Swedish Beer - Part VI / Yule Ales

Living now in Sweden, I expected certain traditions regarding Christmas and beer to be observed. I was not let down. After I returned from Brazil, Systembolaget had rearranged some of their goods to make space for a few shelves dedicated to Christmas beers. Anticipating pre-Christmas visitors I picked up a handful.


Åbro Julbock didn't quite live up to my expectations - while it was dark and clearly in the style of Scandinavian Christmas beers in general, it seemed lacking in taste when compared to the two excellent Christmas beers from Nynäshamn Ångbryggeri and Nils Oscar. The Winter Ale from Oppigård was a pleasant surprise: true to its name, and unlike the others it is actually an ale.

Jackfruit

I recently went to Brazil and one of the cities I visited was the city of Ribeirão Preto, in what was once the heartland of Brazilian coffee production. Now, according to locals, the only coffee trees that remain in Riberão Preto are those separating the two directions of traffic down the middle of Avenida do Café. On the grounds of what used to be one of the very largest coffee plantations in Brazil, but which now belongs to the Ribeirão Preto campus of USP (Universidade de São Paulo), one finds the Plínio Travassos dos Santos municipal museum and it's direct neighbour, the Coronel Fransisco Schmidt coffee museum.

Shortly after entering the municipal museum a lady working there inquired as to my origin, and my attempts to explain Sweden were initially stumped by my lack of proficiency in Portuguese (as far as I could understand the only language she spoke). Then when I found the museum's collection of coins which contained a few Swedish coins, I was able to tell her Suécia. After trying to explain to me some details of a painting of the coffee plantation that used to be there she gave up on me for a while, only to come to me later to make sure that I also visited the neighbouring coffee museum.

Guiding me through the garden towards the coffee museum, she suddenly pointed to some rather large fruits sitting several meters up a tree in the garden and exclaimed "Jaca". Judging alone by size of the fruits I guessed that these might be jackfruits - which is correct according to wikipedia. Not thinking much more of it I entered and quickly toured the coffee museum. The quickness of my tour was due mainly to (a) the relatively modest size of the coffee museum (b) my poor ability to read Portuguese (even if better than my ability to speak it) - more so than the fact that I don't actually drink coffee. Upon exiting the coffee museum, I found my new friend approaching with a plate of palish yellow pieces of fruit flesh.. yes, it was time for me to taste the jackfruit.

My new friend proceeded to show me how each seed sits in a coat of fruit flesh, which can be torn from the fruit and eaten. It was quite sweet and personally I rather liked it.

Bowmore Laimrig

As it turns out this purchase was more special than I realised at first.

Passing the shelf with whiskey, someone nudged me and asked if I didn't want a bottle. Well .. put like that .. how could I not? I glanced over the selection.. what to choose: something new or an old favourite?

When I did pick Bowmore Laimrig, it was based partly on my previous experience with Bowmore and partly on the lovely amber colour. Little did I know that what I was buying was something I couldn't have bought any old place: Bowmore Laimrig is made especially for the Swedish market and is sold exclusively by Systembolaget.

The beautiful colour that caught my attention in the first place is no doubt influenced by the two-stage ageing: first in old bourbon casks and then in old Oloroso sherry casks. The latter of these is likely what lends the taste a particularly smooth edge - the smokiness comes out much in the after-taste in this one.

Liver with Bacon and Capers

Not so long ago I went out for lunch. My eyes scanned the short menu and upon seeing the 'Veal liver with bacon and capers in red wine sauce' there was no turning back. I had to try that. And after trying it, I had to make it myself as well.

Ingredients:
- potatoes
- green beans
- 1 large onion, sliced
- 50 g (2 oz) thinly sliced bacon
- 650 g (1.4 lbs) beef liver, sliced
- salt & pepper
- 1 dL (¹/₂ cup) red wine
- 1 dL (¹/₂ cup) cream
- capers
salad:
- lettuce
- baby plum tomatoes
- pea sprouts

I started by preparing the salad, then rinsed the potatoes and boiled them in lightly salted water. The green beans were boiled in lightly salted water in a separate pot (on account of needing less time).

The bacon was fried till nicely crisp, then removed from the pan and chopped - in the same pan, the liver slices were fried with salt and pepper. When the liver slices were done, they were removed from the pan, and the onion rings were caramelized - then removed. Lastly, the red wine was added to the pan, allowed to concentrate a little before adding the cream to obtain a sauce.

The fried liver slices were served with bacon bits and capers on top. The potatoes with onion rings, and red wine-cream sauce, green beans and salad on the side. And a glass of the red wine..

Next time, I think I'll try a different approach with the red wine sauce - it wasn't bad, but it wasn't quite like the one I had at the restaurant either..

Black Balzam

Having noted my taste in various spirits, a friend of mine picked my a bottle of this potion when he went to Riga this summer.

I hadn't heard of it before, and so was intrigued. Turns out its a herbal bitter - think along the lines of Gammel Dansk, Jägermeister, or Killepitsch.

I was also happy see that someone out there is keeping alive the old tradition of selling spirits in earthenware bottles.

Potato Pizza 2

We read about a variation on this concept .. and realised it was sufficiently different to merit a post on its own. I think the two are equally good - just different.

Ingredients:
- pizza dough
- olive oil
- 2 yellow onions, finely diced
- 1 clove garlic, crushed
- fresh thyme
- salt & pepper
- 8 potatoes, thinly sliced
after baking:
- parmigiano reggiano, freshly grated
for serving:
- fresh arugula (rocket)

The finely diced onions were caramelized in a little olive oil together with crushed garlic, fresh thyme, salt and pepper - then set aside.

The pizza dough was parted in two portions and each was rolled aided by durum flour.

Each pizza was topped with a layer of caramelized onions, then potato slices and sprinkled with oil, salt and pepper.

After baking the pizzas were sprinkled with more fresh thyme and freshly grated parmigiano reggiano - and served with a little fresh arugula.

Danish Beer - Part VI / Bear Beer II

Danish brewery Harboe's is probably most famous for Bjørnebryg^[1] - which would translate as 'Bear Brew', but in the US I saw it sold under the name 'Bear Beer' (in Trader Joe's) - with the trademark polar bear on the label. Interestingly, when I bought Bjørnebryg in the US it was probably the first time in my life I ever bought it - and mainly for warped nostalgic/patriotic reasons. Thing is - to my mind Bjørnebryg has a rather dismal reputation: it's not famous for being a particularly good beer, but much more so for being a relatively cheap strong beer (traditionally 7.7% ABV). In short, it has the reputation of being a beer for alcoholics.


But if Bjørnebryg's raison d'être is it's comparatively good alcohol/price ratio rather than the taste experience itself, then that begs the question of why the Swedes seem to want a low-alcohol content version of that beer? While Systemet sells Bjørnebryg holding 7.2% ABV, some Swedish supermarkets sell a version with 2.8% ABV. Naturally, I was intrigued. Unfortunately, as I expected, there is no good reason for buying this beer. And the real one is so intensely alcoholic that I ended up mixing the two for a more drinkable (if not memorable) compromise.

^[1] While Danish brewery Carlberg also sells a strong beer leaning on the imagery of the raw power of exotic animals (Carlsberg Elephant Beer, 7.2% ABV) this sales tactics not unique to Danish breweries as witnessed by e.g. the Finnish Kahru and the American Rhino Chasers.

Yggenyk Cookies

When I was a child one of the stories I really enjoyed was the story about the yggenyks (which are three-legged birds) stealing the round tower in Copenhagen. The yggenyks then demanded a ransom of yggenyk cookies for returning the popular tower. The book even had the recipe for authentic yggenyk cookies - complete with a warning not to leave the window open when baking them since yggenyk might get attracted by the lovely scent. I, of course, loved these cookies as a child too.

Earlier this year, I felt like making yggenyk cookies myself and googled the subject. This is when things got complicated. Spellings varied 'yggenyk', 'yggenyg', 'ykkenyk' and I suddenly had three fairly different recipes all claiming to be the recipe for authentic yggenyk cookies. The three recipes were quite similar except for a few key issues: one didn't include eggs (seemed at the very least unusual), another didn't include any obvious leavening agent, while the last one called for both eggs and hartshorn.^[1]

It seemed the confusion stemmed at least partly from the fact that the author had in fact given two different recipes for authentic yggenyk cookies - one in the book I remembered, and another one in the book in which the yggenyks steal the queen's palace in Copenhagen demanding a cookie ransom (yes, a fairly similar plot).

After discussing the matter with my external consultant^[2] I opted for the recipe including both eggs and hartshorn... and was somewhat disappointed with the resulting cookies. They were not as hard as I remembered them, and in hindsight I guess I used too much hartshorn (the recipe calls for 'a pinch'^[3]). Some time went by and I tried again - the result was better, but still not quite to my satisfaction. On the third attempt I was finally learning to use sufficiently little hartshorn for the cookies not to rise too much.

Ingredients:
- 250 g (9 oz) granulated sugar
- 250 g (9 oz) margarine, chunks
- 100 g (3.5 oz) dark chocolate chopped
- 3 eggs
- pinch of salt
- pinch of hartshorn
- 500 g (18 oz) flour
optional coating:
- 130 g (4.5 oz) milk chocolate

The margarine was cut in chunks and worked into the sugar using a ladle.^[4] The eggs were stirred in one by one, and then the chopped dark chocolate. Salt and hartshorn were added and lastly the flour was stirred in in three portions.

The dough was rolled into 50 balls which were placed on two baking sheets and baked sequentially on the top rack at 200 C (400 F) for 16 minutes each. Once out of the oven the cookies were transferred to a rack to cool.

The cooled cookies were flipped upside down and the bottoms were coated with melted milk chocolate (melted with three 20 second pulses in the microwave oven). The milk chocolate was allowed to harden before storing in cookie tins.


The resulting cookies were much like I remembered them (if still less hard), although the grown-up me has to concede it's basically just a chocolate chip cookie. I'm not sure I'd bother with the milk chocolate bottom coating next time - it didn't add that much to the overall result.

^[1] Hartshorn = Ammonium bicarbonate (aka 'powdered baking ammonia').
^[2] i.e. my mom.
^[3] In Danish 'a pinch' is 'en knivspids' - i.e. "as much as lies on the tip of a knife".
^[4] This part is clearly easier if the margarine is allowed to warm to room temperature first.

Green Enchiladas with Prawns and Chèvre

I admit it: when I was living in California, I neglected enchiladas. Why? I'm not sure, I was vaguely aware that they existed, but for some reason I underestimated their potential. Last year I realised this had been a mistake when I went to dinner at a friend's place and had some enchiladas there. Then I kinda forgot about it for a while, until I saw a recipe for green enchiladas in bon appetit, but thought I couldn't do anything about it as I hadn't seen tomatillos anywhere since leaving California. But recently I found some at a market right here in Stockholm, and here follows the result.

Ingredients:
- 12 tortillas (medium sized)
salsa verde:
- 4 tomatillos
- 7 jalapeño peppers
- 2 cloves garlic
- juice of 1 lime
- salt
filling:
- 400-500 g (1 lb) tiger prawns
- 1-2 tsp ground cumin
- 1 large red onion
- small bunch fresh oregano
- 2 jalapeño peppers
- 8 scallions, chopped
- 150 g (¹/₃ lb) chèvre
topping:
- 1 bunch cilantro
- 1 avocado

I started with the salsa verde:
The tomatillos were de-husked, rinsed and boiled for 15 minutes, then blended with crushed garlic, jalapeño peppers, lime juice and a little salt.

The prawns were fried with ground cumin, then added onion boats, oregano, and finely chopped jalapeño peppers.

The bottom of an oven-proof tray was coated with a little less than half the salsa verde.
Working one at the time, the tortillas were added a line of prawn-onion mixture down the middle, then added chopped scallion and a little chèvre. The tortilla was then rolled and placed in the tray. The tray was nicely filled up once all the tortillas were rolled and the rest of the salsa verde was spread over them. They were baked at 200 C (400 F) for 20 minutes.

The enchiladas were served with freshly chopped cilantro and avocado wedges.

Delicious! Now I really want to make more enchiladas...

Grilled Zucchini & Eggplant Pizza

Although I was quite happy with the recipe for pizza dough I picked up recently, one tiny detail did bother me: That the dough has to stand and rise for an hour makes for some rather late dinners if I make the dough when I come home from work.

So, I started thinking: what happens if I make the dough the evening before? Will it work? Or does yeast dough 'un-rise' if left for too long?

Well, only one way to find out.

The dough was mixed and kneaded just like in the other recipe, but after coating the ball of dough in a little olive oil and placing it in a bowl under film it was left standing overnight. The next morning the dough was parted in two equal portions, each wrapped in film and stored in the fridge until after work. The doughs were rolled with a little durum flour as usual - and the result was just as great as always. So, now the question is: for how long can I store pizza dough in the fridge?

Anyway - this batch was topped with:
- tomato sauce
- mozzarella, sliced
- black olives, sliced
- 1 eggplant, sliced and broiled
- 1 zucchini, sliced and broiled
after baking sprinkled:
- salt
- pepper
- dried oregano
- fresh rocket salad
served with:
a glass of Chilean Errariuz Pinot Noir - a very smooth red wine