grocery of the week

We're back!

New times blogging. New food culture to explore; the Swedish and the Sami food tradition locally from Umeå, Västerbotten, Sweden.

And of course the food culture from the countries all our new friends are from.

But we miss the Australian way of shopping. Ica and Konsum are not so sexy really. But there are some delicatessen shops here which is good.

Grocery of the week:

Smoked and salted reindeer meat. Definitely 100% natural since the reindeer live a happy life semi-domesticated and mostly freely nature.

Preferably served with local crispy tunnbröd spiced with aniseed and fennel and horseradish cream. Other good accompaniments with the bread is Västerbottenost (the best Swedish cheese).

sandwich classic

Today i tried another bakery. Luxe in Newtown. Sourdoug bread, cheese, lots of smoked ham, dijon mustard and tomatoes. I have not had that classic combo for a while; a happy taste-return!
I bought a loaf of that bread to bring home and got a ciabatta for free. Funny. Maybe the revealing story of the history of ciabatta has made it unpopular? I am not really sure if thats the case though.

bread reflection one: the secret life of ciabatta

The apparently 'traditional' Italian flat loaf, staple of the balsamic-swilling, sundried-scoffing crowd, is not what it claims to be. Robin Stummer investigates. continue reading

ginger desserts part 3

ginger gino

gino was invented in the 80-90s, in a legendary restaurant in stockholm. famous for its drunk actors and writers having a blast.

the original recipe lacks ginger. so does the genuine brulée tart's. non the less these desserts with ginger reaches another level.
another ingredient i love in gino and is not in the pa&co recipe is cherries, a lot of them. nectarines are alright too. i don't remember if i like gino more with or without white chocolate. i think some people would say that's the most important ingredient in the dish. i'm not really sweet on white chocolate but i can tell it is alright in this, for you that are unsure about the white chocolate.

recipe

for 4 persons
2 bananas
2 kiwi fruits
1 liter of strawberries
cherries
1 piece of ginger
1/5 dl raw sugar
1 dl desiccated coconut
(130 g grated white chocolate, put it in the fridge before you grate it)

serve with vanilla ice cream

1. oven 200 degrees, over heat / grill heat.
2. peel and chop the banana and kiwi fruit. put them and the berries in a baking pan.
3. grate the ginger finely, mix the ginger with sugar and desiccated coconut.
4. Strew the mixture on top of the fruit.
5. place in the oven for 3 - 10 minutes.

make sure the fruit is not boiling heavily or getting burnt. you can open the oven door to let a bit of the heat out.

enjoy!

manakish/manousheh - Middle Eastern pizza

This is manakish - Lebanese pizza, one with za'atar and the other one is cheese and meat. Perfect to share to get the different flavours.

Za'atar is a mix of herbs and nuts. By googling it I find hundreds of different recipes. It is usually composed of thyme, oregano, sumac, sesame seeds and salt. And sometimes with other herbs and nuts. The taste is acidic, aromatic and salty, a lovely combination with the cheesy cheese and the lemon - chilli seasoned meat.

Very cheap and very nice! My favourite place to have it is a small lebanese pizza shop in Panania.

today's breakfast

coffee and toasted sourdough bread with figs, cranberries and barberries.

BEER O´CLOCK!

It´s almost the weekend! It would be great to welcome it with this great lager from Bulgaria. unfortunatly I havn´t been able to find it here, or anywhere else outside of Bulgaria. I might have to start importing it myself.

Phở

Phở is a typical vietnamese dish. It is a noodle soup based on a broth of simmered beef bones, that usually takes hours to prepare. rice noodles and thin slices of beef are then added as it is served. The beef is raw when added to the soup, but quickly cooks in the hot broth. Bean sprouts, corriander, thai basil, chilli and spring onions are then added to the soup, as well as freshly squeezed lime juice.

Phở 54 in Cabramatta and Phở pasture in Bankstown are good places for some of the best pho in Sydney

favourite instant noodels

Mi goreng fried noodels.
Nice with instant noodels that is not a soup. The instant noodel soup is pretty useless eating in a hurry, with the soup splashing around your face.
Serve it with a fried egg as in the pic!!

grocery of the week

tamarind!

one suggestion:

try malaysian ice tea with a couple of
lime halves, dried tamarind, lost of
ice and a little bit of sugar.

Ginger Desserts part 2

Skipper Bengt's Ice Cream

Mum always presents this dessert in a glass.
Where she puts vanilla ice cream, small slices of sweet pickled ginger.
Then she pours a little bit of Punsch over it.

Punsch is a liquor typical in the Nordic countries based on the South East Asian liquor Arrack. Arrack not to be confused with the Middle Eastern Araq. Arrack is produced by fermented fruit, grain, sugar cane or the sap of coconut palm. It came to Sweden in the 1700s from India. Punsch consists of arrack, lemon juice, sugar, water and tea which gives a rich and sweet 25ish % alcohol.

Back to the melting ice cream.

On top of the ice cream, ginger and punsch you add a couple of spoons of whipped cream, a walnut each serve and a little bit of instant coffee powder on top.
Finished!

Easy and wonderful. It has a sweet rich taste with a little bitter flavour that appears in the backround of Punsch (arrack and tea), the walnut and coffee that contrasts to the sweet ice cream and sweet and spicy ginger. The whipped cream is a big fluffy fatty nothing, I love it. I think the golden, sweet punsch really comes to its best in a dessert. A little too sweet to drink a lot of. Except in the editorial office of Blandaren. And one glass of warm punsch with pea soup and pancakes at grandma's place on a Thursday.

måndagslyx in Haberfield

I had pappadelle porcini (pasta med karljohanssvamp).

Matt had fried zuchini flowers; fried tiny zuchinis,
cheese and anchovies. (at Napoli in Bocca, 73 Dalhousie Street).

Almond ice cream! Why havn't I come across almond
ice cream before? Matt choose panna cotta ice cream
with caramel souce. (at Dolcissimo, 96-98 Ramsay St Haberfield).

grocery of the week

Cambozola!

grocery of the week

Anchovies in oil

Ginger Desserts

Ginger Desserts part 1 / Ginger Brulé Tart at Burke Street Bakery

Alright I am not really a tart lover but this blew me away. It is a combination of every taste I like in a sweet and in a brilliant way.

The tart consist of three layers of three different textures. The pie base is perfectly crispy right through and not too sweet. Just crispy! (in most cases pie bases are a little bit soggy close to the filling or too hard, too sweet or like bread). The custard is firm, creamy and ginger flavoured. Ginger in desserts balances the sweet in such a pleasant way. The hard caramel on top is crispy and with a rich sweetness and with pieces of pistachio. The Bourke Street Bakery is one of the most busy spots in Surry Hills. Nice and friendly staff and delicate dishes and coffee. They also have sourgough bread, which I haven't seen much here before.

I saw another Burke Street Bakery further south, and closer to where I live.. so I guess you will know more about them soon.

malaysian/singaporian/vietnamese ice coffee

Sorry for a quite week! We've been busy moving and working. We have left suburbia for a little more urban suburbia a LOT closer to the city. Yay! And my first week working in Australia. Yay again!

It is autumn here. Based on calender not climate. Autumn in Sweden is when the daily average temperature is 0 - 10 degrees Celsius for ten days in a row. Its 7 pm and 27 degrees! So time for a cool drink! Only 5 minutes from my house is a Vietnamese place where they do Asian ice coffee. I've tried this coffee in several places with several names but it is always very refreshing!

Freshly brewed coffee. Vietnamese roasted/French roasted/medium roasted coffee, fast and strong brew, espresso.  About a quarter to a half as much sweetened condensed milk as coffee. Poured over a lot of ice.

The taste is strong coffee and creamy taste of the condensed milk. I don't like sweet coffee but this actually fabulous. Try it at your closest Vietnamese restaurant or at home! 

Zeno's on Crown

hidden among all the trendy bars and restaurants that now line crown street in surry hills is this little gem. Zeno's pizza bar serves up some of the best lebanese food in sydney. You can get a mixed plate full of classic lebanese dishes served with bread and hommus for less than ten dollars, but the real hero of this place are their falafals. They are made fresh right in front of you. perfectly crispy on the outside, but soft and moist in the middle. best enjoyed wrapped in lebanese bred, with fresh minty tabuli and loads of hommus.

grilled prawn paste on sugercane

This was a fantastic vietnames lunch in Cabramatta, Sydney. Prawn paste on sugercane stick being grilled and eaten on a leaf of salad with thai basil, mynth and bean sprouts dipped in a sour vietnamese souce with lots of chili. You don't eat the sugercane but it gives flavor to prawn paste. Very fresh and delicious! And I guess it is easy to do at home, just figuring out how to do the prawn paste in the right way. I think the main ingredients are minced prawn, pork and garlic.





And in a great atmosphere with mirrors and red glossy plastic menues.

suburban burgers

Vic´s Hamburgers from Aki Kaurismäki´s I hired a contract killer.

Matt's enjoying a burger from North Cronulla´s surf kiosk. Cheap and with nice meat and of course beetroot.
Real australian hamburgers has beetroot on them. Try that!

whale ale

Murry's Pale Ale

by Murry's Craft Brewing and Co, Port Stephens, NSW

A nice crisp american style wheat beer from the north coast of NSW.

This beer gets extra points for its beautiful design. despite the name, no whales were used in the brewing of this product.

Try it with the steamed leak and ginger dumplings at Yulli's on crown street, Surry Hills.