Fräsa

Fräsa is a Swedish verb with several related meanings, the most common being in cooking. In this sense, fräsa means to fry briefly in a small amount of fat or oil to release aroma and flavors, effectively to sauté. The technique is typically used to prepare onions, garlic, peppers, and other vegetables as a flavor base for a dish. Fräsa usually involves high or medium heat for a short time, until the ingredients are softened and lightly colored but not deeply browned. A typical instruction might be to fräsa lök i lite smör tills den är mjuk och genomskinlig (sauté onions in a little butter until soft and translucent).

Beyond cooking, fräsa can describe a hissing or sizzling sound made by hot fat, oil, or liquids meeting heat. In colloquial use, it can also mean to speak angrily or snap at someone, as in han fräste till (he snapped angrily).

Grammatically, fräsa is an irregular verb in Swedish. The present tense is fräser, the past tense fräste, and the supine is fräst. It is commonly contrasted with steka, another cooking term meaning to fry more generally or to brown, with fräsa emphasizing a brief, aroma-building stage rather than long browning.

In usage, fräsa is prevalent in recipes and kitchen instructions, while its figurative use appears mainly in everyday language to convey sudden anger. Related culinary terms include sautera (borrowed from French) and steka, which denote different levels of heat and duration in cooking.