Body Cakes (Kroppkakor)

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body_cake

I have never participated in a Body Cake competition; I don’t think I have the body for it. It’s not about how well or pretty you make them, the winner is the one who eats the most! They are heavy but still one of my favorites of the Swedish traditional comfort foods. There are many different variations of it; some areas do it with raw potatoes and some like them as I do below.

6-7 big potatoes
one egg
300 ml (1.2 cups) flour
one tea spoon salt
200 g (0.45 lb) bacon or salted pork
onion
one teaspoon salt and some pepper

Peel the potatoes and boil them until they are done. Mash the potatoes and mix with the egg and flour. Season with salt. Cut the bacon and the onion in small pieces. Start to sauté the onions. Add the bacon and sauté them together until the bacon is crispy. Season with some pepper.

Form the potatoes mixture into a big roll. Slice the roll in pieces. Press your thumb in the middle and fill it with some of the bacon mixture. Cover the filling and make a ball of it. The size can be a little bit smaller than a tennis ball. Repeat the procedure until you are done.

Heat up water with salt and when it’s boiling, drop some of the body cakes into the water. When the body cakes floats up, boil them for about five minutes.

Serve with lingonberry jam or cranberry jam, melted butter, grated carrots and a glass of beer. I also always have extra bacon pieces on the side. Leftover Body Cakes are great to slice and sauté the day after.

By the way I am now back in East Village from my lovely stay in Sweden, with some great stops in Copenhagen and London.

(This kind of Body Cake you can call Småländska Kroppkakor. This recipe is rewritten from a recipe in the Swedish cookbook Vår Kok Bok, 1975)

Rum Apple Pie

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apple kingdome

As I am in the Apple Kingdom (Äppelriket på Österlen) right now I thought it was a good idea to write about my apple pie. For this recipe I prefer a sour apple that is a little soft, as they often melt in the oven. If this would be an Apple Tart I would choose a firmer apple. When I am home in the east village I usually buy mackintosh, wish I think works fine. In the apple kingdom they have many kinds of apples (ofcourse) and the best kinds are what they call food apples (matäpplen). This time I tried Gravenstein. I am not sure I really can call that a food apple. But it has the sourness and softness that I like.

3-4 apples
juice of a lemon
3-5 tablespoons rum
100 gram (3.5 oz)  butter
6-7 table spoons sucanat
200 ml (0.85 cups) flour
75 ml (0.3 cups) walnuts or almond

Peel the apples and slice them thin. Cover the bottom of a greased baking tin with the apples. Soak the apples with the rum. Mix the flour with butter, chopped walnuts and sucanat. Squeeze some lemon juice over the dough and mix it. As I never really follow a specific recipe when I make my apple pie it could be necessary to add some more of the ingredients. The crust should be sticky and the taste should be sweet with a nice touch of sour lemon. Let it rest a little in the fridge. Flatten some of the sticky crust out in your hand and place it over the apples. Repeat until all the apples are covered. Bake the pie in the oven at 200°C (400F) until the apples are melted and the crust has started to get firmer and got some color. Serve warm with some whipped cream.

M:s Potatoe Pancakes

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ms_potatoes_2

In the beginning of the eighties M was house squatting in the fancy neighborhood of Chelsea in London. Next door to the Rolling Stones he learned how to make Potatoe Pancakes. He was studying Architecture and this was a great way to live cheaply as he had a hard time with his parents. At that time he had the pancakes with butter and sugar. Today we have them with goat cheese and caviar!

for one person you need

one large potatoe
one tablespoon flour
one small egg
pinch of salt

Peel the potatoes. Cut them in smaller pieces and mash them in a blender. Squeeze out some of the water and mix together with the flour, salt and egg in a bowl. Pour small amounts of batter to make about five pancakes in a standard frying pan on medium heat. Fry them with some olive oil or butter until they are golden brown, turning once only. The pancakes can be served with many different things: lingonberries or cranberries, freshly grated carrots, sautéed bacon pieces, goat cheese mixed with sour cream and lastly caviar.

By the way, I just came from London and I am now posting from a lovely cottage in Sweden. Where I am planning to stay until the end of October.

Creamy Bacon Pasta

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tango

My sister dances tango wherever she goes. Barcelona, Berlin, Manhattan, Buenos Aires or the Pyrenees Mountains. Once she danced with a man who got so happy that he gave her a bottle of Bordeaux. Mushroom picking is also a thing my sister does well, and in her kitchen you will find glass jars of dried ‘funnel chanterelles’ (tratt kantareller), ‘king bolete’ (karl-johan) and ‘horn of plenty’ (trumpet svamp). My sister often crumbles some dried funnel chanterelles into her bacon sauce.

6-8 slices of bacon
½ or one onion
one clove garlic
tiny amount of chili
200 ml (0.80 cups) cream (or half and half)
150-200 ml (0.6-0.8 cups) cheddar cheese
(dried funnel chanterelles)
salt and pepper

Shred the bacon into thin slices. Chop the onion and the garlic thin and sauté them together with chili in some olive oil. When they are starting to get soft add the bacon and sauté them together until the bacon gets a little crispy. Add the cream and let it boil slowly for one minute. Lower the heat and add the grated cheese. When the cheese is melted, season the sauce with salt and pepper. Last night I served it over fresh pasta topped with fresh grated parmesan and a tomato salad with fresh cilantro balsamic vinaigrette. An earthy Bordeaux will probably work well whether it comes from a tango dancer or not!

Marinated Salmon

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girl_with_blue_hair

Yesterday we had Sophia over for dinner. Sophia used to live in our building long before I met M and moved over here. M remembers her as the girl with the blue hair. Some time ago M was teaching architecture, he had told the students to draw where they came from. Suddenly he recognizes his building and the girl with the blue hair, she is one of his students! She had drawn their house and she had also added some Manhattan likely crowns on top of the ugly buildings across the street. She thought they needed it. I think it would be more fun too.

salmon filet
shallots
dill
olive oil
vinegar
lime
pepper
tiny amount of chili

cold sauce
mayonnaise
sourcream
dill

feta
potatoes
arugola

Marinate the salmon for half an hour with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, chili, pepper, lime and the shallots. Bake it in the oven in a covered dish or foil for about 15 minutes at 350 F. Prepare the sauce by mixing one part mayonnaise and one part sour cream together. Add some chopped dill. Serve the salmon together with the mild sauce, boiled potatoes, feta and a simple arugola salad.