Look what I made tonight!

My very first cake with sugarpaste. I'm rather proud!

Breakfast Rolls

Getting this recipe was a slight disappointment for me. See, I first tasted these rolls at Vigdis, a lovely cat breeder friend. Vigdis has lead a very exciting life, living all over the world, having done tons of different things. She made these great rolls, and I don't know, I sort of expected a story there. For some reason. Anyway, I asked her for the recipe, and she happily complied. And handed over a recipe card, the kind you get from those recipe clubs that were so popular in the 80:s.

So, while not the result of any wonderful journeys, these rolls are really, really good. And they're incredibly easy to make. If you've not used to yeasted dough - here's one for you to try. I doubt this can fail.

Vigdis added raisins to her bread. I didn't this time - didn't have any at home - but I did sprinkle half of them with poppy seeds and sea salt. They're fine plain too though. And whatever variety you choose, they freeze very well.

Breakfast Rolls
makes about 24

50 g fresh yeast
50 g butter
500 ml milk
2 tsp salt
775 g flour (regular, white)

To glaze:
1 egg
poppy seeds (optional)

Melt the butter and add the milk. Heat this mixture until tepid. (About the same temperature as your finger.) Crumble the yeast into a bowl, and add some of the liquid. Stir until yeast is dissolved, then add the rest of the liquid, the salt and the flour.

Work until you have a smooth dough that doesn't stick to the bowl. Leave to rest for 15 minutes.

Divide the dough into equal sized pieces - I weighed mine, and found 50 g to be about the right size. Roll each piece into a smooth ball. Cut a cross in the top of each one, and place on a lined baking sheet. Cover with a towel and leave to rise for about an hour.

Preheat the oven to 250°C. To glaze, beat an egg with a few drops of water, and brush the buns, using care so they don't deflate. Top with poppy seeds and sea salt if you want to. Bake for 7-8 minutes, until just lightly golden.

Recipe in Swedish:
Frukostbullar

Foodie Gifts - package from Johanna!

I was really excited to get this package in the mail - completely unexpected, it was Passionate Cook Johanna who had sent me a lovely care package. It contained something I had lusted over since I was in London - pale blue Le Creuset ramekins. I saw them last summer, in pink, blue and.. green? - but Per thought they'd be too heavy to lug around (good point) and that surely they'd be available at home, too. Guess what? They're not.

So I'm really happy now. I also got homemade jam, chocolates (yum!), Delicious magazine which had a feature on Johanna - and, knowing me well, she included a bag of Starbucks Coffee. Awww.

I did a small piece on eating in Stockholm for her blog a little while back - check it out if you'd like!

Waiter, there's something in my... Spicy Apple Pie

I really like this new food blog event, "Waiter, there's something in my..." hosted by Cooksister Jeanne, Passionate Cook Johanna and Spittoon Andrew. It's great fun! However, this month I was a bit stumped. The rules called for a covered pie of some sorts. And well, I don't really do that. Ever. Could be that I don't like pie crust all that much, so a double-crust pie is out of the question. I did have some brief fantasies about what I like to call a "Donald Duck Pie" - remember in the comics, Granny Duck, whatever she's called in English, always made a lovely double-crust pie with air vents, and when she'd put it out to cool someone would steal it? Anyway, that's what I had in mind.

But in the end, that didn't really happen. Both Per and I have the flu - he's on his way to getting better, I'm a few days behind. I did manage to make these individual apple pies tonight though! The crust is a simple affair, quickly thrown together in a food processor, and the filling is just briefly assembled, fried in butter for a minute or two, and dumped into the container of your choice. I like my Le Creuset hearts, a lot. It didn't come out looking like I had imagined - but well, it's good enough. And it smells divine. And most importantly - it's super delicious. The filling is sticky and spicy, and the crust is just thin enough to impart a nice crunch. I had this with a scoop of vanilla ice cream - custard would be nice too!

Spicy Apple Pie

Pastry:
100 g butter
100 g sugar
20 ml milk (1 tbsp + 1 tsp)
1 egg
200 g flour + extra for rolling

Place butter, sugar, milk and the egg in a food processor and blitz. Add flour, and process until the mixture just comes together. Wrap with plastic foil and let it rest in the fridge for an hour. The dough will be enough for at least six individual pies, but you can freeze any leftovers for another day.

For the filling:
1 apple per person, peeled and diced
1 tbsp sugar per person
bit of butter
cinnamon
cardamom
ground ginger

To glaze:
1 egg
sugar

Mix the diced apple with sugar and spices. (Use as much as you want - I used quite a bit of cinnamon, and maybe 1/2 tsp each ginger and cardamom, for two pies.) Melt the butter, and add the spiced apples. Fry for a few minutes until the apples have softened and the sugar has caramelized. Divide into pie dishes.

Roll out the pastry dough on a very well floured surface. (Or you'll be sorry!) Cover the dishes, and remove excess pastry with a sharp knife. Brush with a beaten egg and top with a little bit of sugar. Bake at 200°C for 15-20 minutes, or until pies are golden.

Recipe in Swedish:
Kryddiga äppelpajer

Weekend Cat Blogging - Kittens seven weeks old

Julius and Juliet

I was nearly lynched last week when I didn't post any kitten pictures, so fine, here they are. If you want to see the full set, it's here.



Jupiter


Jamy


Juliet


And cute Julius, still for sale.

Chocolate Fudge Sauce

It's Friday - so go on, have something sweet. This is a delicious chocolate sauce - perfect to pour over ice cream. It's an old recipe - Alice who's a food journalist and has a lovely blog in Swedish, tells us that it was originally published in Allt Om Mat back in the early 70:s. The name in Swedish translates to "White Hare Chocolate Sauce" - but I have no idea why. Anyway, I call it a chocolate fudge sauce, because that's essentially what it is.

This freezes very well, and when frozen, it's pretty much solid and makes the most delicious candy. You can just scoop it out with a spoon and enjoy the smooth chocolately bliss. Or, heat it, and eat in a more normal and civilized manner. That's fine too.


Chocolate Fudge Sauce

650 ml sugar (about 570 g)
250 ml milk (1 cup)
250 ml cream (1 cup)
100 g butter
1/4 tsp salt
75 g cocoa powder, sifted
1 tsp vanilla sugar

Mix butter, sugar, milk, cream and salt in a very large pot, and bring to a boil. Cook for an hour on fairly low heat, until you have a thick, golden, caramel sauce. Don't worry if it looks weird in the meantime - it'll be fine.

Remove from heat, and add the cocoa powder. Beat with electric beaters for five minutes, then stir in the vanilla sugar.

Eat right away, or save for another day. You'll probably have enough to do both. This will serve at least ten.

Recipe in Swedish:
Vita Harens chokladsås

Lentil-fried fish

Let me tell you about another great dish that Per made a couple of nights ago. He ground red lentils until they resembled a fine powder, and used this to coat fillets of firm, white fish. (Cod works very well.) They were then pan-fried, and served with a shrimp spinach risotto. A real treat! I really liked this unique new way to cook fish - it added crunch and texture, and color, too.

Ironman Pasta

Pasta, and cheese. If I could just eat one thing for the rest of my life (ok, two), chances are pretty good I'd choose pasta and cheese. We eat something similar to this quite often. You can buy perfectly tasty cheese sauces in the dairy section here - both a mild regular sauce, and a blue cheese sauce. I like to have both at hand in the fridge. If there's not something similar where you live, you'll have to substitute with a freshly made cheese sauce which I'm sure will be very tasty, but involving slightly more effort.

I like to think of the following as "ironman pasta", due to the fact that both broccoli and spinach are high in iron.

This also re-heats very well, I like having it for lunch.

Ironman Pasta
Serves 2-3

dried pasta, about 100 g per person
50 g boiled ham, thinly sliced into strips, or diced
1 small head of broccoli
1 large handful fresh spinach
butter
250 ml (1 cup) of cheese sauce, blue cheese is especially good with the broccoli

Boil the pasta in plenty of lightly salted water.

Divide the broccoli into florets and blanch for 2-3 minutes in salted boiling water. Then immediately transfer to a bowl of very cold water, to stop the cooking. This helps retain the beautiful green color.

Melt the butter in a pan, and fry the spinach and ham for a few minutes. Add broccoli and cheese saucem and finally, the drained pasta.

Very yum.

Recipe in Swedish:
Ironman Pasta

Two eating experiences

I apologize for the not so great pictures - both were taken with a tiny camera, on location. The first one is from a very nice little café, called exactly that - "Lilla Café", where I had lunch with my mom a few weeks ago. I had a grilled foccaccia sandwich with olives and feta cheese, and a latte. As you can see, the latte came with a heart, and a small cookie. Lovely. Can't wait to go back. (It's at Wollmar Yxkullsgatan, I *think* number three. They were just recently opened, and didn't have any business cards.)



This photo, on the other hand, shows what I had at a buffet at Café Opera, one of the fanciest nightclubs in Stockholm with a normally very good kitchen. (Shared with Operakällaren, one of the finest restaurants.) We were at a movie premiere - Per works in that line of business - and it was all very cool. Except for the food. Which was just cold, and rather boring. Oh well.

Shrimp Chips

The guy at the store called these "elephant nails". Charming. But that's really what they look like, pre-frying.

I'd only tried these ready-made, sometimes in Chinese or Indian restaurants, and I think I bought a bag a few years ago in Holland. This was the first time I fried them myself though, and though the flavor is much the same, it's a lot of fun. The little hard shards will expand to the fluffy chips you see in the picture. And they're mighty tasty, too!

I got my bag at FineFood, but I'm sure you can find them in many Chinese or Asian supermarkets, too. Or apparently you can make them from scratch.

Sauce Béarnaise

This is one of the most delicious things I know, and yet I had never attempted to make my own until a few days ago, for Valentine's Day. I had been rather nervous, reading up on recipes from all sorts of books, and pestering my friend Jesper (who has a lovely food blog in Swedish here) with questions. In the end, I decided to trust Nigella, and not bother with clarified butter. Instead, I used diced softened butter, and it worked out very well. No signs of splitting!

We made the amount below just for us two, and it made quite a lot. It could easily have fed one more, or possibly too - depending on hunger and more importantly, greediness. This is really very, very good, and I'm not saying that you should eat it every day, but it's fine for an occasional treat. Try not to think about the amount of butter. And have something light for dessert.

Sauce Béarnaise
Serves 2-4

3 egg yolks
175-200 g butter
1 shalott
1 tsp whole white pepper
1/2 + 1/2 tsp dried tarragon
4 tbsp white wine vinegar, or tarragon vinegar
freshly squeezed lemon

Start by cracking your eggs and separating them. Put the egg yolks in a round-bottomed bowl, that will fit on top of one of your saucepans. Dice the butter, and keep on a plate in room temperature for about an hour. Each dice should be pretty small - no more than 10 grams.

Dice the shalott very finely, and mix with 1/2 tsp dried tarragon, the vinegar and the white pepper in a small saucepan. Reduce until you have about 1 tbsp of liquid - this will happen very fast. Strain the liquid into a clean cup and put aside to cool to room temperature.

When you're ready to make your sauce, place a saucepan with a little bit of water in it on the stove and heat until the water is simmering but absolutely not boiling. Place your bowl of egg yolks on top of the pan (witout touching the bottom!) and add the reduced liquid. Beat with a large balloon whisk until it's foamy. Add the butter, one dice at a time, and whisk well the whole time. The sauce will gradually thicken. When all the butter is added, you're pretty much done. Remove from heat, and whisk in a few drops of squeezed lemon, and some more (1/2 tsp) of dried tarragon.

Recipe in Swedish:
Sauce Béarnaise

Ferran Adriá to Stockholm!

Yes, that's right! The amazingly inventive Ferran Adriá, of El Bulli, is coming to Stockholm. Unfortunately not to cook, but to accept a prize; White Guide Global Gastronomy Award by the White Guide. (A restaurant guide.) He'll be here at their gala, March 12, and wow, I wish I was there too! And I wonder who will get the Swedish award...

Weekend Cat Blogging - Enough Kittens.

Hey, you might get sick of kitten pictures, so here's one of Kelly instead. Kelly, who by the way is very anxious to have some kittens on her own. She's been in heat for a week now, and is meowing me crazy.

For the kitten pictures - which by the way are all blurry, and I took over 300 - you can go here.

Sugar High Friday - a seductive fruit salad

This is the dessert I made for Valentine's Day, and thus I think it's more than fit to be my entry for this month's Sugar High Friday. The event is hosted by Confessions of a Cardamom Addict, and the theme? Sweet seduction.

I like that this is a really light dessert - perfect after a hearty meal. As much as I love chocolate, if I've had something massively fattening (let me remind you that we had Steak Béarnaise for our Valentine's dinner!) I really crave something light and refreshing. This worked really well.

You can use any citrus fruits, really - think of this more as a general sketch than an actual recipe. I used a spoonful of home made vanilla sugar - you can use regular sugar, or omit alltogether if your fruit is sweet enough.

The easiest way to get pomegranate seeds out is to first squeeze the fruit, then cut it in half across the middle. Hold the halves, cut side down, and bang on the fruit with a wooden spoon. The seeds will fall right out. Just pick off any white membrane that might fall out, too.

Five-Citrus Salad with Pomegranate
Serves 2

1 pink grapefruit
1 blood orange
1 regular orange
1 mandarine/tangerine/clementine
1 lime
1/2 - 1 tbsp sugar or vanilla sugar
1/2 pomegranate

Peel the fruit with a knife, and make sure not to include any white pith. Cut out nice wedges - little tiny fruit fillets. Put the wedges in a bowl, with most of the citrus juice. Sprinkle with sugar, and leave in the fridge for an hour or so. (Or eat immediately - but you can prepare this well in advance.)

When you're ready to eat, divide the citrus onto plates or in shallow bowls. Top with pomegranate seeds, and indulge.

Recipe in Swedish:
Citrussallad med granatäpple

Warm Mango & Bacon Salad

I'm happy to report that the béarnaise sauce I attempted for the first time yesterday was great! No problems at all - and certainly no reason to be afraid. I'll report in more detail in a few days.

Here's a delicious salad, perfect for a lunch. I always find it a bit difficult to fix lunch on weekends - we usually have a fairly late breakfast, and often a fairly fancy dinner, but you need *something* to keep you going mid-day. This salad definitely fits the profile.

Warm Mango & Bacon Salad
Serves 2

2 handfuls of arugula/rocket
2 spring onions, finely sliced
handful of basil, shredded
70 g bacon, diced
1 red onion, cut into thin wedges
handful of green beans, blanched in boiling water for a few minutes
diced mango - about a handful
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
parmesan cheese, flaked

Fry the bacon until crispy. Add the onion wedges for a few minutes so that they caramelize and soften sligthly. Rinse and dry the arugula, and mix with spring onion, basil and the green beans in bowls or on plates. Top with mango, onions and bacon. Drizzle over a little olive oil and vinegar, and finish with a couple of parmesan flakes.

Recipe in Swedish:
Varm sallad med haricot verts, bacon och mango

Love

To all my lovely readers out there - a big, big hug! I'm so thankful for each and everyone of you, and although I don't need a special day to share that love, today's a good day to remember it.

As for the one I really love, more than anyone, we'll be celebrating tonight with a nice home-cooked meal - we're thinking a starter of avocado and blue cheese on crisp rye bread, a perfectly grilled entrecôte with home-made béarnaise (pressure, much? I've never done it before) and a large green salad, and to finish, a citrus salad with pomegranate. Sounds good? I think so.

Have a great day!

Chèvre gratinated Asparagus and Potatoes

I've mentioned that Per has started to cook more frequently for me (well, he cooks a lot, but he's gradually getting into more fancy food) and here's another dish that he has cooked recently. It's a delicious side dish of chèvre gratinated asparagus and potatoes. It could even be a veggie main dish, or perfect for a buffet-style spread. Chèvre, goat's cheese, is one of my favorite ingredients ever, and it goes especially well with umami-tasting ingredients like beets or asparagus. Umami is often called the fifth flavor, in addition to sweet, sour, salty and bitter, and present in many foods. (Read more at Umami Information Center.)

Now, for the dish. It's from Per's favorite cookbook - Mera Fredagsgourmet från Allt om Mat, a collection of perfect Friday night dishes from a popular Swedish food magazine.

Chèvre gratinated Asparagus and Potatoes
Serves 2

200 g potatoes - new if you can get them
300 g fresh asparagus - green and white (the white has to be peeled)
250 ml single cream (about 20% fat)
200 g chèvre cheese
salt
black pepper

Boil the potatoes until just done. Briefly boil the asparagus in salted water, and immediately transfer to a bowl of iced water to stop the cooking. Put the vegetables in an oven-proof dish.

Bring the cream to a boil, and let it reduce for a couple of minutes. Crumble the cheese into the cream, but reserve some to sprinkle on top of the dish. Add salt and pepper to the cream, and mix well.

Pour the sauce over the vegetables, and crumble over reserved cheese. Put the dish in your oven with the grill element on the highest setting, just for a few minutes until the cheese turns golden.

Great as a side dish with grilled meat or chicken.

Recipe in Swedish:
Getostgratinerad sparris och potatis

Afternoon Tea

I've discovered yet another place to have Afternoon Tea in Stockholm. My friend Pia has made it her mission to try every place that offers it, and I'm happy to tag along. And our last discovery was Sheraton hotel. They offer afternoon tea from 3 pm, in front of a gorgeous, large fireplace. It was really very cosy, especially on a cold winter day. There were plenty of tiny sandwiches and scones with blueberry jam and whipped cream, and also an assortment of petits fours and cookies. And tea, of course - a pretty basic selection, but good nonetheless. We paid 110 SEK each (just two weeks ago), which felt very reasonable, but the website now states that it's 165 SEK - and I don't know if I'd pay *that* much for it.

Crank's Bread

This recipe is supposedly from veggie classic restaurant/veggie producers Crank's. Not sure how authentic it is, but it *is* one of fairly few healthy bread recipes that I've had success with, so I highly recommend it. I got it from a book simply called "Matbröd" - "bread", basically, in Swedish - by Tulla Grünberger. It's really simple to make, and fairly fast, too. These babies freeze very well in a tightly sealed bag.

Crank's Bread
Makes 16 small buns

25 g fresh yeast
300 ml tepid water
1 tbsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp neutral oil
100 ml quark ("Kesella" in Sweden)
600 ml whole wheat flour (2,4 cups)
2-300 ml regular wheat flour (about 1 cup)

Crumble the yeast into a bowl, and add some water. Stir until yeast is dissolved, then add the rest of the water, the oil, sugar, salt and quark. Add most of the flour and work into a nice, clean dough. Leave to rise under a towel for 30 minutes.

Knead the dough until it's shiny, and divide in half. Divide each half into eight pieces - use kitchen scales to make sure they're the same size, if you're unsure. Roll out into nice round balls. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or a non-stick sheet, cut a slash in the top of each bun, and cover with a towel. Leave to rise for 30 minutes.

Heat the oven to 220°C. Bake the buns for 15-20 minutes, until they are lightly golden. Cool completely on a rach before freezing.

Recipe in Swedish:
Cranks Bröd

Kitten time!

Julius cuddling up to Hamlet, who's happy to give him a quick licking.

I know this is the highlight of the week for many - who needs food - so here's another round of kitten pictures. They really are cute as buttons now, but they're getting hard to photograph properly. They move way too fast, and they're very bouncy. In fact, Julius bounced right off the kitchen table!

We've managed to find excellent homes for three of them, Julius being the one still looking. I'm sure we'll find a great new family for him too - after all, they don't move until they're at least twelve weeks.

Without further ado - the Flickr set is here, and may I present.. the little monsters.


Jupiter, about to pounce


Juliet, absolutely refusing to look into the camera


Julius with his favorite mouse


Jamy, waiting to be picked up

Mango Mousse

Happy Friday! Why not make something fancy, but really easy and really fresh, for dessert tonight? Here's my tip - a mango mousse. Just the ticket after a heavy meal, and with wonderfully refreshing taste. It also takes you away from the dreary winter gloom, right to the beaches of South America. Or well, I suppose that depends on your imagination. But it's a very good start.

Mangomousse
Serves 4-6, depending on how big your glasses are.

250 g mango, diced (you can use frozen, defrosted, if you don't have any ripe ones)
the juice of 1 lime
100 ml (about 6 1/2 tbsp, or 0,4 cups) of powdered sugar
2 leaves of gelatin
2 egg whites
250 ml (1 cup) cream (full fat, 35-40%)
2 passionfruits, to decorate

Purée the mango. I use my immersion blender for this. Add the lime juice and the powdered sugar, and mix well. It should be very smooth.

Beat the egg whites until very stiff. In another bowl, whip the cream until it's deliciously fluffy and holds soft peaks.

Let the gelatin leaves soak in cold water for a few minutes. Meanwile, bring 2-3 tablespoons of water to a boil.

Take the gelatin leaves from the cold water, and squeeze them. Melt them in the hot water, and add to the mango mix.

Add the mango mix to the cream, and mix well but gently. Add the egg whites and fold until completely combined.

Spoon into pretty cups or glasses, and place in fridge for at least 3-4 hours. At serving, divide a few passionfruits, scoop out the seeds and decorate with this.

Recipe in Swedish:
Mangomousse

Multi-cakes

Maybe you've tried rice cakes? Cardboard-y, thick white things, mostly tasteless, that health propagandists try to get us to eat instead of popcorn or other snacks? Well, they just upgraded. To this. "Multi-cakes". (Produced by Swedish company Friggs.) While it sounds just as awful, the result is not bad at all. These still contain rice, but also corn, spelt and other goodies. And they're thin - not at all like those thick discs I remember. And crunchy! I actually like them a lot. Not so much that I'd eat them instead of popcorn, ever, but they're nice for a pre-dinner snack. Good on their own, better (a lot) with a thin slathering of butter and a slice of cheese. Two thumbs up!

Slow Braised Meat Sauce

I've done some housekeeping. I've added a bunch of blogs to the link list on the right - check them out and see if you find any new favorites! (I can't believe how much easier it's to work with the template in the new blogger - incredible.) I've also added a tiny little Favicon, that hopefully means you'll be seeing my raspberry photo up top in your browser.

I was asked to submit a recipe for Sauce Bolognese, to Swedish food blogger Lisa. However, I'm not a huge bolognese fan. At all. So this sauce, which was the result of several hours in the kitchen yesterday, is most resolutely NOT a bolognese. It is however, very tasty. And just the thing on a cold winter night. If you have a few spare hours - it's not labor intensive, but it does take time - give it a shot! If not, hold out, I'll be posting a super quick pasta sauce recipe in a few days.

Slow Braised Meat Sauce
Serves 4-6

150 g smoked lardons - bacon is fine
5 yellow onions, fairly small
1 tbsp tomato purée
600 g beef - shoulder is good.
4-5 cloves of roasted garlic
3-400 ml white wine (Italian is preferrable)
water
sage
tarragon
thyme
salt
white pepper
1/2 - 1 tbsp white wine vinegar
worcestershire sauce

Start by dicing the lardons very finely, and slice the onions. Fry the lardons in a large pot, no extra fat needed. When it's browned nicely, lower the heat a lot, and add the onions. Pour over about 100 ml of wine, and 200 ml of water. Cover with a tight-fitting lid, and simmer slowly for half an hour.

Add the tomato purée to the pot, and mix well. Cut the beef into three or four large pieces, and add to the pot. Remove any tough or stringy bits. Add the herbs - dried are perfectly fine here, and indeed better than fresh since the fresh would lose their flavor with the long simmer anyway - and the garlic. Add more wine and water, until the meat is just about covered.

Simmer on very low heat for two hours. Check every half hour so it's not drying out.

After two hours, the meat should be really tender. Lift it out, and shred it, using two forks. Put it back into the pot, and add more water to thin out the sauce slightly. Season with salt, white pepper, white wine vinegar, and a splash of worcestershire sauce.

Boil some really good pasta (here'd be a good opportunity to go for homemade, if you can) in plenty of salted water. When the pasta is just tender, drain but save some of the water. Put the pasta back in the pot, add a few spoonfuls of sauce, and mix together with a few spoons of pasta water and a pat of butter until shiny and delicious. Serve with more sauce on top.

Recipe in Swedish:
Stillsamt Kokt Pastasås

Swedish Pancakes

I suppose I should have blogged about Swedish Pancakes long ago. After all, it's a staple in most Swedish households, and beloved by kids and adults alike. However, it's not a staple in MY household, and actually, I just learned how to make them. My mom made excellent pancakes, so I never had to. And Per made good ones too. Until he forgot how. (A real disaster, that one.) See, we eat pancakes maybe once a year. And this time, he just forgot how he usually makes them. So, a very grumpy Anne decided that it was probably time to just learn it.

And it's not hard at all. But it is hard finding a recipe that works for you - everyone has their own preference, and a lot of people just add flour and milk until "just right" - whatever that is. Swedish pancakes are thin, and made without baking powder. They shouldn't be fluffy at all. We usually eat them with jam, some people add whipped cream which makes it more of a dessert (traditional on Thursdays, after a split pea soup by the way) and some eat them with just sugar. I like a dollop of crème fraîche on mine. I don't know of anyone who eats it with something savory - but you could, of course. Anyway, this is the recipe I ended up using.

Swedish Pancakes
Serves 3-4

3 eggs
3 dl flour (1 dl = 0.4 cups. So, 1,2 cups is what you need here.)
600 ml milk (2,4 cups)
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp vanilla sugar
1-2 tbsp liquid margarine, or melted butter
butter to fry

Beat eggs and flour until smooth, and gradually add the milk. Add salt and vanilla sugar. Make sure you have no lumps! Leave the batter for at least an hour, to rest. Then fry thin pancakes in butter - buttering between every third pancake should be enough - on medium high heat. Don't put too much batter in the pan - they should be thin. Fry until the bottom is golden, then flip using a large spatula. It's really not very difficult, so don't be afraid.



Any leftovers? Make crêpes! Just fill the pancakes with something tasty - I like a thick mushroom stew - roll them up, top with cheese, blitz under the grill until cheese is melted. Simple as that.

Recipe in Swedish:
Pannkakor

Swiss Cheese

I love cheese. Let me just get that off my chest right away, in case anyone didn't know already. Last week, I had the opportunity to go to a cheese lunch. It was a press thing (and I'm always SO happy to be invited, very exciting for this humble blogger) and it was held at the Swiss Embassy in Stockholm, by Emmi which is a Swiss dairy company. They recently launched several products in Sweden - the Caffé Latte that I talked about the other day being one of them, and now several different cheese. Delicious, delicious cheeses, I should add. The picture above (incidentally the one I mysteriously mentioned a few days ago, but then disguised by a simple but cool Photoshop move) shows Gruyère and a lovely herb-cured cheese that was just called Swiss Alp Bellevue, and our favorite hard goat cheese which is not made by Emmi at all, but Swedish. Anyway. The herb cheese amazing - it tasted strongly of thyme, and was strong but mellow. The gruyère was very good too. We also got to try raclette, and we even got a tiny raclette grill to take home. (I'm a sucker for freebies.)



There was a few Emmi representatives at the lunch, but also Jenny Svensson who's a chef, and who had put together some nice things to enjoy with the cheese, including a dried fruit-and-nuts salad that was delicious.

Toasted Oat Sourdough Bread

I've been meaning to blog about this bread for very long, but I haven't really gotten around to it. It's a great bread though, and perfect if you've got some sourdough hanging around, needing to be used up. I keep sourdough in the freezer, and revive it a few days before I want to bake - it seems to work nicely for me, though I'm sure sourdough purists would frown.

This bread is really good toasted - the oatmeal is already toasted before it goes into the bread, but the extra toasting brings out the flavor, making it nutty and just perfect with slice of strong cheese, or a spoon of good marmalade.

Toasted Oat Sourdough Bread
Based on a recipe from Riddarbageriets Bröd

450 g water
120 g sourdough from rye
450 g strong wheat flour (extra protein)
150 g wholewheat flour (spelt works fine)
15 g fresh yeast
1-2 tsp golden syrup (you can substitute honey)
1 tbsp salt
40 g rolled oats, toasted (toast in a dry frying pan or in the oven until golden and fragrant)

Mix everything except for salt and oats. Work in a machine - I use my Kitchen-Aid - for 7-8 minutes. Add the salt and oats, and work for another five minutes. Remove dough to a clean bowl, and leave to rise for two hours.

Divide the dough in half, and shape each half into nice loaves. Brush with water and dust over some wholewheat flour. Move loaves to a baking sheet, and cut a pattern if you'd like. Let rise for 1-2 hours.

Preheat the oven to 250°C. Place the baking sheet in the oven, and spray with water. Lower the heat at once to 225°C. You can spray with water a few times during the baking to get a crunchier crust. The total baking time is about 25-30 minutes.

Recipe in Swedish:
Surdegsbröd med rostad havre

Weekend Cat Blogging - kittens four weeks

Julius, looking a bit shy.

I don't even dare to post any other cat pictures right now - I have so many e-mailing me about the kittens! And no surprise, because they are totally cute as buttons. Four weeks old, and starting to romp around their little playpen. They are still a bit wobbly, but they happily wrestle and play with each other. And if you come close to the pen, they'll run up to you, meowing to be lifted and cuddled. Cuties!


Jupiter


Juliet (who's really developing into a princess)


Jamy

And more pictures over at Flickr.

Complaints Choir

This is a cheeseplatter. It is. Just a bit photoshopped. And the only relation to the rest of this post would be this: Would you like some cheese to go with that whine?

Ok, I just have to tell you about this - it has nothing to do with food, but a lot to do with putting me in a great mood today. I've had a not-terrific start to this year, and I have been doing a lot of complaining. But enough is enough! Time to cheer up!

I just discovered something called Complaints Choir. It's a very amusing movement, with choirs in Birmingham, Hamburg, Helsinki and a few other places, too. Watch the videos, and enjoy! Helsinki is my favorite.

Banana Maple Muffins

I've made these muffins to have at hand in the freezer for our prospective kitten buyers. So far, they hold up very well. I de-frost them and heat them slightly in the microwave, and they really go down a treat with tea or coffee. You could serve them for a luxurious weekend breakfast (if you're not so concerned with kitten buyers, and I imagine most of you are not), drizzled with more maple syrup.

The recipe is, like so many other muffin recipes I try, from Dagensmuffin.se (The Daily Muffin - sorry, in Swedish.)

Banana Maple Muffins
Makes about 15

5 dl (2 cups) flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1,25 dl (1/2 cup) sugar
300 ml soured milk (buttermilk or a neutral yogurt would work fine)
1 egg
3 tbsp maple syrup
3 tbsp vegetable oil
3 bananas, sliced

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Mix all the dry ingredients - flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and cinnamon - in a bowl. In another bowl, mix the soured milk with the egg, maple syrup and oil, and the sliced bananas. Carefully mix everything together, and dollop into muffin cases. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until lightly golden and no longer sticky.

Recipe in Swedish:
Bananmuffins med lönnsirap

Big hickup

Blogger has been very weird today, and I've had big problems both accessing my blog and clicking on old links. It should all work now though, so let me know if something is still wrong!

I just came home from a delicious dinner with my parents. Before dinner, we had some rye crispbread with a super blue cheese, St. Agur. After that, we got chicken breasts with rice and a creamy curry sauce with chickpeas and braised leeks. Dessert was apple pie with vanilla sauce, and I drank a lovely red wine that's a new favorite, Raccolto Nero d'Avola Cabernet Sauvignon. Really very tasty. Another wine that I love is the one in the picture - an Amarone wine that we drank on Christmas eve. Stupid me didn't think to write up the exact name - but then again, I've loved all Amarone wines I've been fortunate enough to try.

Pene pointed out that I should tell you what country they're from - sorry! Both wines are Italian, and both are also very full-bodied, flavorsome wines.

Today, we had our first prospective cat buyer over. She fell in love with little Jupiter, who will move in with her and her two Labradors in about two months time.

And tomorrow, I'll be getting a new camera, a Nikon d80! Very exciting! So I know what I'll be doing this weekend...