Oscar's two years old birthday

I am getting too slow in writing on the blog, unfortunately, so I miss to write "at the right" time a lot of posts. In reality, I would have still Isabella's four years old birthday to mention, but I feel like that has really lost its timing.
I will try then to pick up with Oscar's two years old birthday. There should be also few things from Christmas to mention, but it feels already too old to be lifted up here.

This Oscar could appreciate already before the party. 

I should focus a bit on TipToi that is absoluted loved by both kids but especially Oscar. He sits for many minutes just exploring the books (this one, with "Woods" as theme is a birthday present) or the game we have. It is a very great toy for our kids so that can have an opportunity to learn italian and we really like because it is so rich that I am sure they will have hard time to get tired of it

For Oscar's birthday, we had few friends over for a little party. As I am getting bad in writing blog posts, I am also quite bad in taking proper pictures. I know I baked the cake (the same that I did for Isabella's four years old birthday) and thought I should take pics for the blog, but then I did end up with a picture with the cake ready to be put in the oven. And that's it.

Some new cars, a car carpet and some other cards related items. Did I say cars?

We had balloons everywhere and Oscar was happily playing around and eating a lot of apples and melon (maybe too much).
Isabella was having her friends over too, so she was quite busy as well. Their friends were kind enough to bring some presents for the little prince.

A classic from the 80s which I have been dreaming of having (and playing). Both kids love it, although they have some technical inabilities

Although we tried to contain the amount of presents, Oscar got spoiled with many things. Few books (he loves reading, so this is very well appreciated), some car and a tractor and few other games that I am showing with a picture.

Cthulhu is making an entrance in our equipment. We haven't yet introduced the world of Arkham to the kids. Maybe it is time? :) Picture is borrowed from the internet. Cthulhus is looking over Oscar's sleep right now.

Puzzle and board games are appreciated especially by Isabella (although they might be for her brother). In this case, the game on the left was a Christmas present for her, with aimed at learning letters, while the puzzle on the right was for Oscar (who spends most of his days counting in both languages up to 10 or 11...), so that he can learn a bit what the numbers he is saying stands for.

Finally, the cake. We had different cakes and a small buffet with cookies, some extra pastries and some small sandwhiches, As usual, the cake for the kids is the "official" cake and in this case it is a red currants pie, which I ate at a friend's place with the kids when we both were on parental leave and meeting regularly (sigh, I miss those days). Isabella fell in love and asked for the cake for her birthday and of course, I repeated the request for Oscar's one. As always, I tend to burn it, but maybe this is the key to success? No matter. It doesn't looks amazing, but it tastes as such (and I am bad in baking).

Red currants pie

Ingredients
150g butter
3dl flour
1,5dl sugar
1 pinch salt
1 pinch bakingpowder
5 dl red currants
Extra sugar to sweeten the berries

Turn on the oven to 225.
Mix the dry ingredients while you are melting the butter.
Pour over the mix all the butter and then press on a pie form. Put on top the berries and sugar.
Bake it for 20 minutes (and hope you don't get it burnt as I do ;-))

Southern Fried Chicken with Sweet Potatoes mash

After watching too many seasons of Masterchef US, it is natural to want to try some dish that is mentioned 700 times.
We are no pro, so our first attempt here has been a basic recipe, which turned out to be incredibly easy and good for frying also vegetables.

Ingredients:

• 2,5 kg of chicken in pieces
• 2 eggs
• 2 tablespoons of salt
• 2 teaspoons of ground black pepper
• 0,3 l of milk
• 0,5 l of flour
• 0,6 l of vegetable oil

The batter

 Mix milk and eggs in a bowl by whisking them properly.

The magic bag used to put the flour on the chicken

 Combine in a plastic bag the flour, salt and pepper. In some recipe there are often added paprika or pepper as well, but not in this basic one.

The chicken is ready to be fried

 First we dip the chicken in the milk mixture and we shake the excess off. Then we shake the chicken inside the bag so that it gets covered by the flour. We take the chicken out of the bag and we fry it at 170 degrees, for about 10 minutes. Smaller pieces can get cooked in a shorter time.

Fried chicken

 Move to paper towels to drain the oil and serve!

Ingredients for the potatoes mash

• 6 sweet potatoes
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 0,15 l milk
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 1/2 teaspoon of ground black pepper

Sweet potatoes to be peeled

Dice the potatoes, after peeling them. Put them in a large pot, covered with water and bring them to boil. Let them cook for 15 minutes, or about the time they are tender.

Drain the water.

Add all the other ingredients and mash to a smooth mix.

Sweet Potatoes Mesh

The birthday party for the three years

Isabella has been keeping mentioning having her birthday party as soon as the Christmas festivities were over. For four months, she has gone on and on about her friends coming over and receiving presents.
Yes, she got the sweet taste for opening packages with Christmas. And when Oscar arrived, she has been lucky enough to get small presents as well.
So, in our house, it has been Christmas for about 4 months :D

For her party, we tried to fix sunny and warm weather, all her friends coming over, a lot of food that anyway she would not eat and candies hidden in a pirate bag. What she loved most was the pirate bag (which will probably become a tradition, since she has already decided that when Oscar grows up he will have a birthday party and the bag will return) and having all her friends, farmor and farfar over.

I didn't know what happened to me. I wanted to do something simple and I ended up preparing so much fingerfood that laste for one week. I had in mind to prepare what can't be bought here in Sweden: the classical "children (and not only) party food" that is served in Italy. Mini pizzette, other salty finger food, and the milk buns. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to succeed with the latter: the taste was ok, but they were slightly compact.
With this, there was also a lot of fruit. I was hoping that Isabella would at least be eating that!

The buffet

Pizzette
Ingredients for about 21 pizzette

• 1 roll of puff pastry (230 gr)
• 100 gr of tomato sauce
• 5 anchovies filet
• 100 gr of mozzarella 
• 1 egg
• some oregano

With a glass, I cut the shape of the pizzette in the puff pastry. I take each pizzetta and put it on an oven plate covered with baking paper. 

I whisk the egg and I brush the pizzette with it. Then I put on top the tomato sauce (for best result I prepare the tomato sauce by warming it up for about 15 minutes with a bit of olive oil and salt/papper and a basil leaf) staying away from the edge. I put a little bit of mozzarella, a small bit of anchovies (not too much or it will be too salty) and I add a bit of oregano on top. 

One could have some other cheese instead of the mozzarella and surely, top it with anything else. For the kids and the vegetarian friends, we used olives instead of the anchovies.

Put them in a warm oven at 200 degrees for about 12-15 minutes.

Frankfurter in puff pastry

Ingredients for 12 frankfurters

• 12 frankfurter (of about 25gr)
• 1 yolk
• 1 spoon of milk
• 1 roll of puff pastry (230 gr)

This is a very simple recipe but if the pastry keeps its consistency can be very tasty. One could also dip the frankfurters in ketchup or mustard.

I cut in stripes the puff pastry. I roll each frankfurter with the stripes. I whisk the yolk and then add the milk. I brush each frankfurter with the yolk. 

They need to be cooked in the oven at 180 degrees for about 40 minutes.

I will skip writing the milk buns recipe until I will actually manage to do it properly :-)

We had also three cakes for celebrating her. I did two of them. One is the classical "cold cheesecake" that I do for her birthday, another one was a nutella enriched pie, which usually turns out pretty good, but was a bit strangely cook at this occasion.

We asked our friend Ullis to bake a cake for Isabella and it turned out to be one of the best cakes we ever had! 

Ullis' cake for Isabella

Christmas Day menu

As we did for Christmas Eve, we mixed recipes and traditions also for Christmas Day.
First, Santa Claus came and pay a visit to us, distributing presents to everyone. The children were completely fascinated by him (and the adults also ;-D).

Also in this occasion, unfortunately, time was an issue so I didn't follow up on the recipes nor took that many pictures. Let's see if I can recollect the menu properly!

Starters

• Assorted cold cuts

Main Dishes (all homemade)

• Classical lasagne
• Prinskorv (prince-sausage)
• Oven cooked chicken with potatoes and onions
• Glazed ribs
• Saffron fennel (which was a disappointment)

Dessert

• A wonderful panettone, decorated with a holy scene, covered in chocolate (coming from Rome!)

Recipe for the Glazed Ribs

Ingredients for a buffet for 6 people:

• 1 and half kg short ribs
• 2 yellow onions in ckives
• Salt according to the description below

For the glaze:

• 1/2 dl honey
• 2 spoons of concentrated tomato
• 3 spoons of soya sauce
• 1 tea spoon white wine vinager
• 1 spoon finely grated ginger
• Grated skin of one orange

Put the ribs and the onions in a big pot and cover it with water. Put 1 and half spoon of salt for each liter of water. Let it light boil it for about half an hour.

Turn on the oven to 225 degrees. Take the ribs from the pot and put them on an oven pan. Brush the ribs with the mixture of all the ingredients of the glaze.
Grill it in the oven until it gets a nice surface for about 30 minutes. Brush it with the glaze several time while it is cooking in the oven. Turn the ribs the last 10 minutes. 

Recipe for the Saffron Fennel

Ingredients for a buffet for 6 people

• 2 fennel
• 2 garlic cloves
• 2 and half dl of white wine
• 0,25 g of saffron
• 2 star anise
• 50 gr of cold butter
• Half tea spoon of salt
• A quarter of a tea spoon of ground black pepper

The ingredients

Turn on the oven to 225 degrees.Clean and slice the fennel in the cloves. Put it in a baking dish with the finely chopped garlic.

Fennel and garlic

Mix the wine, the saffron, the star anise and pour it over the fennel.

The wine mix

Put the butter in small quantity over the fennel.
Add salt and pepper and let it cook in the middle of the oven for about 30 minutes.

Ready for the oven

Christmas Eve menu

Since this was our first Christmas in our own home, we wanted to make it special, mixing Italian and Swedish traditions. Of course, not everything went according to plan, or not all the recipes became top notch, but we put a lot of efforts and energy in this.

For Christmas Eve we did follow the Italian (or maybe Catholic) tradition to not eat meat and we pushed the Santa Claus visit to Christmas. Of course, we didn't watch any Donald Duck during the afternoon since noone would "appreciate" this Swedish tradition.

Unfortunately, the time was very tight and I didn't manage to follow up on the recipes as I usually do and I didn't even manage to photograph the table or the dishes prepared or being eaten.
I will then try to remember what we ate...

Starters

• Russian salad (not homemade)
• Brantevikssill (herring as in Brantevik) (not homemade)
• Inlagd sill (herring with red onions and other spices) (homemade)

Main Dishes (all homemade)

• Snabbgravad Halstrad Lax (quickly cured grilled salmon)
• Cod with tomatoes and potatoes
• Janssons frestelse (Jansson's tempation) 

Dessert

• Marinated orange salad

Recipe for the Cured Salmon

Ingredients for a buffet for 6 people:

• 300gr salmon
• 1 1/2 tea spoon sugar
• 1 tea spoon salt

Mix the salt and the sugar and roll it around the salmon. Let it get cured at room temperature for about 30 minutes.

Warm up a frying pan and grill the salmon for around 30 seconds on both sides. 

Let it cool down.

Cut it and serve it, if you like it, with a cured salmon sauce (we skipped it and in our taste was not definitely necessary).

Recipe for the Marinated Orange Salad

Ingredients for 4 people:

• 6 oranges
• 2 figs cut in cloves
• a clean pomegranate

For the marinade:

• 2 dl of light syrup
• 1dl of orange juice
• 2 tea spoon of crushed cardamom seeds
• 1 star anise

For serving:

• 2 dl of whipped cream for serving (if necessary)

The ingredients

Boil all the ingredients for the marinade in a pot and let it cool down in a big bowl (remove the star anise).

Marinade left to cool down

Peel the oranges and take a clove at the time, removing the membranes. 

Put all the fruit in the marinade and mix it carefully.

Let it cool a bit in the fridge to get a better taste!

Ready!

Third Sunday of Advent: Christmas Candies

I haven't fully understood why but Christmas means a lot of baking and a candies production. I suppose that the truth is that they don't have panettone and they have to compensate somehow. The candies I mean are often cacao based but, although they could easily be eaten during the rest of the year, they are mainly consumed during the Christmas holidays. Since people here do not have enough to do, they tend to prepare them by themselves involving also the kids. The candies includes toffee, chocolate, marzipan and even butterscotch.

Since I didn't have enough to do (obviously...), I decided to undertake such task, hoping Isabella would want to help (instead, she just ate the sugar) and experiment a bit.

Ginger Butterscotch

Ingredients

• 100gr butter
• 4 spoons of cacao
• 2dl of double cream
• 3 1/2 dl of sugar
• 1dl light syrup
• 2 spoons liquid glucose
• 2 spoons finely grated ginger

Melt the butter in a pot with a thick bottom. The pot should have a quite large base.

Remove it from the heat and mix slowly the cacao, so that there are no lumps made.

Add the cream, sugar, syrup and the glucose. 

Cook the mix until it reaches the temperature of 120 degrees, or higher if one wants something crunchier. 

I have been trying to do this without a thermometer, but the first attempt was not a successful one. With the help of a thermometer, reaching the right temperature is much easier. It is also true that it might take a while before the mix reaches the right temperature: it seems that for hours nothing happens and then all of a sudden one risks to burn it!

Put some oven paper on a tray or a big pan and pour the batter on it. Let it cool over night or at least for four hours.

Break it in small pieces and enjoy it!

Puff toffee

Ingredients:

• 100gr butter
• 1dl sugar
• 1/2 dl syrup
• 1 spoon cacao
• 3 spoons flour
• 3dl puffed rice

Mix all the ingredients but the rice in a pot.

Let it boil while mixing and then lower the temperature and let it cook it more for about 5 minutes. Mix it the whole time.

Add the puffed rice.

Put the batter on a pan where you have been previously putting some oven paper.

Let it cool over night and then divide it in small pieces.

Lucia's cats

In this case, we are not talking of real cats, but of buns that are usually baked for Saint Lucia, which occurs the 13th of December.
For the Italians, it will be so strange to read that saffron is used for baking, but, incredibly enough, it actually does work.

Ingredients for 30 buns:

• 50 gr yeast
• 150 gr butter
• 250 gr quark
• 1 gr saffron
• 2 dl sugar
• 5 dl milk
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 eggs (one for brushing the buns)
• 1 1/2 dl raisins
• 960 gr flour

The ingredients

Crumble the yeast in a bowl.

Yeast

Melt the butter and in the meanwhile, pound the saffron with a little bit of sugar in a mortar. 

Saffron and sugar

Add the saffron to the butter.

Milk, butter and saffron are warming up

Add the milk and keep the temperature around 37 degrees.

Take a little of the mix and add it to the yeast and mix it together. 

Adding a bit of yeast to part of the mix

Then add the rest of the mix, the sugar (a bit at the time), the quark, the salt and the egg. Add also the raisins.

Starting to add all the ingredients together in the mix

Add almost all the flour (a bit at the time) and whisk everything. When the flour has been added, whisk the dough for 10 minutes (if by hand, otherwise 5 minutes).

Adding the flour

The mix is now a recognizable dough

Top the dough with a bit of flour, cover with a cloth and let it yeast for 35-40 minutes.

Take the dough on a workbench where you have been spreading some flour.

Add the remaining flour and make sure that the dough is quite soft.

It is now time to work the dough with the remaining flour

Prepare an oven plate with oven paper and beat the egg.

Start to take small pieces of the dough, roll it and give it the "S" shape. Put 2 raisins in the bun, after laying them on the plate.

Ready to be cooked in the oven!

Turn on the oven to 225 degrees and let the buns yeast for another 35-40 minutes and when done, brush them with the egg.

Bake them for 8-10 minutes. Let them cool down covered by a cloth.

Enjoy with some glögg :-)

Ready!