OK, I realise it’s been an insane amount of time since I posted. But I won’t come with all my excuses, instead I’ll just post about the great dinner that I had yesterday at Lux with Anne, Lena and our significant others. A delicious meal with good friends, it can’t get any better!

Lux is a restaurant focusing on Swedish flavours using local producers near Stockholm. As an example the pike we ate was caught by a fisher below the Skuru bridge, just close to where I live. During the meal the dishes were served with detailed descriptions, down to the name of the farmers. I highly recommend a dinner at Lux, especially if you’re a foreigner and want a good Swedish meal since the menus will always be seasonal and local. The tasting menu that we had yesterday is valid for July and August, however they will be closed between July 19th and August 20th.

Starter, not mentioned on the menu. Asparagus in two variants (deep fried and as a crisp) with mayonnaise. Salmon with pickled cucumber. Cucumber juice as palate cleanser. I liked the asparagus the most.

Everyone got something called a pharmacy; a tray with various small bottles and things including a lollipop! Every time we were supposed to use something from the tray we were told by the waiters. After the starter we ate the first thing in the pharmacy, a radish with butter and salt.

Mackerel from the Swedish west coast, spice simmered with lumpfish roe
from Simrishamn, tomato, creamy vinaigrette and poached Grebbestad oyster.
Nice taste but a lot of difficult textures.

Scallops from Fröya, wine boiled and roasted, with Elmsfeuer rhubarb from Gotland, soy dressing, sorrel and rye bread.
Very tasty, the rhubarb and toasted rye bread croutons were a very nice pairing to the rest of the dish.

Next we we’re told to drink our little bottle from our pharmacy. It turned out to be a drink made of Queen of the Meadow (Älgört). It was refreshing and left an aftertaste of buckwheat.

Veal steak from Snällebo, tenderized and lightly grilled with iced celery from Östhammar, raw shaved forest mushroom and parsley cream.
The veal had been tenderized for three weeks and was nice but I don’t think anyone really liked the iced celery.

Close up of the veal.

Close up of the iced celery and the parsley cream. I do wonder who AT is.

Whole primeur chicken from Hagby farm, roasted with steak sauce, spice marinated duck liver, fresh pepper and pickled cabbage.
In the foreground you can see the lollipop from the “pharmacy”.

We were told to use our small grater and the small piece of horseradish that was in our pharmacy.

We got some warm soft bread to scoop up the sauce. Yum! This was the highlight of the savory dishes.

Hornudden’s tomatoes. Basically a cold tomato juice.

Pike from Skurusund in Mälaren, water baked with stuffed zucchini flower, butter seared brill, garden vegetables and fresh herbs.
The pike came in three different variants of which one was a raw cream. I did not like the pike in the zucchini flower, but the brill was tasty.

Frostmofjäll goat cheese from Gullspira farm, in thin slices, with warm goat cheese milk, small pancakes, sorrel and almond cream.
Here we used the maple syrup that hid in the dark bottle with the pipette. Delicious!

An extra dessert not mentioned on the menu. A classical Swedish cheesecake with tangy rhubarb.

A small scoop of ice cream, either bilberry or caramel with the fruit “sprinkles” from our pharmacy. Nice ice cream, but not even near the best I’ve had.

Strawberries from Stenhusegård, juice simmered and chilled with sorbet of Eskesta dairy sour milk, Enskede elderberry and oat muesli.
Strawberries in different variants, including jelly, frozen and compote. Yum!

We had the last dessert and coffee out on the terrace. In the background Chocolate cake Grand Gru with raspberry and marmalade with coconut. In the foreground a lollipop with soft caramel filling.

And some chocolate to the coffee before finalizing with the lollipop from our pharmacy. Through out the dinner we also had different kinds of warm bread, although I did not include them in this post.

I experimented yesterday and did a twist on the traditional mazarins, which are small pastries made of short crust filled with almond paste and then glazed. However I used toasted oat flour and rhubarb instead of normal flour and basic almond paste filling. The toasted out flour provides a lovely nutty flavour that goes very well with the sweetness of the almond paste and the tanginess of the rhubarb.

I made the recipe especially for the contest “Cake of Sweden”. Not only will the winning cake be served at the Shanghai World Expo later this year but the winner will also get to go to Shanghai. I would love to go there, especially since we have a couple of friends there. If you like the recipe, then please vote here .

Toasted oat flour mazarins with rhubarb
(makes 20-25)

Dough:
175 gram cold butter
400 ml wheat flour
300 ml toasted oat flour (skrädmjöl)
100 ml sugar
1 egg
2 tsp water

Filling 1:
300 gram grated almond paste
150 gram butter, at a room temperature
2 eggs
2 tbsp flour

Filling 2:
300 gram pink rhubarb
50 ml sugar

Glaze:
200 ml icing sugar
1 tbsp water
1 tbsp lemon juice

Disposable aluminum pans

Combine all ingredients for the dough quickly in a food processor, adding the egg and water at the end. Chill for at least 1 hour.

Cut the rhubarb in 2 cm wide pieces. Heat with sugar in a pot. Let simmer for 3-4 minutes and let cool.

Blend softened butter with grated almond paste in a food processor until smooth, add each egg separately. Stir in flour.
Preheat convection oven to 175 degrees C.

Roll out the dough, preferable between cling film as it’s rather hard to handle, and cover each pan with dough.

Divide almond paste filling between pans. Divide the rhubarb mix between the pans.

Bake the mazarins on a cookie sheet in the middle part of the oven for about 15 minutes. Let cool.

Sift the sugar for the glaze, stir in water and juice gradually until glaze is smooth and shiny. Spread thinly on cooled mazarins.

A very happy Easter to all of those who celebrate. In Sweden Easter is mainly celebrated on Saturday, and in Poland today on Sunday. Yesterday we went to church with a small basket of food for the traditional blessing of Easter food that is common for Eastern European catholics. We had lamb racks for dinner and today we’re having an Easter “smörgåsbord” with both Polish and Swedish dishes.

I’ve only seen this colour of Le Creuset online earlier, that is until today when I saw it in Lagamati in Stockholm. It’s an adorable and irresistible colour! This oval casserole is standing in my kitchen now and I’m wondering what the premier dish will be. The official name of the colour is cassis and it’s new since this year.

Today is Waffle day in Sweden. I don’t know about other countries but in Sweden it’s very common to buy waffle mixes that you just add some water to before you make your waffles. For years I used the mix without even reflecting on it but nowadays I always make my own batter. It’s simple, delicious and contains no unnecessary additives. I often experiment with different types of flour and in a couple of days I’ll also post a recipe for savoury cheese waffles served with smetana, chopped red onion and caviar! But until then enjoy these waffles with kiwi, passionfruit and ice cream as seen on the photo or the traditional way with whipped cream and jam.

Dagmar’s Waffles
(makes 6-8)

100 gram butter
2 tsp baking powder
200 ml wheat flour
150 ml spelt flour
150 ml milk
250 ml sparkling water (makes the waffles crispier!)

Melt the butter. Combine all ingredients in a bowl, mix with an electric beater until smooth.
Heat your waffle iron.
Pour 75-100 ml of the batter onto the waffle iron and cook until crisp and golden. Serve right away together with whipped cream and jam, or fruit and vanilla ice cream.

NB: This recipe has only been tested with a Swedish waffle iron. Swedish waffle irons make thinner waffles than for example the ones used in Belgium.

Photo from Philipson & Söderberg

I’m waiting impatiently for spring but the whole garden is still completely covered in snow. However last week I got a taste of summer as I got to try the new (for Sweden) sparkling wine Fresita. It’s a lovely sparkling wine with fresh strawberries and it’s all natural without any artificial colourings or flavourings. I really liked it and I’ll definitely keep a bottle or two in the fridge during summer.

Doughnuts that I made some time ago, with various sprinkles and cherry glaze.

I tried a random doughnut recipe and the doughnuts were OK when consumed directly after frying. However two hours later they were really dry. Maybe one of my mistakes were to make them quite small, my doughnut cutter is smallish, but I did fry them rather quick to compensate. Does anyone out there have a great doughnut recipe for fried doughnuts?

I’m basically in Copenhagen every week lately and one of few days in Stockholm I was invited to a lunch arranged by Landrug & Fødevarer, earlier called Danish Meat Association. They had a PR lunch here in Stockholm and had invited René Redzepi, co-owner and chef of Noma, to cook the food. At Noma they focus on food and local ingredients from the Nordic countries, and as René said during his presentation you would for example never find mango on the menu but instead something local. René and his crew prepared 4 dishes for us. All with Danish pork and all very tasty.

First we had savoury aebleskiver. I guess you can easiest describe aebleskiver as doughnut holes or fluffy round pancakes. They are normally served sweet, like this recipe that I’ve posted earlier. These however were filled with pork rilettes and dusted with some kind of vinegar powder instead of the custom confectioner’s sugar.

The second starter was very danish: flaeskesvaer, crispy pork rinds. They had a “Noma” touch and were powdered with lingonberry powder. To this we got a lovely smoked cheese dip.

Next was pickled vegetables and bone marrow served with a very tasty sauce made of roasted ribs. All vegetables were pickled in different marinades. For example the yellow beets were pickled in elderflower marinade.

The last thing we got was slow roasted ribs glazed with hazelnut and mustard seeds. René encouraged us to let out our inner child and eat it with our hands. However I think I and Anne were the only ones doing so :-) The ribs were absolutely the best dish and I had to text my husband saying that I’m now converted. Yes, because I wasn’t that fond of ribs earlier, but these were amazing!

It was an extremely nice lunch, the food was delicious and René was very friendly and had a very nice presentation on Noma and Nordic food. There was also a short presentation by Landbrug & Fødevarer. I still haven’t been able to book a table for dinner at Noma, but hopefully I’ll be lucky one day and until then this lunch will be remembered as a small teaser and preview.

As a contrast to last time’s snow post I thought it would be fun to show you my watermelons that I planted and grew last year. The plants were planted in large pots on the terrace and I pollinated the flowers with a small brush. Both varieties seen on the photos, Sweet Sibirian and Cream of Saskatchewan were supposed to have a final weight of 4.5 kg but ended up very small yet still extremely tasty. It’s quite unusual to grow watermelons in Sweden, especially if you don’t have any greenhouse. It’s hard to say if it was worth the effort since the harvest only resulted in 4-5 tiny watermelons but it was indeed a treat to eat them.