torsdag 3 november 2011

Truffles


I just discovered what a small splash of truffle-oil can do with your risotto (yeah, I know I'm late)! I pride myself in making a pretty good risotto and I made one with mixed mushrooms the other weekend. Next I'll try it in the mashed potatoes.

tisdag 9 augusti 2011

Spring rolls

Inspired by our visit to Restaurant Asien the day before, D decided that we should attempt to make our own spring rolls. I let him take the lead in the kitchen for once... I had a really hard time to keep my fingers off! We made a bit too many.


Fresh herbs like cilantro, thai basil (which has a lovely licorice flavor), glas nudels, carrots, shrimp and cucumber.


D and his delicate (!) handiwork.


And then you dip it in hoisin sause. Yum! Maybe not as good as the ones we had at the restaurant but a good effort.




måndag 1 augusti 2011

Mon Balzac

One place you have to visit, if you are a foodie, is Gdansk! Amazing food, huge portions at a cost that almost makes you ashamed. We found our favourite spot just next to the big touristy main street. Mon Balzac had great food, really lovely atmosphere and great staff!
We started our three course meal with some vodka!



Goldwasser is one of Gdansk's specialities (clear liqueur with gold flakes) but when ordering a shot, our waiter recommended their own local vodka instead. So we tried them both. And he was right. Their vodka was much better.
D had some carpaccio for starters and I enjoyed eggplants stuffed with meat and sun-dried tomatoes. Yum!



I have never tried Fondue of any form before so why not try it in Gdansk! I was a bit worried that the boiling bouillon wasn't enough to cook the meat and that we both would have to stay locked in our hotel room the next day with food poisoning! This was of course not the case at all!



I've got a extra stomach only for desserts, and one for beer, and one for bacon, so ordering a creme brulee with lemon sorbet wasn't a problem! All this delicious food and vodkas and a few glasses of red wine was only 147 zloty's (1 zl = 2,42 sek)!!

måndag 11 juli 2011

Nero

The last evening of our spa visit we ate at the restaurant located within the hotel premisses. Funny how things can change. D's parents was here a year ago and they were so disappointed with the food! I couldn't imagine why! Looking at the menu beforehand, you couldn't get away with that kind of menu being bad!



For starters, my most favourite thing in the world! Fois gras!! Well, not authentic fois gras. That I'm so not okay with! So duck liver paté on a piece of roasted brioche and fig sauce.



A lovely piece of lam roast beef with some potato au gratin, guzzled down with my favourite Valpoicella wine!



And of course I had room for dessert! Always! Banana - fudge - whipped cream! Need I say more? A perfect 9! Things must have changed a lot.

tisdag 21 juni 2011

"Oz Emellan"

Today, my colleges and I had a day out of the office and we all went to a restaurant for some dinner. We were a party of 20 so to make things a bit easier, we had a look at the menu on their website and called in the order. When calling, they said that the menu had changed and that we had to order on site. I ordered Pasta Vongole that according to the menu should be fresh.



I never seen fresh, handmade pasta look like Penne. Not even in Italy. Others ordered a piece of cod fish with new potatoes. Apparently the fish was dry and the potatoes undercooked. When we tried to order wine, more than half of the wines had run out (expecting delivery, they said). My pasta wasn't very good, a 4 out of 10. We thought by ordering dessert they could make up for the bad main course. Sad to say, the portions varied so much in size and when we pointed that out the waitress got really snippy. So to sum things up... Oz Emellan in Helsingborg. Bad food, bad service. Avoid it!

söndag 19 juni 2011

Pain? Bien sûr!

I do appreciate a good piece of bread but this craze with sour dough bread has made me so negative towards the whole thing. But now I have come to my senses. So I just made two different batches. Let's hope they act the way it supposed to.



Apple is the base with both, one is wheat and the other one rye. I named them Steve and Charles. If you figure out why, there's a price...

onsdag 15 juni 2011

Diet food is not that boring!

If you read my other blog, you might have figured out that I'm on a diet. I was fearing constant lettuce, carrot and egg white every meal but no. That is not the case. I know what I'm allowed to eat or not to eat so yesterday I made a fish soup!



This one has white fish, shrimps, carrots, fennel, tomatoes and saffron! Yum!

lördag 28 maj 2011

The oyster, continued...

From a cooking blog to a blog of thing I eat. Well, I guess it was just a matter of time... But why not making it about both cooking AND eating. And not being to pretentious about it.

With that being said... Here's what I ate yesterday at Restaurant Brogatan:
First an oyser (not picuted here), than duck liver on toast, rhubarb and pecans.



Followed by calf's liver (kalvlever) with bacon and capers (see a pattern?)



Whether I have any room left or not, I always try to get some! And who am I to resist a Pavlova??



David's evening was all meat, meat platter followed by steak tartar. And for dessert, he chose a sample of cheeses. Typical him :) Where will we go next?

måndag 25 april 2011

Easter at Mum's

Been awhile since I updated my food blog. And this time I can't even take credit for the dishes!
Easter day means dinner at Mum's and this year was amazing!
Starters was a cheviche of matjesill, red unions, mango and apples. Didn't even bother to run for the camera, we simply inhaled it.

Then came the main course:



A lovely piece of cod with a pure of parsnip, a foamy, creamy sauce with mussel, asparagus and parsnip chips. It was fresh, flavourful and lots of nice texture. Then came time for dessert. I made mini-Pavlovas for everyone (that was my contribution to the dinner).

After dinner we had some coffee and then Mum asked if we would like some rum. And she put this on the table:



I mean, who could resist a bottle with leather chaps? The rum was really nice but if you want a bottle you have to go to Denmark and a specialist store.

måndag 21 mars 2011

Bangers & Mash

A couple of weeks ago, I got 4 sausages from my colleague Staffan. I might have mentioned him earlier, he is my supplier of boar meat and other good stuff! On of the first things I ate in London last year was a sausage with wild boar and apple. So for Sunday's dinner I tried to recreate that dinner.


I roasted the sausages in the oven because I wanted to do a gravy from the juices (but that didn't really work out). I made a fluffy mashed potatoes with lots of butter, milk and nutmeg. The green stuff on the plate is mushy green peas with mint! David gives the sausage an 8 (and the other stuff too), I'll give it a 7, not because of the sausage (that was an 8, believe me) but because of my failure to make gravy!

Oh, and if you ever have money you don't need you can always get me a KitchenAid. Don't forget the accessories package!

måndag 14 mars 2011

Apricots & Hazelnuts

There's one thing (ok, maybe two things) I'm not that confident about in the kitchen and that's baking. I don't know if it's wait for the bread to rise or the kneading or the messy fingers... And how do you get around that problem? Well, by baking bread without yeast! I got this great recipe from my brother; Apricot and hazelnut loaf.


It's great with just butter on it. Other combinations? Maybe figs and walnuts, white raisins and almonds... I'm sure making this bread again.

söndag 6 mars 2011

Risotto

Do you even try to top yesterdays dinner at Bastard (read more here)? No, probably not.



One of my signature dishes (if I may) is a Risotto. The basic recipe for a Risotto is simply arborio rice, onion, a splash of white wine, a nice stock (vegetable or chicken) and parmesan cheese. I usually add some asparagus but today I mixed things up with green peas. My kind of comfort food!

måndag 28 februari 2011

Home cooking

Oh! I forgot to tell you! I got this amazing book from Mum yesterday.



In English it's called "The Art of Home Cooking" and it's written by the Swedish masterchef Leif Mannerström. You can actually get it in English (and on sale) right here.

söndag 27 februari 2011

Favourite Pasta

Sunday lunch time at Mum's place... We made one of my favourite pasta dish. I guess this is more of a family classic.



Tagliatelle with bacon, basil, tomatoes, parmesan, an egg yolk and freshly ground black pepper. Simple, fresh and delicious. If you want to make the dish a bit more fanciful, I recommend asparagus. This I have to give an 8. I guess Mum's food is the best thing in the world...

måndag 21 februari 2011

Biff á la Lindström



Yesterday I made an attempt on a Swedish classic; Biff á la Lindström. This dish actually has it's roots in Russia. A manufacturer named Lindström, born and raised in St. Petersburg visited a hotel in Kalmar (Hotell Witt) with some colleagues and wanted them to get a taste of Russia and ordered in ground beef, capers, beets, potatoes, union and eggs. He then gave the chef instructions on how to cook it and the restaurant has kept it on their menu ever since. This was back in 1862.

My version comes from the Swedish chef Leif Mannerström, famous for his husmanskost, and also contains mustard and HP sauce.

I give it a solid 6, good homey food. David forgot to give his review but I'm sure he liked it.

söndag 13 februari 2011

A piece of Pie

I know I said I would do something fishy but when the day came, I just didn't have the energy. Or maybe it was the daunting thoughts of trying to get nice fillets out of a fish... I don't even have a proper knife (writing that down on my wish list).



So I ended up making a savoury pie with Västerbotten cheese with serrano ham and a fresh green salad with avocado. Review: David gives it a 7 and I give it a 6. I think I whisked the eggs a bit to hard cause it felt a bit to soufflé-ish.

torsdag 10 februari 2011

Blubb, blubb



We have been eating a lot of meat lately so I think it's time to cook some fish. I have pike in my freezer, so maybe I'll do quenelles, butter sauce (or saffron sauce) and potatoes. Well, I guess we have to wait and see...

lördag 5 februari 2011

Bloody Mary's, blini's, borsijt and b… pavlova

Yesterday we cooked up a storm!
Joining me and David on this Russian feast was Helena and Peder. Helena is a vegetarian (but eats fish) and Peder hates everything that comes from the sea (but likes some meat now and then). So we settled on a Russian inspired menu.


First out was David's mini Bloody Mary's, all gulped down with home made Russian salutes.


This is me flipping the starter curse: blini. Served with finely chopped red onion, avocado, smetana and black caviar (no, not Beluga).


Main curse: Borsijt. Need I say more?


Dessert was a Pavlova, a dish from New Zealand in honour of the Russian Prima Ballerina, Anna Pavlova. This was my first attempt of making a meringue and it turned out amazing.

David gives all the dishes a 9, which is big for a guy who's not really in to desserts. I give it an 8 but that's just because of the hassle of finding buckwheat flour for the blini.

söndag 30 januari 2011

Kæmpepålæg

I might be treading on a thin line here. I know this post contains no cooking and some might argue that this isn't a classic. But it's one of the best things from the Danish food culture. Thin slices of milk chocolate on toast. That and a cup of tea and a glass of orange juice and I'm in Sunday breakfast heaven!

söndag 23 januari 2011

Linguine alle Vongole

I had a clear idea about what I wanted to cook for Saturday's dinner. One of the most lasting memories of mum's and my trip to Venice was the Linguine alle Vongole we ate at a seafood restaurant. I was really surprised not to find a recipe in my cook book. So I kind of winged it...



The guys went into the pot. It's always a bit of a gamble whether you got good clams or not.



And it turned out great! Again! David gave it another 8 (although he is not very hard to please when it comes to food) and I also give it an 8.

Ps. I have to apologize for the bad quality of the photos. My brother said that the photos of my stew looked like poo. Thanks a lot, dude Ds.

torsdag 20 januari 2011

Sooo...


...what to do for my second attempt on the classics? I think I might actually go Italian. Browsing through my cook book, I really didn't find a pasta dish I wanted to do. David gave me a book about Italian cooking, maybe I can find something there! Stay tuned...

söndag 16 januari 2011

Boeuf Bourguignon

So for my first classic adventure, I decided to do a Boeuf Bourguignon. I don't know why but I got it in my head that it would be hard to do.


On the table are all the ingredients needed, missing is the red wine. I didn't get any fresh thyme from my usually well stocked supermarket. That annoyed the c**p out of me!


The smell was absolutely amazing! I think it turned out pretty good, except the fact that I forgot to add some parsley at the end. I always forget the parsley.


I served the stew with Amadine potatoes. All in all, I give it a 7,5 out of 10 and David gives it a solid 8.


lördag 15 januari 2011

My cook book



My family got me this cook book for Christmas. It was just what I wanted, a good, classic and classy book. Soo... for tomorrows dinner I'm thinking of page 310. Stay tuned!