It was one of those first very cold, very dark, early winter evenings last year. M and I were on our Friday evening out and searching for a good Chinese place nearby. That’s when we went into this restaurant. My husband has a peculiar nose of finding out the best hole-in-the-wall kind of places in any country/city. This one though, is not a hole-in-the-wall but a large corner establishment on Jægerdorffsplatsen just across from the Systembolaget (Swedish state authorized alcohol stores) located in the hipster enclave of Majorna.

Gröna Brunnen (Swedish for an abundant, green well) looks like an time worn, almost forgotten, urban provincial restaurant from eons ago. You step in and feels like you’ve stepped into the 1980s (in a good way). From the outside the place feels and looks like it belongs to the neighbourhood but once inside it also immediately transports you to another era. There are no large, bright screens, no loud latest Spotify playlist crooning from the speakers, none of that idle selfie-wielding razzmatazz of 2026. I stepped in and locked myself into a comfort I’d long known but somehow lost access to.

I think it was late November or early December and the streets outside were already covered in the very early darkness that comes with winters in Scandinavia. They were empty, newly devoid of the usual rush of cyclists, runners, amblers, shoppers. Inside, the large dining area oozed with the comfort of having seen decades roll by, dimly lit and incandescent in its own bathy glow. The smell of old furniture conveniently mingled with that of fried onion, garlic and curry.

On a window table an old man chugged down a glass of beer. On a centre table sat a group of old people from the neighbourhood, listening to Swedish commentary on a football game on what looked like a radio transistor they’d brought with them.

M and I browsed through the menu, communicating with the Chinese lady in our broken Swedish about our choice of order — my go-to noodles (which would change forever after this trip) and M’s order of kung pao beef. We waited patiently sipping our oyr beers as our screen-addled brains tried to adjust to the respite of this place. In that moment, it felt as if we inhabited disparate worlds of existence — one that was waiting for us outside this place, and one that was here inside in that very dense, cushy, hot minute.

The food came — glass noodles mixed with curry sauce, decadently fried vegetables; chicken and a large portion of slightly spicy, homemade kung pao beef curry with a bowl of fresh, smoking hot rice. As much as I loved my order, the rice with beef was just too comforting in that odd hour.

Was it the onset of winter and with it that very Nordic ennui? Or was it the fact that we’d both not been in a geography that gets this dark at just 4pm? Or was it just the laidback, homely cocoon like comfort of the restaurant? (Dear reader, in the coming months I’d be here almost every other week to find out more about what exactly hooked me to this place. I’m still looking.)

Since then, I’ve been to Gröna Brunnen (GB) mostly alone for my middle of the week lunches while I take work calls and type out work emails on the side. Most locals I’ve come to know and hang out with in Gothenburg don’t know the place because of what I believe could be two reasons: a) they have their own version of GB whatever side of the town they live in; b) while there’s an omnipresent comfort of these old restaurants, here in Gothenburg they run in the multiples.

From my numerous visits in 1.5 years in Gothenburg, I’ve noticed that its mostly the retired, old people of the neighbourhood who frequent it. One summer evening as M and I sat outdoors, grabbing our chilled Falcon along with pork dimsums, a gaggle of five friends who would’ve easily been in their mid- or late-seventies came to take the table next to ours. As they chugged beers and indulged in what seemed like seasoned, practised banter, one of them spotted another friend on the other side of the street. She hollered at the friend, calling at her in Swedish to come and join them. The friend joined in and they all raised their glasses at us in a gesture of conviviality and everyday communion.

GB like any of its countless versions and avatars in other parts of the city, is an old business housed on the ground floor of what seems like a deteriorating building. Earlier this winter, during the first snow storm of the year their glass wall developed a ceiling to floor crack. It must’ve taken them a few days to get it replaced because when I went their for a hot meal on what was a -12 degrees day in January, my fish curry developed a thick clotted layer of cream atop it after a couple of minutes of being served. It felt chillier than before and that’s when I noticed how they’d tried to tape the crack up.

Many such small-scale business might fear new construction and being razed off. They serve people who search for company, for a (third/neutral) place to hang out in when the winter depression exerts with all its force. I’ve sat their trying to read the local Swedish newspaper Göteborgs-Posten; watching people drop in to try their hand during lunch at the arcade game or play the lottery machine. Intentionally or not, GB, from what I’ve seen, brings people together under a roof without having anything in common.

Here’s my broken attempt at translating this bathroom wall scribe:

Gröna Brunnen has come to be a great habit. It feels like home. We shall never abandon this place.

M finds their food average, but meal after meal, what I’ve found more at GB is more than delicious meals. In my broken Swedish, I’ve chatted interminably with an elderly Majorna hipster about the weather (she loathed the rain; I loved it), I’ve spoken with the business owner about why I prefer having a soda (Ramlosa) over coke and have shared meaningful smiles and silences with a myriad patrons, while nursing our beers in poetic silence.

Week after week it’s an innate anthropological curiosity and an emotional attachment to Chinese food takes me there. I didn’t grow up on Chinese takeout (it was always dosas and idlis in our north Indian household), neither did we cook a whole lot of it back at home. But ever since I stepped out of my parents house, almost 20 years ago, I’ve felt a sense of belonging, even kinship with Indian Chinese food. While it’s a whole other variety of spicy, oily and mostly junk food, over the years Indian Chinese has offered a cornucopia of pleasures to me.

The first dish I got home delivered from my first paid job was Chilli Chicken and Hakka Noodles. I’ve worked for three of India’s largest English language newspapers in three very different cities. And all three of them had more than one Chinese restaurants next doors. This chilli chicken love runs deep.

GB also inherently reminds both M and me of one of our favroutie south Delhi Indian Chinese restaurants called Golden Dragon. As Delhi journalists always on the lookout of places that stay open till late in the night and offer happy hours I’d been a frequent patron this Indian Chinese joint located in the heart of South Delhi. Venerated by oldtime bureaucrats’ kids as a monthly hangout place (it’s next to Panchsheel Club); a convenient meeting place for business dealings; it’s proximity to various cultural spots (Siri For Auditorium, etc.) opens it up as a hangout place for many groups to catch up at.

The vibe inside is old timey yet it somehow manages to keep up with the times. At some point (2017-20) there was even a state authorized alcohol store on the ground floor, making it almost an imperative to drop by at GD for drinks after buying some booze from downstairs. It comes with its own couple of cigarette shops and a pan stall wherefrom I’ve shared countless meetha pans with friends, colleagues, cousins alike. Given how multipurpose and almost universal GD is, I’ve spotted quite a few famous people there — from writers to actors to my local General Physician.

A google review of GD reads so:

The Golden Dragon restaurant has maintained its authenticity of flavours in Chinese cuisine since the last twenty years. Delicious food, friendly staff and quick service are their speciality. I visit them almost twice a month to enjoy soulful chinese food. Must visit place.

Sometimes it’s just the simple, basic needs that need to be met. Nothing over the top, none of that supercilious, superfluous nothing that only escalates the prices.

We find and then frequent these places whatever part of the world we’re in, because of their propensity to yield stories and keep us coming back for more. In Delhi, GD stands out even more, because very few places like it seem to have survived the near constant erasure of restaurants and places from a time before ours. Each time I used to be in GD, it felt like the last time. The urgency pressing on us from all sides like the bad air outside. A visit to GD is something I look forward to the next time I’m in Delhi. Till then I will continue to map its very unlikely soul sister, Gröna Brunnen (GB) here in Gothenburg because at least for now it’s here.