Eating Off Duty with Fredrik Berselius

Originally from Stockholm, Sweden, Fredrik Berselius has spent most of his culinary career in New York City. He lived right by the forest as a child, which is where he developed a strong connection to nature—and that connection is now reflected throughout his menus.

"In the summer, we would pick berries and mushrooms and other wild edibles like most Swedes do," says Berselius. "If a neighbor had lots of apples during a particularly bountiful year, they would always share them with us and we'd enjoy them and preserve everything else. We always had preserves stored at any given time throughout the year. It's very Swedish." 

His mother was an excellent cook; Berselius says they always had dinner at home and rarely went out to eat at restaurants. For as much as cooking was a part of his childhood, Berselius thought he would become a professional snowboarder.

"I was [snowboarding] competitively. I didn't know a thing about the restaurant industry and never imagined I might one day become a chef, as much as I loved and appreciated good food."

It was through his sister Michaela that he had his first real glimpse into the industry. When Berselius was a teenager, she moved to London during the late '90s to study hospitality. She had several friends who worked with Alain Ducasse and Pierre Koffmann. Berselius's time spent in London visiting his sister opened his eyes to restaurant life. "I would listen to stories about cooking at [a high] level and all the pressure and excitement that came with it. It was like putting on a performance every night. I found it fascinating and it planted a seed."

He took on several kitchen jobs in London while applying to Central Saint Martins in the early 2000s to study art; when he didn't get into school, he "fell into cooking." For a bit of change, curiosity and to experience something different from Sweden, Berselius decided to move to New York City. He taught himself how to cook and went to the Natural Gourmet Institute in New York City where he studied nutrition. Berselius then started working his way through New York City restaurants like the now closed Italian restaurant Falai as chef de cuisine as well as MICHELIN-starred restaurants like Seasonal (closed), Aquavit and Per Se.

Berselius opened his first and now shuttered Frej in 2012, a pop-up in Williamsburg, with partner Richard Kuo. It was his take on affordable Scandinavian tasting menu during a time when money was tight.

Following Frej, Berselius opened Aska, Swedish for "ashes," in its original location in 2012, where he was recognized for bridging the culinary heritage of his upbringing with the immediate environs of his Brooklyn address. He has a small plot at a farm a few minutes away from the restaurant, where in the warmer months they grow much of the greens and herbs used at the restaurant on a daily basis. Most of their ingredients are sourced from other farms primarily in the Catskills area, Maine and other parts of the Northeast. Bladderwrack, or sea oak, is one of Aska's signature dishes, and is served with an emulsion of blue mussels and seasoned with a powder made from blue mussels cooked in vinegar, then dried.

"The flavor profile at Aska is primarily based on my growing up in Sweden, but the menu, in many ways, is a New York-driven menu. I look at similarities between New York and where I'm from—in the landscape, in the vegetables, in all the products that we use in the restaurant. When I create a menu, many of the courses somehow reflect back on memories of growing up in Sweden yet the ingredients are primarily from [New York]," says Berselius.

Within less than a year, Aska earned its first MICHELIN star.

Berselius decided to temporarily close the restaurant in 2014 to move to a bigger location near the edge of the Williamsburg Bridge. Aska reopened in the summer of 2016, and within only a few months was awarded two MICHELIN stars. Berselius's first cookbook, Aska, was released with Phaidon in the spring of 2018.

While he aims to build upon Aska, "We are always searching for ways we can grow and evolve, as a team and as a restaurant as a whole. In New York especially there is already a push to be at the forefront, to keep moving forward, so you must keep moving to remain relevant."