15 Unskippable IKEA Foods

I love, love, love Ikea, but I hate flat-pack furniture. In fact, I only own maybe one or two Ikea pieces, plus an assortment of tchotchkes like cute coffee cups and stuffed animals. So why, you might ask, do I even patronize the big box store? My one-word answer: Food. The restaurant is one of my favorites, and even when I'm not in the mood for meatballs, I can relax on a couch while enjoying a cup of coffee (free for Ikea Family rewards members!) and a slice of cake. The bistro also makes for a fun, quick stop for a super-cheap hot dog (less expensive than Costco's, and you don't have to pay a membership fee). No trip to Ikea would be complete without a swing through the Swedish food market to pick up some take-home goodies. (Ikea may intend its food to lure you into spending more on furniture, but ha! I'm just buying more food.)

Over the years, I've eaten my way through most of the menu items, some of which, alas, are no longer available. Ikea, if you're reading this, please bring back the räksmörgås shrimp sandwich! Certain classics, however, tend to stick around — you know those meatballs aren't going anywhere, and neither are the cinnamon buns. New items, too, join the lineup from time to time, and of course, I have to check those out, too. The following constitutes a list of currently available must-try items from Ikea's restaurant and bistro. As a bonus, it's followed by a few of my food market picks.

I'm not a huge fan of IHOP-style pancakes — too thick, too floury, and drowning in sweet toppings. Ikea's pancakes are the antidote to all that, since they're thin, almost crepe-like, and are served with nothing more than a small blop of sweet-tart lingonberry jam — that's all they really need. They're not available as a stand-alone item but come two on a plate when you order the breakfast plate with pancakes. This is currently priced at $5.99 and also comes with a scoop of scrambled eggs, two strips of bacon, and a small pile of fried potato cubes, all of which are quite tasty. Before you set out on a Swedish pancake quest, though, there's one thing you need to be aware: Breakfast is only served from opening time until 11 a.m., and stores that open at 11 don't serve it at all.

What is there to say about Ikea's meatballs that hasn't been said countless times before? They may well be the main reason why many of us in the United States are even aware that meatballs exist outside the context of spaghetti and marinara sauce. While I am quite fond of the meaty meatballs, I can't really speak to the plant ones, but Redditors seem to find them pretty tasty. At $10.49 for 12 balls plus mashed potatoes, peas, and lingonberry jam, they're also slightly less expensive than the carnivore version ($11.49). While the more vegetable-forward veggie balls no longer feature as a restaurant entree, frozen ones are still available in the food market.

The latest addition to Ikea's spherically-shaped lineup is one of the cheapest deals you'll find at a sit-down chain restaurant outside of happy hour — eight falafel balls plus a side of vegetable couscous for just $4.99! The falafel itself is vegan, and the garlic aioli that comes on the side is reported to be plant-based, as well. Both of these items, however, still appeal to picky, vegetable-hating me, and I'm generally not a fan of plant-based meat and dairy substitutes. At this price (less than half that of a meatball plate), I'll definitely be ordering the falafel balls again. Not only are they fresh and flavorful, but I also prefer the lighter side of couscous to the mashed potatoes I never finish and the peas I never eat at all.

Another budget option at the Ikea restaurant is the pasta with marinara, which gets my endorsement despite my being a spaghetti snob. (I learned from my Italian great aunt how to make a mean marinara.) The sauce is sweeter and tangier than anything you'd find in an Italian restaurant, but it somehow works perfectly with chunky cavatappi pasta. Admittedly the portion is rather small, but it's only $2.99. If you add on a few pieces of garlic bread (something that doesn't feature on the online menu but is generally available at the restaurants), you'll have a satisfyingly starchy mini-meal with room left over for cake.

Egg salad, admittedly, is not the most exciting sandwich filling, but sometimes it just hits right. Ikea's $3.99 egg salad sandwich includes a generous scoop of the stuff along with crunchy salad greens for texture, all on a hearty slice of wheat bread. Paired with a bag of Festligt potato chips and a lingonberry soda, it makes the perfect quick comfort meal.

Ikea's Stockholm salad is one of my all-time favorites, and it's something I've been known to order alongside another entree because I can't bear to pass it up when I see it sitting pretty behind the glass doors. This $7.99 salad consists of several slices of marinated gravlax-style salmon, alongside a small pile of spring greens and a scoop of potato salad. I'll admit I'm not crazy about the too-sweet honey mustard dressing, but this can easily be remedied by mixing in the juice from a few extra lemon wedges snagged from the condiment bar.

When the Stockholm salad is unavailable at the Ikea restaurant, I comfort my broken heart with a winter salad of lettuce topped with chickpeas, dried cranberries, and parmesan cheese. (Also cucumbers and bell peppers, but these are less of a selling point for me). It's not quite a standalone meal, but it's heartier than a side salad. At $4.99, it can be paired with garlic bread or perhaps a plate of pasta and, of course, a dessert.

Dessert is one thing I hardly ever skip at Ikea. Few restaurants, after all, allow you to enjoy a reasonably sized slice of cake with coffee served in the platonic ideal of a mug. (I kind of have a thing about Ikea coffee cups.) Not to mention, here you can do it while lounging on a sofa, which is as close to sybaritic splendor as you'll get in a suburban box store.  The chocolate cake is nearly always in stock (at least at my Ikea), and with its chocolate cream filling and ganache topping, it's as rich and delicious as chocolate cake ought to be. It's perhaps a little pricey at $5.49 a slice, but then, it is one of Ikea's larger desserts and can last through at least two cups of (free!) coffee.

For something a little lighter, smaller, and slightly more out of the ordinary, I sometimes opt for Ikea's $2.39 Swedish apple cake. Here in the U.S, apple cake isn't all that common, since we're more likely to use the fruit in pies and pastries. Ikea's cake is actually kind of pie-ish, come to think of it, since it has a bottom crust, a cinnamon-flavored filling with chunks of apple, and a streusel-type topping. Whatever you call it, though, it's absolutely delicious, and even better with coffee. (Or tea, which is also free for Ikea Family members.)

Even if I fill up in the Ikea restaurant, there's still the other half of the maze to hike through before the exit. This usually means there's room for one more snack from the Ikea Swedish Bistro, which is often a hot dog (or two, so I can bring one home to my dogs). I've never actually been to the Costco food court so I can't compare these famous franks, but Ikea's are cheaper — just 50 cents for Ikea Family members or $1 for non-members. I also enjoy the slightly unusual flavor that reminds me of the hot dogs I had on a long-ago study abroad trip to Norway. 

Just as with the meatballs, there are also plant-based and veggie dog options for under a buck, and there's even a $1.50 mac-and-cheese-topped hot dog. I can't speak to any of these variants as I've yet to try them, but all three have received rave reviews on social media.

The meatball sundae, while it's not something I get on every trip to Ikea, is still my favorite item at the Swedish Bistro simply because of the novelty factor. It's like food you'd get at a state fair, only for a fraction of the price — just $2.50 gets you a paper cup filled with mashed potatoes and topped with meatballs, gravy, and lingonberry jam. Basically, it's a little taste of the Ikea restaurant you can carry out to your car and eat in the parking lot. (Wait, is this not a socially acceptable thing to do? Whoopsie.)

Ikea's cinnamon buns are a crossover item — you can get ready-to-eat ones in the bistro ($1.50 for a single; $8 for a six-pack), or you can hike on over to the food market and buy them in frozen form (half a dozen for $4.99). The two items aren't identical, however, since the frozen buns are smaller and are topped with pearl sugar rather than a swirl of glaze. I enjoy both types quite a bit, even though I'm not ordinarily a cinnamon roll fan. Much as I love both carbs and sugar, frosting-topped Cinnabon-style monstrosities are simply too much for me. Ikea's rolls are much more manageable, and you can actually taste the pastry rather than having your taste buds overwhelmed with an excess of sweetness.

Last year, I attended one of Ikea's monthly bingo nights for rewards members and actually wound up winning a minor prize: a coffee cup (yay!) and a roll of my favorite Swedish cookies. They're called Kafferep, which is Swedish for coffee break, although this brand name applies to a large number of food market baked goods. The cookies taste kind of like shortbread and are sandwiched together with a filling peeking through a heart-shaped cutout.

The raspberry-filled ones are my favorites, but the chocolate-filled cookies are also quite tasty. They've also recently been joined by a new variety I intend to pick up on my next Ikea trip. These cookies also sell for $1.99 a tube and are apparently identical apart from having a lemon and vanilla filling. They're not called Kafferep, though — instead, they're inexplicably branded Bjällra, which translates to bell.

While I'm not a fan of most Ikea flatpack DIY projects, I make an exception for two edible ones: a build-your-own chocolate moose (not mousse) called Belöning ($5.99) and an assembly-required chocolate bunny known as Vårkänsla ($6.49) that appears around Eastertime. They're easy enough that even the most craft-challenged person (me) can put them together, each consisting of just three slabs of shaped milk chocolate with slots that slide into one another. Even if they do come out all wonky, though, who cares? You're just going to eat them anyway, and I can assure you they're both delicious.

My all-time favorite Ikea product, something I love even more than the coffee cups, is a marzipan-covered, cream-filled cake called prinsessbakelse. Well, that's the Swedish name for this type of cake — Ikea, instead, calls it by the generic term Kafferep. These cakes used to be available in the restaurant as well as the frozen section of the food market. They then went away for a few years, returned very briefly last year, and broke my heart again by disappearing almost immediately. 

While I did manage to find solace in a similar sweet item from Aldi, I'm beyond thrilled to see the frozen Kafferep prinsesstårtor ($6.99) back on the website along with a full-sized version called prinsesstårta or princess cake ($7.99) made by Swedish baker Frödinge. Neither item can be purchased online (the same applies to all of Ikea's food products), but should be available in the food market. (As long as I don't get there first, that is, since I'll be buying up as many as I can fit in my freezer.)