Feta-topped salmon

Amazing, amazing, amazing. (although not so pretty) I used the best salmon I could find, labeled "Salma", and that is SO good. Most people probably eat it raw, but since I'm wary of fishy-tasting fish.. I figured it'd be great to cook with as well.

You can add in all sorts of things for the topping. I just went with what I had. 

Feta-topped salmon

serves 4

4 portions of boneless, skinless salmon fillet- about 600 g

200 ml crème fraîche

150 g feta cheese

1-2 tbsp capers

4 sundried tomatoes

2 scallions

black pepper

Finely chop the capers, tomatoes and scallions. Mix with the cheese and crème fraîche, and season with black pepper. No need for salt. 

Place the salmon in an oven-proof dish (they should fit quite snugly) and cover with the topping. Bake at 200°C for 15-20 minutes. (Depending on how well-cooked you like your salmon, you could probably take it out even quicker, but I prefer mine to be pretty well done...) 

Hazelnut Cocoa Cuts

A very yummy version of the humble chocolate cut cookie, which is normally sprinkled with pearl sugar. I don't have a photo of the finished cookie, which should serve to tell you that it's delicous. (Actually, I have some stashed in the freezer. They thaw in seconds, making them perfect to have with a cup of afternoon coffee.)

Hazelnut Cocoa Cuts

about 40 cookies

200 g butter, at room temperature
240 g sugar
2 tbsp golden syrup
3 tbsp cocoa powder
1/2 vanilla bean
2 tsp baking powder
135 g all-purpose flour
135 g wholewheat flour

To decorate:
one egg, beaten
toasted hazelnuts, crushed

Mix all ingredients for the dough, into a smooth and supple dough. Shape into logs - mine were about 4 cm wide - and place on a lined baking sheet. Flatten slightly, then brush with egg wash and sprinkle with crushed hazelnuts.

Bake at 200°C for 10-12 minutes. Wait a minute or two, then cut diagonally into cookies. Let them cool completely on the baking sheets before transferring to a plate or, in my case, to the freezer.

Happy birthday, dear blog!

Eight years! It's actually pretty impressive. I've been blogging for a LONG time. And I still love it. I've cut down a little, but that's ok - I hope most of my readers don't mind too much. In this past year, I've stopped updating my swedish blog, but again, I think that's ok. And I have a LOT of not-blogged-about-yet recipes to post, so I promise a lot of tasty updates soon! (-ish)

Why I still do it? I guess an e-mail I got tonight pretty much explains it. It's from a reader who made my ruby red beetroot risotto. And she cared enough to actually write me to say how much she enjoyed it and how good it was. I love that. It's not the only reason for blogging, but it sure is a (big) part of the puzzle.



So, cake! I bought a cake last year. And the year before that, I never made one either. So this year, I figured I should at least make one, even if it took minimal effort. Titus was excited at the idea, and immediately decided that it should not have any kind of berries, but instead be decorated with candy.



Being lazy, I bought meringue layers (but in hindsight, I should totally have baked a chocolate cake, it'd have been SO much better) and filled them with a simple hazelnut mousse (made from an awesome hazelnut paste, think Nutella but sans the chocolate) and sliced bananas. Then some whipped cream, and I let Titus have free reign over the candy decorating. Of course.



For my previous birthday cakes, I've made Princess Cake, Black Forest Cake (Swedish style), Budapest Roll, Oscar II:s cake, and a humble vanilla bean jelly roll.

And more fika

A much needed fika before picking Titus up at the pre-school a few days ago. A "dammsugare" - the very peculiar little bakery item that translates into "vaccum cleaner", and a cup of coffee. The cup is a Moomin mug from Finnish Iittala - Titus and I love them.

Vegetarian Potstickers

I've made dumplings at home a few times now. My friend Jenny had asked me to show her how to make them, and as she's a vegetarian,  this was the first time to try out a veggie filling! My friend Christina joined us too, for a fun day in the kitchen. Dumplings are pretty labor intensive, so it definitely helps to have some extra hands around. Especially when you have a somewhat whiny baby, with chickenpox, to console at the same time...

(And for that same reason, please excuse the awful  iPhone photo..)

I improvised the filling, but it went something like this:

Vegetarian Potstickers
1/2 small leek, cut into coins
200 g mushrooms
1/2 small head of napa cabbage (often sold as "kinakål" in Sweden)
1 large carrot, grated
fresh ginger, about a thumb-sized piece, grated
1-2 tsp soy sauce
2 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp sambal oelek
2 tbsp fresh coriander
1 tbsp corn starch
salt, pepper
2 tsp peanut oil

First, put the leek, the mushrooms and the cabbage in a food processor and blitz until finely chopped. Heat the peanut oil in a saucepan, and fry the veggies - add the grated carrot as well, until softened. Ideally try to drain out excess fluid at this part - we didn't and our filling was quite wet.

Place the softened veggies in bowl, and add your aromatics - ginger, soy, sesame oil, sambal oelek (or finely chopped chili), and coriander. Add the corn starch as well, and season with a little salt and pepper.

dough:
(enough for about 50 small dumplings)
300 g flour
180 ml boiling water

Place the flour in your food processor. Put the lid on and start the machine. Add the boiling water through the tube, with the machine running. Stop after a few seconds - the dough should look crumbly, and hold together if you pinch it.

Knead the dough carefully - it's HOT! - on your kitchen counter for about 30 seconds, or until it looks supple and elastic. Place in a ziploc bag and seal it. Let the dough rest for at least 15 minutes, but no longer than two hours.

Now, time to actually fill and fold some dumplings! I don't have any photos of this so go to Dagmar's post on the subject which is much more thorough than mine. But - to put it simply, this is what you do:

-roll out the dough, using a pasta machine. Not too thin - they should be fairly thick. I went to 3 or 4 on my machine.

-cut out rounds, using a large glass

-place a spoonful of filling in the middle of each round, fold, and start pinching the edges together.

Repeat. And work fast - you don't want the dough to try out. (In fact, keep whatever dough you're not rolling in the sealed ziploc bag.) It helps to be at least two people, working together.

Next, heat some oil (I like peanut) in a frying pan with a lid. Have a small glass of water nearby. When the oil is hot, add some dumplings - but don't overcrowd the pan. Fry until the bottom is golden. Then, add the water and quickly cover with the lid, and let the dumplings steam for 5-7 minutes (a few more minutes if cooking from frozen). Remove the lid, and re-crisp the dumplings.

Lemon Mousse with crumble and blueberries

I have to share this photo of a gorgeous dessert that Dagmar treated us to a little while ago. It's a lemon mousse topped with a crumble, and fresh blueberries. Yum! I hope she'll post the recipe!

Frozen Orange Cheesecake

Here's one to save for the holidays - it's good all year round, but I'd particularly recommend this to end a heavy holiday meal. Frozen cheesecake is always good (I have two other versions, here and here) but this one is really quite something. Orange compound might sound fiddly but can be prepared well in advance, and it's not at all difficult.


Frozen Orange Cheesecake

200 gram cream cheese
3 eggs, separated into yolks and whites
200 ml sugar
300 ml heavy cream
1 tbsp vanilla sugar

150 g digestive biscuits
50 g butter, melted

to decorate: Pomegranate seeds


Orange compound:
oranges - ideally seed-free
sugar

Start with the oranges. Scrub as many as you'd like to use - I used two, and have about twice the amount of compound I needed. Place the oranges in boiling water for one minute. Drain, and repeat twice - basically you're boiling the oranges three times, each time for one minute, in fresh water each time.

Let the oranges cool a little, then weight them. Add half as much sugar as the weight of the oranges. (Mine were 460 grams, so I added 230 grams of sugar.) Mix until completely smooth in a food processor. Let the compound drain a little if it's very runny.


Place 200 g in a bowl and let it cool completely.

Next, for the crust:
Use a springform pan. Blitz the digestive biscuits in a food processor. Add in the melted butter. Press this firmly into the base of your pan.

Cream the cheese, egg yolks and the sugar. Beat the cream until it forms stiff peaks. Carefully blend with the cheese cream. Beat the egg whites until stiff, and fold those in too. Stir in the orange compound.

Pour carefully on top of the crust in the pan. Put in the freezer for at least six hours or overnight. Take out about twenty minutes before you want to eat, and decorate with pomegranate seeds. This keeps well in the freezer.

Spaghetti Triangles

I had some leftover spaghetti, and needed lunch. Like, right now. This took about one minute of prep, and 6 minutes of cooking. Pretty perfect! You could call this spaghetti pizza, fried spaghetti, spaghetti omelette... I think of it mostly as a tortilla or frittata, but I sold it to my toddler as "spaghetti triangles". (Which you can barely see in the photo.. but time was of the essence, so to speak.)

Spaghetti Triangles
serves 1-2
2 eggs
2 slices of smoked ham, cut into strips
1 scallion, cut into thin slices
a big handful of leftover, cooked spaghetti

Heat some peanut (or olive) oil in a skillet - you want it pretty hot!

Mix up the eggs, ham and scallions. Add  in the spaghetti and mix well - using your hand works very well.

Pour it into the hot skillet, and fry for three minutes on each side on medium-high heat.

Cut into wedges - triangles- and serve. Season if you want to, but mine was plenty salty from the ham. I bet sriracha would be good with this, for those seeking a spicy kick.

Chocolate Cupcakes

Cupcakes are all the rage - or are they over already? I can't tell. It's not something I usually make, nor do I enjoy them all that much. However, I was sent a boxed mix for chocolate cupcakes by Kungsörnen and on a rainy afternoon, it was the perfect project to do with my three-year old.

It really couldn't be simpler - stir bag A with water, dollop into the provided paper cups, bake. Letting them cool was probably our largest problem. Next, mix bag 2 with softened butter and a little water, and in my case, I added a little cream to make it more pipe-able. Pipe or spread onto the cooled cakes. Then take bag 3, which contains sprinkles, and decorate as you (or your kid) see fit. 

They turned out pretty good. Surprised me, actually. Very sweet, but also very chocolatey and they kept well in the fridge for a few days. I think we got nine in total. 

Lemon Mint Tzatziki

Tzatziki is a great sauce that goes well with grilled pork or chicken - or anything else, for that matter. We love it. Usually, it's mostly garlic and cucumber, but this time, I added the zest from one lemon, and some chopped mint, for a completely different twist on the original. It was really tasty - we served it with a spread of "greek-ish" food, while trying out my new olive oil from Kallaras.

Lemon Mint Tzatziki
200 ml Greek yogurt
1/2 cucumber
1/2 tbsp olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced
Zest from 1 lemon
2 tbsp chopped fresh mint
Salt

Coarsely grate the cucumber, and squeeze out as much water as you can. Mix the cucumber with yogurt, olive oil, minced garlic, lemon and mint. Season with salt.

Cinnamon Bun

I have to confess - I didn't bake any cinnamon buns for this year's Cinnamon Bun Day. But we did buy some. This one was mine - a classic cinnamon bun dough, but it's filled with hazelnut paste. Delicious!! It'll be sold all through October at Gateau bakeries, so pick one up of you can.

Cinnamon Bun Day

October Fourth is the national cinnamon bun day in Sweden - Kanelbullens Dag.


I have several recipes. The ones above are cinnamon "knots", a sort of twisted bun.



Regular buns.



Buns free from eggs and dairy.



And finally, American style sticky cinnamon rolls. Not traditional in Sweden, but delicious.

Broad Beans on toast

Simple lunch, but oh so tasty. Broad beans must are rapidly going out of season, but if you can still find any - make this. (You can sometimes find frozen, too.)

First, you need a lot of broad beans. A LOT. They're mostly pod. Say that you want at least 200 ml of shelled broad beans, and I think we had nearly a kilo to start with. (Sorry, didn't pay exact attention.)

Shell all those beans, and cook them in rapidly boiling water for 4-5 minutes. Cool them in cold water, then cut a tiny slit into each bean and slip off the skin.

Toss the naked beans with the juice of one lemon, a teaspoon of sambal oelek or other spicy chili paste, a little salt, and perhaps a tablespoon of finely chopped cilantro if you happen to have it.

Toast some bread. Spread with cream cheese, then mound on the broad beans. Top with a slice of air-cured ham - we had serrano ham. (It's obviously fine to skip the ham, for a totally veggie toast.)

Enjoy!