Deconstructed Apple Pie

Well, sort of anyway. It was a really simple dessert I made a few weeks ago, and I bet it'd be perfect after a light weekend meal - say, after a soup?

Three components. One - apples. Cut up a few apples (about one per person) and fry in butter and a few spoonfuls of sugar until softened and caramelized. Add spices as you see fit - cardamom and cinnamon are obvious, but very tasty choices.

Next, the cream. It's a simple mixture of cream cheese and lightly whipped cream. You can use mascarpone if you'd like. Or just whipped cream, or crème fraîche. Yogurt, too! Be innovative! Add a little sugar and vanilla, to taste.

And finally, the topping. It's mainly rolled oats and chopped nuts, fried in butter and sugar with a little bit of maple syrup stirred in. You can see this recipe for a more exact idea, though I used less butter and hazelnuts rather than pecans this time around.

Thirteen courses on Twelvth Night, 2009

Raspberry Collins

By now, some of you know that me and some of my friends have a party each year on Twelvth Night, or Trettondagsafton as it's known here. (2006, 2007, 2008.) It's a gourmet dinner with 13 courses, and each couple cooks three courses. (I, as hostess, also make a welcome drink and something to nibble on.) So, it's essentially a very exciting tasting menu, and usually quite eclectic! I'll post my recipes soon-ish, and I'm sure Dagmar and Lena will share their recipes on their blogs as well, Tesse isn't blogging, though. So - here's what we ate! We started with drinks, a Raspberry Collins with Olive Hazelnut Cantuccini. And of course, alcohol-free versions for some of us.


Olive Hazelnut Cantuccini

On to the appetizers. We started with a light Vietnamese Pomelo salad, with chicken, papaya and fresh coriander. (Dagmar.) More asian - we then got a spring roll filled with mushrooms and fennel, with rosemary dipping sauce. (Tesse.) Next was a Petit Choux filled with smoked moose. (Lena.) I went last with chicken thai bites - a savory sour-sharp salad in cucumber cups.


Vietnamese Pomelo Sala


Spring Rolls with Mushrooms and Fennel, Rosemary Dipping Sauce


Petit Choux with Smoked Moose


Chicken Thai Bites

Main courses: Tesse offered a very exciting kangaroo filet with Dijon mustard sauce and mashed potatoes. That was followed by one of Dagmar's specialties - potstickers with dipping sauce. I made Jalapeño Shrimp, and Lena finished with a blue cheese pork tenderloin in puff pastry, with a refreshing melon salad.


Kangaroo Filet with Dijon Mustard Sauce & Mashed Potatoes


Potstickers with dipping sauce


Jalapeño Shrimp


Blue Cheese Pork Tenderloin with Melon Salad

Dessert is always my favorite. Lena went first, with a vanilla pannacotta on top of blackberries, finished with flambéed Punsch, a sweet Swedish liquour. I then served a Parfait with orange, strawberries and dark chocolate, with a chocolate glaze. Dagmar hade made the cutest little mini-semlas, a lovely Swedish pastry. And finally, a very light citrus cocktail with candied walnuts and balsamic vinegar.


Punsch-flambéed Pannacotta


Orange-Strawberry-Chocolate Parfait with Chocolate Glaze


Mini-Semlas


Citrus Cocktail with Candied walnuts


I feel extremely lucky to have such talended foodie friends. This is really a lovely tradition, and I hope we can keep it up for many more years!

Get them now!

Just a reminder - buy pomegranates while they're still in season. These particular ones were huge, about the size of a cantaloupe rather than the normal size. And delicious! I de-seeded both of them and kept the seeds in a container in the fridge, and snacked on them for at least a week. I can't wait to get more though - they're so tasty! (And, an excellent source for anti-oxidants, too.)

And a handy tip for de-seeding, unless you want pink juice all over yourself and your kitchen: do it underwater. Get a bowl with cold water, divide the fruit into four segments, and gently break apart under water. The seeds will sink, the membranes will float. Very handy!

Almond Shortbread

Here's the recipe I promised you, for the almond shortbread. It can be pressed into individual fluted tins - but make sure they are *very* well buttered - or just pressed into one large tin and scored into squares or sticks. This is a very rich and delicious cookie - and it freezes well.

You really should try to use a grinder for the almonds - a food processor won't give the same texture. As it's a fairly small amount of almonds in this, you might get away with it - but if you have a grinder, definitely use that.

Almond Shortbread

100 g margarine
150 g unsalted butter
150 g sugar
30 almonds, ground
1 tsp almond extract
360 g all-purpose flour

Place margarine and butter in a bowl at room temperature for at least one hour before baking. Then, beat it with the sugar until it's soft and fluffy. Add the almond extract and the ground almonds. Finally, stir in the flour.

Press into well greased tins, and bake at 225°C for about 7-8 minutes.

Recipe in Swedish:
Mandelmusslor

Mandelmusslor - a very traditional Swedish dessert

Here's what we had for dessert after Christmas dinner! It's a Swedish classic, and something my grandmother used to make. Mandelmussla literally translates into "Almond Mussel", or probably "Almond Shell", and it's made from an almond shortbread. You'll get the recipe soon - I'm just to tired to type it at the moment, but I promise to share it. You bake it in small fluted metal tins, that come in various shapes and sizes. The prettiest ones are no longer sold though, so you have to try your luck at fleamarkets...

It's served with softly whipped cream and jam - here's a mixed jam with blueberries, raspberries and blackberries.

Update: here's the recipe.

Thai-style Potato Leek Soup

Enough baby talk. (Although I assure you there will be much more of that on this blog, later on. It's hard to resist.) I got this great soup recipe from a dear friend who recently turned food-blogger - Feline. She only writes in Swedish, but she has really great recipes and a wonderful writing style, so visit her!

Potato and leek are common in soups, and a classic combination - but this soup uses spices and coconut milk to turn it into a much more exciting dish with definite thai inspiration. For a more genuine touch, you could certainly use fish sauce rather than soy sauce.

This is very adaptable - you can add more water to serve more people, just up the spices a little bit too. And you can easily add more potatoes. It's really good on its own, but serve it with extra wedges of lime, and for something special, maybe some grilled shrimp on top?

Thai-style Potato Leek Soup
Serves 3-4

4 large potatoes, peeled and diced
1/2 leek, sliced
2 garlic cloves, chopped
4-5 cm fresh ginger, chopped
2 fresh jalapeño peppers, de-seeded and chopped
oil for frying
1 tsp garam masala
1 tsp chili powder
water
400 ml coconut milk
1/2 - 1 tbsp japanese soy sauce
1 lime, zest and juice
salt

Heat the oil, and add the spices. Fry the potato, leek, garlic, ginger and jalapeño for a few minutes. Don't use a huge pot, but a fairly snug one, so you won't have to add so much water in the next step.

Add enough water to cover. Salt well, bring to boil, cover with a lid and lower the heat. Cook until the potatoes are soft.

Blend the soup, either in a blender or with an immersion blender, until smooth. Add the coconut milk, soy sauce, lime zest and juice. Add more water if you want a thinner soup.

Season to taste with more salt, soy sauce and lime, and possibly more chili.

Recipe in Swedish:
Thai-smakande Potatis & Purjosoppa

Yep, a little Chef is on the way...

Baby Chef, 14 weeks

Most of you figured out my not-so-subtle hint yesterday. Yes, I do indeed have a "bun in the oven"! It's really very, very, very exciting, and feels very weird at the same time. Some of you might have noticed that I've posted a bit less, and definitely fewer recipes, and this is the reason. I have felt very uninspired to cook, and while I've been lucky enough not to have had any morning sickness (or anytime-of-the-day-sickness, really) I haven't been eating a whole lot, either. No cravings, as far as I can tell...

The baby is due in mid-May (actually, the tentative date is the same as my own birthday, May 21, but I'm sure it'll be any other day) so I'm about halfway there. So far, it's been really easy, except for a lot of hormonal roller-coaster mood-shifting - let's hope it stays as easy as this!

Anyway - I probably won't post a whole lot about this, but I really wanted to share with all my friends out there, across the world. Many hugs!