekströms has been a royal court supplier and today Orkla Foods Sweden is the court supplier of the Ekströms brand to Carl XVI Gustaf.
Since 1958, Ekström’s blueberry soup has been served in Vasaloppet. From 1966 to 1995, the phrase ”Ekströms Blåbär” was even on the Vasaloppet number bibs. (In 1995, Ekström’s Nypon, meaning rose hip, was written on the ladies’ number bibs in Vasaloppet.)
This classic Vasaloppet soup is made by Ekströms from dried blueberries, freeze-dried and powder: These are freeze-dried blueberries from the EU (Vaccinium myrtillus L.), as well as blueberry powder from the EU (Vaccinium myrtillus L.) and North America (Vaccinium angustifolium). Blueberries, incidentally, cover about 11 percent of Sweden’s forested land area.
In Sweden, the word blueberry has come to be used generally for a beginner or amateur, first recorded in writing in 1955. However, according to the Swedish Language Council, it is unknown who coined the term.
Gustav Vasa used the word blueberry in a derogatory sense as early as 1542. He spoke of privileges ”wij icke till eth Blåber achte”, meaning not to pay blueberries any heed, similar to a modern Swdish saying of ”not being worth a rotten lingonberry”.’
Each participant in Vasaloppet’s Winter Week drinks an average of just over 0.6 litres of blueberry soup. Even in the summer, of course, blueberry soup is served in the Vasaloppet Arena.
The page was updated 2022-10-17
