A Swedish Christmas.

[brucesw]

Beautiful loaves.  Wish I could smell them.

[CatPoet]

Bruce:  My neighbour asked what I been cooking or baking because the stairwell smelled of Christmas, warmth and candy.   I gave him gingerbreads, candy  and let him sniff the loaves and he was bit sad he had turn down Christmas lunch and dinner with us so he could go to his family.

 

I have also made a  Poverå loaf,   Poverå is just a shorting of  Potatoes Wheat and Rye in Swedish, but it sounds fancy  and the ham is cooked, more broth made and  now I am nearly ready for Christmas tomorrow!

[CatPoet]

Tree is up,   vegetable pate baked  and I am making  Doppekex,  dipping crackers is what it would be if I translate it word by word but it is really crackers made from the lard on top of the Christmas broth ( doppe)  and it has this lovely meaty flavour  and also I have made  breakfast  for tomorrow already. 

[CatPoet]

 

Starting breakfast, this will be the traditional  tomtegröt  ( gnome porridge)  it is made with rice, milk, butter and cream.  Lovely.

 

 

Done! It will be even better tomorrow when it has swelled some more.

 

Doppekex, slowly drying out in the oven.   Smells, horrible at the moment due to the baking ammonium  but soon it be  scrumptious. 

 

 

Hello my lovelies soon you are ready for my belly  but first you need some cheese.

 

 

This is the start of the pate ,  it  is three coloured, one layer of broccoli then a layer of cauliflower and at last carrot.

 

 

And this is the final step before the oven.   Tomorrow  my friends, you will see it all.  Now I am tired after wrapping gifts and  cleaning  and running around town like a daft dodo . 

Night!

[CatPoet]

 

GOD JUL!   This was our breakfast this morning, yes I ate it too. Gnome porridge and  cherry sauce,

I will post the whole spread later tonight.

[CatPoet]

Here comes the Christmas spread as I promised.  We call it walking table ( gående bord) since you walk to get your dinner.  We spread it out this year because  we are all tired of putting our sleeves in to  different foods.

 

This  vörtbröd ,  wort / malt loaf, one with raisins and one without , no poverå loaf because my husband didnt want it today and crackers.

 

 

A pot of broth with the  boiling sausages   in it, we  do it that way to keep the sausages warm.  My old beloved cast iron  skillet is filled with butterfly cut prinskorv ( small smoked  sausages, like cocktail weaner)  and isterband  cut in smaller pieces,  isterband is a  soured lightly  smoked   sausage with barley in it.  My  Ikea pan in the   has   pickled ribs,  they were pickled with  apple cider vinegar, cloves, ginger, cinnamon, cummin and then the Swedish  meatballs.

 

 

Then we had Finish carrot bake, porkkanalaatikko ,  mustard grilled ham  and  in the glass bowl  mustard and rosé pepper pickled herring.

 

 

Brawn, lever pate , cold cut sausage,  red coleslaw  and   Edam cheese ( big red one),  Grädd ost, which means cream cheese but is just a creamier hard cheese made with fatter milk ( the little red one) and a pickled onion and chive cheddar ( tiny black one) and  a Glenphilly  Whisky cheddar  ( the big black one).

 

 

Look at the beauty of that  jelled pork broth and the  brined pork inside it.   I wish I could  get hold of  pate and sylta ( brawn) moulds these days but they become as rare as hen teeth now a day.

 

 

I am very proud over my lever pate, it turned out creamy  with a robust flavour.

 

 

Smoked whisky sausage,   well smoked rabbit sausage  and   lightly soured  and smoked  Yule sausage.

 

 

My best ham  ever, I never gotten the mustard coating so picture perfect and tasty as today. The ham was  really good too,

 

 

 

This is what we do with the Christmas broth, we dip bread in it and it one of the best thing you can get, salty  ham broth with bread. *drool* 

 

 

My daughter's plate, with a little bit over everything.

 

 

My brothers plate with a lot of everything,

 

 

The food was scrumptious , we really enjoyed our dinner. Everything perfectly cooked and nothing burnt.  Except the  vegetable pate had an accident in the morning and couldn't be saved, such things happens.

Edited December 24, 2014 by CatPoet (log)

[CatPoet]

 

The Sweet table,  roasted salted hazelnuts,  normal shelled almonds and hazelnuts, European walnuts,  knäck, kola, marknads nougat, tablets and buckeyes. And yes a flower pot as bin !

We also had glögg, which is Swedish gluhwein,  must  which is a sweet soda flavoured with  malt and hops  and lots of gingerbreads.

 

Any Questions?

Edited December 24, 2014 by CatPoet (log)

[Shelby]

It all looks so lovely!  I wish I could come over and have a taste of everything!

 

Edited to say Merry Christmas!!!!   And, sometime in the future when you have a minute, I'd love the recipe for your veggie pate--I'm sorry it had an accident

Edited December 24, 2014 by Shelby (log)

[CatPoet]

You are welcomed!! 

[CatPoet]

Tricoloured  vegetable pate.

 

 Carrot layer

400 gram carrots

2 teaspoon of potato starch

3 tablespoon of creme fraiche

1 egg

½ teaspoon salt

a pinch pepper

a pinch ground corinader.

 

Cauliflower layer

400 gram cauliflower

2 teaspoon of potato starch

3 tablespoon of creme fraiche

1 egg

½ teaspoon salt

a pinch pepper

a drop of lemon juice

 

Broccoli layer.

 

400 gram broccoli.

2 teaspoon of potato starch

3 tablespoon of creme fraiche

1 egg

½ teaspoon salt

a pinch pepper

 

 

Heat the oven to 175 .  Grease a tubpan or a loaf tin that holds 4 cups.

 

Clean and cook each vegitable in a seperate pot until  soft. It has to be soft.   Pure the vegetable and mix each pure with  potato starch,creme fraiche, egg and spices. 

 

Spread  either carrot or broccoli layer out first in the pan. Then over that  cauliflower and then the last pure.  Cover with tin foil.

Make a water bath and bake the lowe part of the oven for 50- 60 min.  Cool a bit and turn it out on a plate.

 

It is lovely warm, but good too at room temp. 

 

I dont turn it out until I am ready to serve or keep the pan over it as protection. 

[Shelby]

Thank you!!!!  That sounds wonderful.  I will make this before the new year.  

[Smithy]

You put on a beautiful spread - wow! Thank you very much for taking the time to show it all and let us enjoy it too!

[CatPoet]

No problem,  It was just fun to show  that Sweden is more then just soured herring, meatballs and IKEA.  I really loved doing this,

[ElsieD]

Thanks so much for all the trouble you went to to show us what Christmas in Sweden is like. I enjoyed it immensely. Is brawn what I might call headcheese? That consists mainly of pickled pork head together in a gelatine mixture.

[CatPoet]

Elsie:  my brawn is made of  cured  ham hock, it is in a very salty brine and if I remember head cheese is more like our press sylta.

[Thanks for the Crepes]

Merry Christmas, CatPoet!

 

Thank you so much for generously taking the time and effort to share this with us.

 

I found it fascinating, and I really appreciate it.

[JoNorvelleWalker]

I don't celebrate holidays for religious reasons but some years ago (quite a few years ago now, actually) I was hired as the photographer for the state's three hundred and fiftieth anniversary New Sweden Christmas celebration and dinner.  Though I suspect some of the food may have been Americanized.  Even though the early seventeenth century log cabin has the original sixteenth century Scandinavian cooking vessels.  I was honored that the Swedish consul chose my picture from that night as his official photograph.

[brucesw]

This thread has been beyond wonderful.  Fortunately there is the 'like' button here on eG, so I could quickly express my appreciation while my mind was racing ahead.  I have just taken the pot off the burner with the ham and sausages (and will be stealing an advance dip in the pot with the vört limpa shortly) and already I'm looking forward to next year and more dishes to try.

 

Thank you again for sharing all of this with us.

 

Now you deserve to take a week off and rest.

 

God Jul to you and your family and Gott Nytt år.

[CatPoet]

When it comes to cooking ham, I do the   frozen method. It is easier and  produce a great results.   I bake it with 1 litre of water, covered in the oven from frozen, it takes  8- 10 hours and all I do for the first 7 is sleep.

 

Today  we will be eating left overs and enjoying it.

[CatPoet]

JoNorvelleWalker: It is all about the food  for me.

[CatPoet]

 

Breakfast this morning....  the robots are taking over!!!!

Edited December 25, 2014 by CatPoet (log)

[rlibkind]

I had Aebleskivers for breakfast. does that count even if they are danish?

[CatPoet]

Rlibkind: well close enough I am less then 2 hours from Denmark  and this used to be Denmark  once....  so it is oki.   My  village name is actually Danish, it comes from a old  word for over grown lake or  wet bog and then been misspelled and mispronounced over the years.

[CatPoet]

Oh the last  of Swedish Christmas will be 13 of January! 

Yes I will also post the end celebration of Christmas.

[CatPoet]

 

Now Christmas is over in Sweden.   Husband and kid has plundered the Christmas tree.  We were supposed to have a party but everything has been cancelled due to the winter vomits ( yes that is the name here), the flu and  the combo of both.  And since it only was the kid and the husband doing the plundering  I hung the candy in  the tree and omitted  the gingerbreads that normally hangs there.  

 

 

The paper thingies contains a  toffee,  fruit flavoured  and there is even a  Clementine lurking in the tree, which my kid ate first before toffees and other treats.

 

Oh well, Christmas is over  but soon there will be Easter and I promise  I show  you what we do then!