For Gareth Baty, cooking starts long before he picks up a knife or turns on a stove.
In the latest episode of A Moment in the Nordics, the MasterChef: The Professionals winner tells Off The Map Travel CEO Jonny Cooper that he can “taste” food in his mind, mentally working through ingredients, flavours and combinations before he begins to cook.
It is an approach that helps explain why Gareth is so inspired by cooking outside the traditional restaurant environment.
During his time in northern Sweden, inspiration came from the landscape itself. A visit to Grön Marknad in Gunnarsbyn introduced him to local produce, foraging with Eva Gunnare opened up the flavours growing wild in the surrounding countryside, and cooking beside the river with chef Magnus brought everything together.
Rather than simply arriving with a dish already planned, Gareth talks about responding to where he is, what is growing and what is available around him.
That relationship between food and place runs throughout the conversation.
Finding inspiration in northern Sweden
Gareth’s trip began with a visit to Grön Marknad in Gunnarsbyn, where local ingredients and producers offered a glimpse into the food culture of northern Sweden.
It is a different way of approaching cooking. Instead of deciding on a menu first and sourcing ingredients afterwards, the landscape and season begin to shape the dish.
For Gareth, being somewhere new can completely change the way he thinks about food.
He describes how flavours begin forming in his mind before he starts cooking. An ingredient might suggest another flavour, which leads to another idea, until a dish starts taking shape mentally.
Put him in the forests of northern Sweden and suddenly there is an entirely new collection of flavours to work with.
Foraging with Eva Gunnare
Foraging with Eva Gunnare took that connection with the landscape even further.
Walking through the countryside becomes a lesson in looking more closely at what is growing around you. Plants, herbs and berries that could easily be overlooked become ingredients, each bringing a different flavour and story.
It is this direct relationship with food that makes cooking in the Nordics particularly interesting.
The ingredients have not travelled far. Often, they are growing only metres away.
For Gareth, that creates another layer of inspiration. He is not simply cooking with an ingredient. He is experiencing where it came from.
Cooking beside the river
One of the standout moments of the trip was cooking outdoors beside the river with chef Magnus.
There was no restaurant kitchen and no need for one.
The forest, river and ingredients became part of the experience.
Gareth talks in the podcast about preferring to cook in places that inspire him, rather than always working within the confines of a restaurant.
Change the surroundings and you change the way you think.
More importantly, the experience did not end beside the river. The ingredients, ideas and flavours Gareth explored during his time in northern Sweden became the inspiration for a new Signature Dish at Arctic Retreat. It means future guests staying at Arctic Retreat can experience a taste of Gareth’s journey for themselves, with a dish shaped by the landscape, local ingredients and the time he spent cooking in this part of Sweden.
It creates a lasting connection between the trip and the place. What began with a market visit, a walk through the forest and an outdoor cooking session has become something that will remain part of the Arctic Retreat experience.
It is also a reminder that some of the best food experiences when travelling are not necessarily the most formal ones. A meal cooked beside a river, surrounded by the landscape that produced many of its ingredients, can stay with you long after you have forgotten a conventional restaurant table.
Memories of Christmas in Sweden
Northern Sweden also has a much more personal meaning for Gareth.
During the conversation, he reminisces about Christmases spent at his mother’s cabin in the north of Sweden.
Those memories add another dimension to the way he talks about food.
Taste has an extraordinary ability to take us back somewhere. A flavour or smell can immediately recall a family meal, a childhood Christmas or a place you have not visited for years.
For Gareth, cooking appears closely connected with those memories.
It is perhaps why his time in northern Sweden feels less like a chef simply visiting a destination and more like a return to somewhere that already means something to him.
Throughout the episode, food, landscape and memory continually overlap.
A market provides the ingredients. The forest offers another flavour. A river becomes a kitchen. A childhood Christmas becomes part of the story behind a dish. And that journey now lives on at Arctic Retreat, where future guests will be able to experience Gareth’s Signature Dish for themselves.
Before any of it reaches the plate, Gareth can already taste it in his mind.
Listen to the latest episode of A Moment in the Nordics as Jonny Cooper talks to Gareth Baty about food, travel, creativity and the places that inspire him to cook.
Link to listen on Apple Podcasts – LINK
Link to listen on Spotify – LINK
Link to listen on YouTube – LINK
