Accepting No Excuses

Needless to say, I'm really no big fan of this dreadful commercial festivity of love. For someone like me who doesn’t consume anything sweet, this day is just filled with big no-nos in all possible ways. Food-wise it's ridiculous: Heart shaped cupcakes, kitsch wrapped chocolates, creamy and puffy pastries; I've even encountered a heart shaped steak once! What a waste of perfectly fine meat I’d say…

However, there’s something about love and food that naturally goes hand in hand. I mean only the act of eating together in many cultures is the number one sign of intimacy and bonding and it is often a mutual slipper slope to other more sexual activities. C’mon, passion and lust (and love) are embedded in good food! But really, why go and make a mockery of your loved one by letting him/her cut in to a heart shaped Tournedos?! It’s just plain stupid if you ask me. A real sign of devotion and love is to cook for your loved one yourself. Now I’m sure there a bunch of lazy-asses or people calling themselves horrible cooks who would oppose, but I have to say in my defense that love really does make you do things you would never do otherwise! That is what I call Valentine’s Day spirit.

And of course I’ve got a personal story for you, otherwise it would be too easy to sit here and speak for almost anything hypothetical. A couple of years back, no, six years back I think it was, I was already a huge gourmade and on top of that I was IN LOVE big time. Back then, Valentine’s Day still meant something to me. It was a special day where any act of love however absurd, overwhelming or cheesy, was fully legitimate and welcome. I had all kinds of romantic images in my head of a five-course meal in a classy restaurant, but considering our age and our economic misery, we wouldn’t even have been able to order a decent glass of red. Let’s say that fantasy had to be postponed to the remote future back then. But I certainly wasn’t ready to give up the thought of being served a romantic meal though, and I damn sure didn’t want to be covered in food stains when I for once had planned on wearing a little sexy dress and be all girly and pretty to please my boyfriend. Solution: I decided that he would be the chef for the night. See that’s the great thing about teenage love. You were actually able to command our loved one and he would do what ever you asked for. ­Good old time…

My ex, poor fellow, was everything but a cook – seriously. I remember his Dad even pealing the oranges for him (maybe that was simply because he was too lazy…anyway)! But to my astonishment he fully accepted the challenge. I was ecstatic! Maybe now he finally would realize how much work and effort a home cooked meal actually takes and he would finally appreciate all my works of art that he had gobbled up in matter of seconds without even recognizing whether it was chicken or beef he was eating.

He started stressing a week ahead it seemed and when D-day arrived he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. I felt bad. Maybe it would be best if I took over after all. He was somewhat of a sore looser so there was no way he would admit defeat before even having attempted the task. Three hour before dinnertime he asked me to leave the house. I delightedly followed his orders. As I kissed his goodbye and wished him good luck, I couldn’t help but feeling warm inside when I noticed the stack of recipes he had ripped out from magazines and printed out from the internet. I felt special and loved, what more could I have asked for.

Three hours later I was welcomed back to the house. It smelled amazing! Of course there were some bubbly wine, roses and a heart shaped card, but that was not the point. The point was that he had done it! A three-course meal was about to be served and all I had to do is sit and look pretty. Everything tasted divine! Plus he really hadn’t taken the easy way out. And this was a young man who honestly couldn’t cook for the love of God! 

So there you go, I won’t accept any more excuses – ever. If you haven’t made reservation in a restaurant that doesn’t serve lame-ass Valentine’s Day specials, cancel your reservation and google a few yummy recipes on your lunch break and on your way home drop by the nearest well equipped grocery store. I bet my head on it that you will get lucky!

Reveal Yourself

Have you ever thought about what happens to food and the raw materials when they're being cooked? Have you ever pondered what a specific  way of preparation means and signals? Have you ever realized that when food is cooked and prepared it gets a label and it carries a marker of something? Known for his famous work Physiologie du goût (Physiology of Taste) published in 1825, epicure and gastronome Jean-Anthelme Brilliat-Savarin said "Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you who you are". Do you think the food you cook tells the others the truth about you?

I've many times thought about what kind of image and idea I convey of myself through my cooking, my food preferences and my eating habits. I've always considered myself as a very incoherent eater, but maybe I do, after all, follow certain patterns.

It's fascinating to see the variety of dishes the exact same ingredients and raw materials can result in when they're being cooked by different people with different culinary backgrounds. We turn food into cuisine with our hands. I for sure would love to base my understanding of another person solely on his/her eating and cooking! I wonder what I could find out only based on a cooked dish. Food habits and preferences matter and what a person decides to eat and how he cooks his food could definitely give off some interesting secrets.

I wonder how close to reality a judgement made through food could be. Could I tell whether it's a man or a woman, a Swede or an Englishman, whether the person is young or old, fit or unhealthy…Some elements are certainly more obvious than others. Anyone who has worked as a waiter in a restaurant knows this. At some point you just know who ordered what. But not everything is as clear. And I'm sure each and everyone of us has some very contradictory and incoherent vices.

I have a feeling that naming a person's cultural background based on his cooking and food preferences might be a bit trickier. It's not like food stays within any cultural boundaries nowadays. Besides, how much do we know about foreign countries' cuisines except for the common stereotypes? A year and half ago, I was jumping up and down of joy when I first found out that I'd be living with a Greek when moving to Sweden. I had always wanted to learn how to make an authentic Moussaka. Turned out the only thing that Greek ate was hamburgers and other junk food! I think this proves my point.

But if we stick to cultural markers only, not only do we eat foods from many different countries, but our eating habits can have multi- and/or transcultural origins. Until recently, I was sure that the Finns could boast with being the only people to make smoked cheese. A while ago a friend of mine living in Vigo, in Spain made me try a Galician speciality, smoked cheese – Another one bites the dust.

So if it's no longer what you eat that reflects your cultural origins, I'd like to suggest that it's the way you cook and prepare food that still can reveal your cultural identity. I'm saying this because a few days ago as I was watching a cooking program on TV, I realized that it's enough that you add one crucial ingredient or do something that no one else would do and you're busted. The chef on TV was showing how to make fajitas. I was surprised, a Finnish TV chef preparing fajitas in February, ok, why not. The ingredients he would use all seemed to respect the authentic recipe. And then as he had almost convinced me, he blew it.  I quote "in order to make it easier and faster" (to two 'musts' in Finnish everyday cooking) he empties a plastic bag of deep-frozen mixed "Mexican" veggies on the frying pan together with the ready sliced and ready marinated "Taco & Fajitas" chicken slices. Sigh.

In some strange way you just got to love it though. I mean it's simply a means to make an otherwise pretty foreign dish seem more familiar. In the best of cases, the Finn eating the Finnish fajitas à la Finnish TV chef might one day have the will to try the real thing because he got a "smooth landing" to a whole new world of tastes through the version suitable for Finnish taste. One sure can hope for the best.

Am I What I Eat?

 There are many sayings related to food and I regard many of them as essential spices of my daily vocabulary. To use food and kitchen terminology in other registers and contexts is not only fun, but also very metaphorical and figurative. There’s especially one saying that I have stumbled upon recurrently these past few days.

“We Are What We Eat”, that’s what they say, don’t they? I’ve learned that the food you eat can not only reveal your tastes, but even your gender, ethnicity, social status, cultural traditions and the list goes on. But of course the saying is usually employed when promoting healthy eating habits. Come to think of it, if I am what I eat, then I have to say I’m a pretty scrumptious person: I love eating delicious, honest, flavorful and fresh food! Jokes aside, I honestly believe the food I eat is both healthy and appetizing at the same time. Sometimes however, I just can’t help myself and my lust for all those special treats take over my will of being healthy and in control!

There’s someone in particular who almost always brings out the true gourmande in me. Let me introduce my favorite partner in crime Tif – a fabulous woman who has inspired me through her many exotic recipes and taste combinations, a loyal friend who’ll always sneak to the fridge with you for that last little bite... When we’re together we certainly are what we eat! We turn into spring rolls, pannacottas, goat cheese filled duck breasts, you name it. We even manage to turn into human sushi – don’t ask. But still, there’s one thing we most certainly become and that is cheese!

We both returned to our parents’ houses for Christmas, Tif to Central France and me to Southern Finland. We then reunited for New Year’s in Strasbourg where we’ve lived together a while ago. We didn’t really have time to plan ahead, but I trusted my intuition that we’d have  a “mutual understanding” on things anyway. And did we have a mutual understanding alright!

I arrived to my ex-home in Strasbourg with my bag full of goodies. As special treat with love from Finland just for Tif, 1 and a 1/2 kg of leipäjuusto – a Finnish oven baked cheese she has had a love affair with since 2 years and still going strong. Six hours later Tif arrived. She only needed to unzip her backpack and I already understood. She took out a huge plastic container, opened it and the source for the smell was immediately located. Tif and her Dad are always very generous with food gifts, but never before had I’ve had the immediate access to such a quantity of fine artisan cheese! One cheese among the many, the Salers was an especially enchanting encounter. If Tif has given her heart to leipäjuusto than I’ve even named myself after the Salers cheese. I took it as my pseudo-French surname to avoid sort of “misunderstandings” connected to my Finnish one that’s how much I love it!

Accompanied by nice bottle of Cahors, our favorite red, we dug in. Bonsoir Cantal, salut cher Rocamadour, comment vas-tu Saint-Nectaire, ça fait longtemps Bleue d’Auvergne… Ah, it felt like home. As I was about to savor a nice big chunk of Salers, I took a moment of silence. After all, I was about to take the “We are what we eat” to a whole other level. The moments of metamorphosis has to be crystallized. I no longer only bare its name, I truly turned into Salers. I think I’ve answered my question.

                                                Mini Teeny Tiny

As those of you who follow culinary trends know, mini is the new maxi. And no wonder, small is cute. There’s no doubt about it. Girls and women go AWWWWW pouting their lips, making that certain face... They just can’t help it. Neither can I to be quite honest. Bakeries have started making tiny cup cakes, mini tarts, mini what-have-you instead of rather unaesthetic overly big versions. In my opinion, it’s all for the best. Firstly, mini pastries and desserts are awfully cute and tempting. Secondly, you don’t feel half as bad after eating them. And thirdly, it might come as a surprise to those of you with a severe sweet tooth, but one or two bites maximum will do the trick most of the time. All in all, perfect I would say!

We decided to skip the traditional Christmas food this year. It’s a bit boring, it’s heavy and no one in my family is especially fond of it. Not a big loss, in other words. Of course I had ideas for the whole alternative Christmas menu, but there was something teeny tiny that I really wanted to do and Christmas would be the perfect occasion to carry it through. So even though there won’t be a traditional Christmas meal in my house this year, we’ll certainly be very full and very satisfied anyway.

A festive meal prepared with love will for sure guarantee the satisfaction, but the whole shebang isn’t complete without a dessert.  But what to do – I’m unable to make up my mind and choose one yummy dessert over another! Solution: several mini desserts! Here we go…

I really had trouble choosing four mini desserts out of the million ideas I have in my mind, but I think I nailed it down pretty well. As tonight’s dessert I’ll serve:

Mini cinnamon & orange crème brûlée

Mini blackcurrant-blueberry-Cointreau jelly

Mini gingerbread biscuits with Brie-cheese filling

Mini chocolate truffles with a touch of cardamom & Himalaya salt

I did most of the preparations last night already and it has been hard not give in to a tiny "sneak peak". I hope everything will taste divine because if not, I‘ll be devastated.  I hate to serve something that I myself don’t regard as the best I can do.

Merry (mini) Christmas! Be good to your belly!

To Each His Own

I've eaten some pretty weird things in my life. Taking into account that I've lived four years in Vietnam and travelled  across most on South-East Asia, I feel that I can say 'been there done that' to eating most insects, eye bolls and other less appetizing foods. Best of all, I've learned not to knock it until I've tried it. And I'm happy about that. It would be a shame not to give my taste buds some very exotic and bizarre excitement ever once and a while. Then again, I won't lie and say that I loved eating eye bolls when I was eight years old, but that is a question of taste and preference…As in Swedish "smaken är som baken" (literally: the taste taste is like the bum) - there's no accounting for taste. Eyebolls might be someone favorite food! But when I encountered locos for the first time, I seriously had to pause before putting the thing in my mouth.

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present to you: Locos - strange little creatures of the sea, I must say. Thanks to Wikipedia I can offer you a more descriptive definition:  "Concholepas concholepas, common names the Chilean abalone or loco in Chilean Spanish, is a species of large edible sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk." Apparently, locos are only available in Chile and Peru and there people eat them like tuna. Or something. Now you might wonder why I, physically located in Southern Sweden, managed to get a hold of them. Well, it's a pretty funny story.

Me and my boyfriend were walking home late on a Saturday night after a nice meal accompanied by some nice wine. Even though we were completely full, both of us had a sweet tooth for something. Luckily, we live in a very un-Swedish area in town and noticed that there were many small Oriental grocery shops still open. One shop had a sign saying "Chilean specialities" so picked that one as my boyfriend has been living in Chile and wanted to see what they had to offer. We entered and found all kinds of funny "specialties", all from ahi pebble sauce to mate. As we headed toward the counter, our shopping basked was filled with the most random items. We thought it was hilarious, of course. The wine had probably something to do with it. We were about to pay for all the nonsense we'd most certainly regret buying the following day, as my boyfriend got very excited and grabbed a tin can from the shelf behind the salesman. It was canned locos. At that point I was already completely lost with all the products I had never seen before, but this was beyond all comprehension. The salesman started to eagerly promote the product by explaining that "it's very good for men".  Oh haven't I heard that one before. In Vietnam they made the Western men eat almost anything by guaranteeing "it's good for men". Usually it was just a funny practical joke to see how the idiot tourist would seconds after swallowing puke is brains out because of the nasty thing he just ate… My boyfriend got so convinced that he took two cans. Turned out locos were not just "good for men", but also worth a fortune. Kindly, without a word, he paid for his locos and turned to me and said: "They better be amazingly good!".

Three months later, the locos were still sitting put on the shelf where we had placed them that night my boyfriend spent a fortune on  some weird sea snails. I knew that we had to start packing all our stuff in boxes in a couple of days because our current rental contract is about to come to an end. It was a perfect deadline for eating the slimy delicacies. We decided to serve them as a side snack for the welcome toast I'd do for our Finnish pikku joulu (little Christmas) party the next day. Glögg and locos - the combo of the year - would definitely bring our party to an excellent start.

Minutes before our friends came over, I opened the can of locos. As soon as I saw the creatures in their juice and took a closer look at them, I knew there would be a risk of me I not being able to appreciate them in the way I probably should. It happened to me once preparing a whole goose. When you yourself are the one doing all the sometimes a bit nasty preparations, you end up not being able to block those images from your thoughts and end up not being able to enjoy the end result. Well, that happened to me this time. I simply couldn't get over the fact that the locos very accurately resembled something I'd rather not eat… You can make your own judgement based on the photo.

Although I wasn't going to enjoy it fully myself, I proudly presented the little pre-appetizer snack to my guests. But because of my rather bawdy humor, I simply had to crack a stupid joke. I couldn't help myself. See I served the locos cut in smaller pieces so it wasn't that obvious what they had looked like before. Turned out, I ruined the tasting for some, but made it even more enjoyable for others. Fair enough.

One shouldn't argue on matters of likes and dislikes, even though someone not liking something as delicious as garlic or mushrooms might seem almost like a blasphemy for a foodie. Neither should you knock it until you've tried it, may I add in defense. Even though the locos look a bit shady, they actually taste rather good. I'm sure that when freshly prepared, they're even better. When I'll one day travel to Chile I'll definitely have another go, I swear. To each his own!

Sausages! Sausages! Sausages!

There are many foods that are totally underrated and misunderstood if you ask me. Some because they're too ancient, or because they're no longer considered “sexy”, trendy and/or healthy enough – Others simply because the contemporary version of the product is a far cry from the real thing, from what it once used to be. Some foods make comebacks though, like different root vegetables and beats have done recently. This winter gourmet chefs in played around with the wonderfully coloured different beetroots for example. And to think that root veggies used to be labelled as poor man's food… I guess it also comes down to demand, supply and availability. If there's too much of something and its value therefore declines, it's no longer as exceptional and fancy, trendy and cool.

Judging by the title of this post, I'm obviously talking about sausages in particular. I, myself come from a country that truly has its own idea of what a sausage should be like. To give you an idea, our most eaten sausage might as well be classified as pastry! How on Earth? Because, the beloved HK Sininen Lenkki® consists of only 43% meat. The rest? Don't even get me started. Let's just say it's everything but a sausage if you ask me. 'Sausage' in Finland means something completely different than sausage in Southern Europe for example. Sausages in Finland are seen as fatty, nasty and uninteresting food par excellence. It's only in the summer that the makkara seriously takes over the nation.

I have always liked sausages of different sorts. And as the selection and availability of all kinds of sausages from all over the world get bigger and better, I'm even more convinced about my love for them.

Today, on December 6th, I celebrated Finland's Independent's Day - in Sweden. I told my flatmate that in Finland we usually eat a Finnish type of knackwurst called nakki with potato salad and stick Finnish flags on toothpicks on everything… We weren’t going to do that this time, but still I insisted on having some kind of sausages. I was busy at work, so the only guideline I gave her when she went grocery shopping was: “Get real sausages with 80% meat minimum”. As she's a big meat lover, I knew I could trust her.

She didn't let me down, that I can assure. The smell captured me already at the first floor (we live on 4th) as I entered the building after a long day at work. Floor by floor, the smell got better and better. Real, meaty, smoked sausages awaited me! I crammed the key into the keyhole and ran into the kitchen. There they were, nicely side-by-side, sizzling on the oven grill. Dark red-brownish, meaty sausages, “They're Slovenian, are you satisfied?”, my flatmate asked with a smile on her face. Was I satisfied?! I was exultant!

I've tasted some pretty awesome sausages in my days, but these particular ones were heavenly, smoky, not too salty, not too spicy, but still had a nice subtle sting to them. I couldn't but write about them and my overall love for good quality sausages. If you think fatty, nasty and unhealthy when you think about sausages, then you're being way too judgmental. Sure sausages are heavy food, but when you're picky enough, I bet you'll be surprised how absolutely fantastic sausages can be. I'm hoping that among you, dear readers there are some loyal sausage fans (excluding vegetarians), but if not, find out if you have a good quality charcuterie in your hometown and go and buy yourself some good sausages. Maybe they'll even have some Slovenian ones. And just for the record, I think sausages are very hip and trendy, but above all, sausages for me represent honest and yummy real food. Plus they're fun and surprisingly easy to make yourself, at home.

Say cheese sausage!

My Thanksgiving II, Here I Come

Thanksgiving – the biggest holiday excuse to eat like a pig. No offense to those of you who define it as something else. I've only celebrated Thanksgiving once in my life so far and I can tell you, it didn't come with a very pleasant ending. 

Last year my favorite American friend Sean invited me to his Thanksgiving dinner. I had no idea what to expect. Basically, the only thing I knew was that there is big fuss around a big turkey; the stuffing, the gravy... I could only think about some B-class 90's sitcom series where the kid in the family crams his head up the turkey's butt, or something like that. Anyway, like I said, no expectations. Sean was kind enough to provide the invited guest with some typical American Thanksgiving recipes so that each guest could both contribute with a dish and understand the essence of the feast: pumpkin pie, brussel sprouts, green beans casserole, etc, etc. Got ya! I, however, decided to be a rebel and bring a Finnish/Swedish Christmasy dish called Janssonin kiusaus instead, literally translated to Jansson's Temptation. A fairly average, oven baked dish composed of thin sliced potatoes, onions, cream and anchovies. 

When I arrived to Sean's place, I immediately got high of all the wonderful smells coming from the Thanksgiving buffet table he had set up. With a smile, Sean invited me to assist and observe him doing the oh so important gravy. D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S! My mouth was watering, I'm sure I was even drooling. 

When the gravy was ready, the feast could start. A feeling of fear, combined with temptation and hunger came over me. I knew it could only end in tears.

After the first round and the first opened button on my jeans, there was no end in sight what so ever. I had to change my approach drastically, otherwise I'd just die. We ate for hours and hours and my belly grew bigger and bigger. At midnight, I had to pull out the white flag. NO. MORE. FOOD. HELP!

I don't know how, but I somehow managed to load myself and my exploding belly on the bus that would take me to my death bed. I know I often say that I had too much food, but this time I was seriously full with a capital F. I think I remember having only tea for lunch for the next couple of days. My very first Thanksgiving 2010 in a nutshell.

...

2011. Another year, another Thanksgiving.  A week ago I got Sean's invitation for the second time around. With a bittersweet smile on my face, I accepted his kind invitation. There was no need to worry, I had evolved, learned from my previous mistakes. I'd be stronger, braver this year. I'd only eat very light a couple of days before D-day and I'd be good to go. Right...

Here I am, 1,5h before the start of Thanksgiving Feast II, writing to you as I'm nibbling on everything I can get my hands on. Shame on me! What else can I do, I've been preparing my contribution to the buffet since 11am and now it's sitting on the stove, looking at me, making me super hungry. "Edith, fight back, be strong!" says my other half. 

I thought writing about it would help, keep my fingers off of it. So far so good. This year, I've made another Finnish classic Kaalikääryleet (stuffed cabbage rolls). Yummy!

With a growing appetite, a strong mind and very big pants, I'll soon take off towards my Thanksgiving adventure II. Wish me luck!