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Nov 26 2014

Aaaand I’m back with a Spiced Plum Cake!

It’s high time I got back into the swing of things. Months have passed and I’ve made only two mediocre updates. I haven’t even been cooking or baking that much, but that’s changing starting from now! Christmas is coming, and before that in just a week from now it’s my birthday. The perfect time of year to get busy and flex one’s baking muscle! For today’s post I have made a spiced plum cake after finding some cheap organic plums for just 5kr. They were from Sweden, and I have no idea how they grew plums at this time of year, but they weren’t that special – a bit hard and not very juicy – so baking with them was a perfect idea.

I think I’ll give Swedish gingerbread a go this year, or maybe some aniseed pigs, or maybe both. Of course, I’m choosing the worst possible time of the year to make a “comeback”. It’s getting darker which doesn’t give me many opportunities for decent photography, as can no doubt be witnessed from today’s offering. Still – as I said last year – it could be worse. I could be somewhere like Tromsø, in Norway. While I’m sure it’s a lovely place, the sun rises today at 11am, and sets at 12:02pm, and it’s not even December yet. This time in a month they’ll have some perma-night going on which would make any kind of food photography absolutely impossible without some fancy equipment (of which I have none) so I should be grateful for the small things.

We’ve had a bit of snow two or three times but it all keeps melting away and yesterday was an unbelievably depressing day. Raining all day, and positive temperatures of around +3 degrees Celsius or so which made everything muddy and dirty. My car looks in a very sorry state with all the crud which sprays up off the road and there’s absolutely no point washing it until everything freezes “properly”.

My son is getting on well at kindergarten. He was terribly sad about having to go there in the beginning but now he absolutely loves it. If he’s ever unhappy you just have to mention it to him and remind him that he can go there again soon and he’s all smiles again.

Well, I’m not going to waste any more time, so I’ll jump right into the spiced plum cake now. I’ll be visiting all the sites I used to look at slowly over the coming days. Sorry I’ve missed so many of your wonderful posts – I can’t wait to catch up!

Enjoy the cake, and I’ll see you all again soon (and this time I mean it!).

Serves 8

Spiced Plum Cake

Juicy, sweet plums rest atop a delicate sponge in this spiced plum cake. A perfect way to use plums which are a little hard or lacking in juiciness.

15Prep Time

25Cook Time

40Total Time

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Ingredients

190g Butter
190g Caster Sugar
3 Eggs
190g Plain Flour
2tsps Baking Powder
3tsps Cinnamon
6 Plums

Instructions

Start off by preheating your oven to 190 degrees Celsius. Cream together the butter and sugar and then whisk together the eggs.
Beat in the eggs bit by bit until completely combined and grease and flour a 20cm cake tin.
Cut the plums in half and remove the pits. Arrange the plum halves flat side down in the bottom of the tin.
Sift the flour, baking powder and cinnamon into the batter and fold in gently. Transfer the batter into the tin, covering the plums, and then place into the preheated oven.
Bake for about 25 minutes. Before removing, check the cake is completely baked in the centre by sticking it wth a skewer and ensuring it comes out clean.
Remove from the oven when ready and allow to cool in the tin for 10 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to allow to finish cooling.

https://homesweetsweden.com/aaaand-im-back-with-a-spiced-plum-cake/

Jun 25 2014

Quick Halloumi and Avocado Salad and the giveaway results

This “quick halloumi and avocado salad” is the result of some creative thinking, and while I originally had no intention of posting it, it looked just so darn nice on the plate (and tasted amazing) that I decided to grab a few quick snaps and write it up.

I was in town and lost track of time somewhat. My wife was due to work in the afternoon and when I returned from town she was taking a well-deserved nap before leaving. I decided to make her a little something to eat before she went to work but the question was… “what?”.

Having a look through the fridge I found halloumi, avocado, and some fresh spinach and pea shoots (leftover from my fried brie – yes, this dish is indeed from a couple of weeks ago and I’m only getting around to posting it now!). Well, that was about everything I needed. Chuck in a slice of bread and you’ve got something fairly balanced – protein, carbs, fat… you could even add in a soft boiled or poached egg on top, although I didn’t feel like that was necessary. Of course, like I said – this salad was the result of some quick refrigerator-raiding. I wouldn’t substitute the halloumi (because oh my God I love halloumi) or the avocado, or the bread really, but the salad composition itself… you can totally wing it.

In other news, my vegetables are coming along fairly well. Pretty much all the peas I planted have come up and are looking healthy. The squash, peppers, chillies and tomatoes in the greenhouse are also looking good. The cucumbers… not so much. I sowed the seeds initially in these little cardboard pots, like egg-boxes. The claim was that when planted directly into the earth, they would break up and “become one with the earth”. “Bulls*#&”, is all I have to say. My cucumbers started yellowing and looking decidedly unhealthy. My only thought was that those stupid little pots had indeed not broken up and were basically stunting the growth, since the roots could not grow out, and the seedling must have by now used up what tiny amount of nutrients was in the soil in the small pot. I carefully dug up on of the seedlings (which incidentally hadn’t really grown a great deal, despite being out there for around two weeks already) and noticed that the cardboard pot was in “great” shape, and fully intact.

I carefully removed the pots from all seedlings and replanted them – a couple of them are looking healthier already, although I think it’s too late for three of them now. Well, I’ll know for next time, that’s for sure!

Anyway, before I move on to the recipe, here’s something I guess a lot of you have been waiting for! The results of my previous giveaway, kindly sponsored by TeaVivre.

Here we go, thanks to random.org:

That means the winners are:

Please get in touch with me here (or by email if you have that) and we’ll sort out the details for the delivery.

Serves 2

Quick Halloumi and Avocado Salad

A simple but fresh, satisfying salad featuring halloumi cheese and avocado

5Prep Time

10Cook Time

15Total Time

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Ingredients

200g Halloumi cheese
2 slices Wholegrain Bread
1 Avocado
1 large handful of fresh Spinach
1 small handful of Pea Sprouts
2tbsps Olive Oil
1tbsp Balsamic Vinegar
2 Lemon Wedges
Salt and pepper

Instructions

Cut the halloumi into two large thin blocks and grill the halloumi on a hot grill or grill pan for a few minutes on each side until slightly charred.
Remove from the pan and rub 1tbsp of the Olive Oil into the bread on both sides. Grill the bread as well to achieve a similar result as for the halloumi.
Arrange the spinach over two plates before placing the grilled bread and halloumi on top.
Half the avocado and remove the seed and skin from each half. Slice and place next to the halloumi before garnishing with pea shoots and the lemon wedge.
Mix together the remaining olive oil with the balsamic vinegar and drizzle over and sprinkle on a little salt and pepper to taste.

https://homesweetsweden.com/quick-halloumi-avocado-salad/

Jun 19 2014

Physalis and Green Tea Jam and a Giveaway

I’ve never cooked with physalis (is that the plural?) before, and come to think of it I’ve never cooked with green tea either, so making this gave me a great chance to flex my culinary muscle, and while making jam isn’t really “thinking outside the box”, the physalis and green tea jam was easy to make, and the taste was amazing. Like… actually, really, really good. It ended up being one of these experiments which you feel really pleased with, and given my previous opinion of physalis, it was nice to know that they can be turned into something delicious.

You see, up to now, physalis have always been these “sticky little berries” which they put on top of cakes and desserts in France, and no-one ever eats them. Well, I always did, because I don’t like wasting food – even if it’s just a tiny “sticky little berry” – but nine times out of ten, I would see them discarded on the side of the plate at the end of the meal. So, what prompted me to suddenly get busy in the kitchen with both physalis and also green tea?

Well, for the physalis, it’s a short answer. They were on special at the store (along with sun-dried tomatoes – yum!) so I grabbed a couple of packets and declared to my wife that I’d “figure something out later”. The green tea requires a slightly longer explanation.

I recently got an email from Alison at a company called Tea Vivre. She asked me if I’d like to try a selection of different teas, and – hey, I’m British – we do love our tea, right? Naturally I replied in the affirmative that, indeed, I would love to try some tea, and although she didn’t ask me to, I said I would also make something using the tea as well, so there you go. While cooking it into a jam perhaps isn’t the most conventional use of green tea it sure made for a gorgeous background flavour to the physalis. The teas that Tea Vivre kindly sent to me were:

Nonpareil Te Gong Huang Shan Mao Feng Green Tea
Organic Superfine Dragon Well Long Jing Green Tea
Premium Tai Ping Hou Kui Green Tea
Fengqing Dragon Pearl Black Tea
Bi Luo Chun Green Tea (Pi Lo Chun)

Now, I’m no green tea expert, and can’t really proclaim to knowing the difference between those, except in taste alone. They all tasted really good; I visited my sister in China about 14 years ago (wow, that’s a long time!) and drank a lot of green tea during my time there. The flavours were enough to bring back happy memories of my trip there – experiencing such a new, exciting culture in the furthest away place I’d ever been to at that age.

My favourite tea was, perhaps unsurprisingly, the Nonpareil Te Gong Huang Shan Mao Feng. The phrase “nonpareil” (without equal) tends to be used to denote things of superior quality so I guess it isn’t odd that I found it the best. I used the tea which sounded the “least exclusive” in my recipe below – the Bi Luo Chun, but I was drinking it while I was making the jam as well and also found it had a lovely clean flavour – probably the most refreshing out of them all, which is why I think it went so well with the jam.

In any event, Alison kindly offered to also sponsor a giveaway (well, three actually). Three people will each win the following:

Premium Dragon Well Long Jing Green Tea (7g x 2)
Bi Luo Chun Green Tea (Pi Lo Chun) (7g x 2)
Huang Shan Mao Feng Green Tea (5g x 2)
Premium Jasmine Dragon Pearls Green Tea (7g x 2)
Peach Jasmine Dragon Pearl Green Tea (7g x 2)

To enter, simply do the following:

Required

Leave a comment below

For optional, additional entries

Subscribe to my mailing list (signup form at the top and bottom of the page), then leave a comment to let me know you’ve done so.
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The winners will be selected randomly using random.org (based by comment number) and announced in a post on the 25th of June. Winners will then have 24 hours (from the time the post is first published) to get in touch with me. If they don’t then a new winner(s) will be selected.

Best of luck to everyone, and I hope you enjoy the physalis and green tea jam!

Yields 1

Physalis and Green Tea Jam

A fragrant, delicately flavoured jam, with background hints of green tea.

5Prep Time

5Cook Time

10Total Time

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Ingredients

200g Physalis
120g Jam-making Sugar
120ml strong Green Tea

Instructions

Start off by thoroughly washing a small, empty conserve jar and lid. Preheat your oven to 150 degrees celsius and place the jar and lid into the hot oven for about 10 minutes to sterilize it.
Remove the papery leaves from the physalis and then wash them, before cutting each one in half.
Place into a small pan and add the green tea. Cover and simmer for about 3 - 5 minutes, until the physalis have started to soften a little more.
Add the sugar and bring to the boil. Boil the jam for about 5 minutes before gently pouring into the sterilized, and still quite hot, conserve jar.
Seal immediately, and allow to cool before enjoying.

Notes

The jam is great as a topping for toast or english muffins, but goes equally well with bread and cheese.

https://homesweetsweden.com/physalis-green-tea-jam/

Jun 09 2014

Fried Brie – a.k.a. “When life gives you lemons… er… Brie”

I’m a person that likes to complain. A lot. Indeed, my poor wife likes to mock me because about one out of every five things I say begins with the phrase “Do you know what really annoys me?”. Of course the usual response to that is a heavy sigh and an eye-roll, followed by “No darling, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”. What can I say? Some people are perpetually positive, and some people are more “glass half-empty”.

I’ll share my latest gripe with you, dear readers, since I’m sure you’re very eager to know. You’d think I’d just be happy that the darkness has gone; that summer is here; that the temperatures are in excess of a balmy 32 degrees every day or so. Well, I am, but I have a big problem. It’s not the perma-daylight that keeps me awake. It’s not the rooster which starts crowing at 3.30am, right when I’m about to finally drift off. No, it’s mosquitoes.

I knew about these obnoxious little trolls long before I came here. I knew they were prolific in summer, and of course they exist in France, but here… they’re just everywhere! Obviously, it doesn’t help that we live next to the forest and not far from a river – both prime breeding grounds for the little suckers, but after spending a weekend in the garden I’ve got about forty bites. Not cool. I have a bad habit of scratching them which ends up making the bite areas huge and inflamed. Bleurgh. Still – to end that little digression on a positive note though, I am thankful that at least I’m living in a part of the world which has a good handle on malaria and yellow fever and the like, so I don’t need to worry about catching something like that from the blood-sucking little parasites.

I did mention being in the garden though – I’ve now planted most things outside. All that remains is the potatoes, and I’m just waiting a few more days for those. The final list is marrowfat peas, leeks, beetroot, runner beans, some sort of red lettuce thing (whose name I can’t remember at all), tomatoes, red peppers, espelette peppers, cucumbers and squash. The potatoes that I’ll be growing are Blue Congo and Apache – sorry about the first link, I couldn’t find any English wiki link about the potato. Here’s one side of the greenhouse after my mosquito-filled weeding and planting session on Saturday.

Elsewhere in the garden, William enjoys helping out with the watering…

When you’ve spent a whole weekend digging, weeding, getting stung by nettles and bitten by evil insects then I think you could say you’ve earned a little rest, right? What better way to relax than with some coffee and cake by the river.

On to the food! I was shopping recently and saw an entire wheel of brie for half price (because it was approaching its “sell by” date – something I always find hilarious with cheese, since it’s probably been sitting on a shelf in a cellar in France somewhere for 6 months before even being shipped to Sweden). So home I went with this massive, calorie-laden disc and then I got a bit stuck as to what I could do with it.

Something I hadn’t made in absolutely years was fried brie (I think the “traditional” version of this dish uses camembert but I’m not such a fan of the stuff). In any case, fried brie makes an absolutely fantastic starter, or even as an hors d’oeuvre if you make the pieces bite-sized. Personally, we ate it as a main course. We didn’t want anything too carby or too filling, and so while this is quite a decadent dish, if you eat it as your only course it really is just the right amount.

I served it with some pea sprouts which I’d seen in the store recently, which were absolutely delicious, and of course a nice bit of redcurrant jelly (or lingonberry jam if you have it!).

Serves 2

Fried Brie

A crispy panko shell, concealing hot, melted brie, combined with a tart redcurrant or lingonberry jam makes fried brie a perfect starter or even a main course.

5Prep Time

5Cook Time

10Total Time

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Ingredients

2 x 150g pieces of Brie
40g Panko Breadcrumbs
3tbsps Plain Flour
1 Egg
2tbsps Redcurrant Jelly

You'll also need~200ml sunflower or canola oil for frying

Instructions

Mix the panko and flour together in a bowl.
Place the oil into a large frying pan and put on the stove to heat up. While the oil is heating, crack the egg into another bowl and whisk up to combine the yolk and white.
Turn each piece of brie over in the egg until all sides are coated and then roll in the panko and flour mixture.
Roll the panko covered brie again in the egg and then roll a second time in the panko and flour, being sure to completely cover any gaps.
Once the oil has reached about 150 degrees Celsius, place the brie into the frying pan and fry for a minute or so on all sides, until golden brown all over.
Serve immediately with the redcurrant jelly.

Notes

If you find that your brie is quite ripe and runny, even before frying, then place it into the freezer for 30 minutes before making the dish. Lingonberry jam can also be used in place of redcurrant jelly. Anything which has a tart flavour goes very well with the full flavour of the brie. To pad the dish out into a main meal, serve along with something like, as per the photo, a spinach salad, fresh steamed asparagus and pea shoots, with a twist of lemon and a simple olive oil and balsamic vinegar drizzle.

https://homesweetsweden.com/fried-brie-aka-when-life-gives-lemons/

Jun 02 2014

Cheap Asparagus Soup

Hi everyone, I’ll be making a really cheap asparagus soup today but before I get to that I thought I’d give you all a brief update of what’s going on here.

Well, let’s see now – not a huge deal to be honest. Things are ticking along much as they always do. The days are getting shorter and shorter and “darkness” is but a distant memory right now. It never gets dark at the moment. It will get a little more “dusky” between 11pm and 1am, but still not very dark. I couldn’t sleep the other night and went down to get a sandwich at 3am. I was met with the sun streaming in through the window, fairly high in the sky.

On the 22nd of June it will be the longest day – the sun will “set” at 11.30pm, and come right back up again at 1.46am, giving us a day-length of 21 hours, 44 minutes. I’d like to say that I have no problem sleeping, but it’s not easy. Time to invest in some light-killing curtains and turn my bedroom into a black-hole every night I think!

Since the soup I made for today’s recipe isn’t very pretty, I thought I’d show you all a passion flower as well, from a plant I recently gave to my mother-in-law. The flowers only last for a day, but the little plant I bought has already had three gorgeous flowers!

Cheap Asparagus Soup

On to the soup though; we’ve been eating a fair bit of asparagus recently since it’s been available for a very low price. I always feel bad about the woody ends which I snap off though since they too have plenty of flavour in. They’re just cast aside because the texture leaves a bit to be desired. What better thing to do than turn them into a soup? If you have a fair bit of asparagus then save those stems – you can chuck them into a soup like this and get an asparagus soup for next to nothing!

Serves 2

Cheap Asparagus Soup

Cheap Asparagus Soup is made from the stems of asparagus which normally get discarded, meaning it can be made for next to nothing!

20Prep Time

20Cook Time

45Total Time

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Ingredients

The tough, woody parts of ~21 Asparagus spears
1 large potato
1 large onion
1tbsp Olive Oil
500ml vegetable stock
Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

Start off by washing and peeling the asparagus stalks and peeling the potato as well. Chop the potato into large chunks.
Peel and finely chop the onion and heat the olive oil in a large saucepan. When hot, add in the chopped onion and sauté lightly until turning golden in colour.
Add the chopped potato and prepared asparagus to the saucepan and add enough stock to just cover the vegetables.
Cover the pan and bring to the boil before lowering the heat and simmering for about 20 minutes, until the potato and asparagus is nice and soft.
Purée until smooth and sieve if desired. Season with salt and pepper to taste and enjoy.

Notes

By the time it's boiled up, most of the asparagus is quite tender, but if you are sensitive to texture then consider pressing the soup through something like a conical sieve to ensure all fibrous pieces are removed. The soup has a mild flavour which goes very well with something fresh tasting - lemon juice, sour cream or crème fraîche all work well.

https://homesweetsweden.com/cheap-asparagus-soup/