Emma Bengtsson was born in Linkoping, Sweden and is currently an expat of Singapore whose parents are from Nigeria. She earned a bachelor degree in food arts and management at Carleton College, Connecticut, USA before pursuing a career in fine dining at Le Cordon Bleu in Madison, Wisconsin. Following her educational pursuits, she worked for four years at the prestigious Ritz Carlton in New York City, as head chef foraged by Peter Kornhess and Alice Waters. After this time she took on a more managerial role in London, first working as communications director at a very prestigious and high profile hotel before becoming a line manager at Le Cordon Bleu. Following this move, she managed to land jobs at London’s Le Touessrok Hotel and then in Hong Kong, before moving back to Paris, where she worked for another renowned French establishment, the Le Prince de Grecien.
In the late nineties, Emma Bengtsson moved back to her home country of Sweden where she opened her first non-Western restaurant in central Stockholm. This small establishment quickly gained popularity because of its unusual cuisine – including Swedish fish roe and black sesame glazed beef tartare – which made it hugely popular with western tourists. It soon spread to other parts of Sweden including the capital city of Stockholm, where it became known as “The Red Baron.” Today Emma’s restaurants can be found in cities all over the world, even including Russia, Turkey, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, India, South Africa, Mexico and the United States. Her restaurants serve traditional Swedish cuisine, however they are also known for their fusion dishes that feature ingredients from around the world.
Emma’s recipe for her famous salmon dish, which is now called Emmentaler, uses oil from the fish’s head as well as its liver. She also includes the heads and feet in her seasoning, which is one of many secrets that the chef uses to make her dishes so different. Many of the ingredients used in her recipes are imported from France and other parts of Europe. Her popularity increased when she was awarded a second star in the London Magazine’s Restaurant Awards in 2021. This was the highest award a non-Swedish chef was given at that time.