I LOVE bagels! But it is not easy to find decent bagels here in Karlskrona in Sweden! In fact the best way I know how to get a hold of good bagels is by begging my sister to make some. Lol! I guess I could try to make some myself, but it just seem so complicated... Because not only do you have to make the dough, shape the bagels and let them rest. You have to boil the bagels too.
Like this. (I took these photos while my sister was making bagels a while back.)
And then let them rest again before they can finally be put in the oven.
So I am definitely glad to have a nice sister who enjoy to bake. Because home made bagels are extremely delicious too! I also like to eat them like in the photo above, fresh out of the oven with butter. Yum!
But this is how real bagels should look. And they are also the type of bagels which are impossible to find here in Karlskrona. The bagel in the photo is one of many I ate when I was in Las Vegas in 2007.
Although I had my first real American bagel when I was in the US in 2005. Which is when I got hooked on them. Sooo goooood!!! However I was surprised over how much cream cheese they put on them. But I quickly learned to love it and now my favourite way to eat bagels is toasted with lots of cream cheese and strawberry marmalade. So if only someone, somewhere within a reasonable distance of Karlskrona could start to sell some great bagels, I would be one of their most loyal customers for sure! AND I could finally stop nagging on my sister to make bagels. :-)
Today I turned 29 years old. A day that has pretty much felt like any other day though. Except for a family birthday dinner and reflection over the past year in my life. The conclusion I made through my little reflection was that I am happy with where I am in my life right now, and I look forward with great anticipation to the rest of it. And my birthday dinner was awesome, so of course I ate way too much! Lol!
Below are some photos of the reasons why I am so stuffed right now. :-)
Fried salmon with boiled potatoes and lemon sauce. Simple and so tasty!!!
Fabulous New York Cheesecake my amazing sister made for me. Thanks sis! :p
My piece. Yuuummy!!!
Now I do not even want to think about how many calories I have eaten today. Yikes! But hey, it is my birthday. I mean, if that is not a great excuse to over indulge then I do not know what is? :p
I love sushi! Although it took some time before I attempted to make it on my own. Because for some reason I had gotten the idea that sushi would be complicated to make. But it turns out it does not have to be, in fact sushi can be pretty simple to make. Actually I think you can pretty much eat anything with sushi rice and call it sushi. :p
So when I made "My Simple Sushi" a few days ago I used sushi rice, rice vinegar, sugar, cold-smoked salmon, cucumber and soy sauce. (This photo was taken after I had eaten all cucumber, hence no cucumber in photo...)
I followed the quantity instructions on the sushi rice bag on to how measure and cook the sushi rice. Which was basically done in 4 steps.
1. Rinse rice in cold water.
2. Cover rice with cold water and let rice rest for about 20 minutes.
3. Bring to a boil then let simmer on low heat for about 10 minutes.
4. Rest again for about 10 minutes.
Once the cooking of rice procedure was completed I spread the rice on a tray to cool a bit. I then heated rice vinegar and sugar until sugar melted. After that I poured the mixture onto the rice and stirred gently. This is what gives the rice a bit of a sweet flavor. After that, to speed up the cooling process, I put the rice in the fridge. After about 45 minutes I started to assemble my sushi bits. I grabbed some rice, formed it into an (sort of) oval shape and put a bit of cold smoked salmon on it.
Voila! My simple sushi completed. With the sushi I had cucumber sticks and soy sauce. Not too complicated right?
Summer and barbecue, ahhh! Yesterday I barbecued for the first time this year. So for me, it's now officially summer in Sweden! :p And below are some photos from my barbecue premiere.
Fire.
Chop, chop.
Guard dogs...
And finito result. My barbecue dinner: Pasta salad, porkchops and a glass of white wine. :p
I don't eat junk food too often, but today I just had such a craving for it! And I thought, why not!? Hehe. So off I went to Max, a Swedish hamburger chain - my favourite, to buy a juicy hamburger meal. It was sooo good! Except that it was quite a lot of black pepper on my hamburger today... But besides that, yummy! :p
Yesterday I cooked and ate duck for the first time ever in my life. I have wanted to taste it for quite some time now. Mainly because it seem to be very popular in all cooking shows on TV. Hehe.
And when it comes to the cooking part, well it was not that difficult. But even though I fried the duck breast in a frying pan, skin down, before and after its visit in the oven. I did not like the fatty skin. Something they always claim is so tasty when they eat it on TV. On the other hand, I don't like to eat fat on any kind of meat. I always cut it off.
So here it is, my duck dinner. I served the duck breast with a red wine sauce, plums, onions, boiled potatoes and boiled vegetables. With that I had a glass of red wine. And I must say, it was very, very delicious indeed! I will definitely eat duck again! Yum! :-p
I made this little dessert thingy one evening when I had an intense craving for something sweet. It's one sliced banana, some crushed gingerbread, whipped cream and chocolate sauce. I made it in like a minute, hehe. Yuuuummy! And sweet, with a taste of Christmas.
Yesterday I helped my mum bake Lucia cats - lussekatter, also known as saffron buns or Saint Lucia buns. It's a tradition to eat them on December 13th in Sweden, when we celebrate Lucia. (You can read more about how we celebrate Lucia and the origin of this tradition on my Christmas page.) Now, I'm not a big fan of baking, I prefer cooking, so I would never make these on my own. But they do taste best when they are home made! So in order for me to grab a few from mum with a good conscience, I decided to help her bake them (well, roll them into shapes), anyway :-) Here are some pics.
The dough, unfortunately not too tasty raw :-(
Different shapes, the classic shape is S. My mum likes to fill them with either almond paste or lingonberry. But I prefer "normal" ones, with just raisins, though the other two alternatives taste great as well.
And here we have the finito productio. With an almond paste filled classically shaped Lucia cat on top of the pile. Yuuummyyy :-p
If you are interested in a recipe for Lucia cats, here is one: Saint Lucia buns
