Christmas dinner: Scandinavia

We made a great Scandinavian dinner for Christmas. I took all the recipes from Scandinavian Cooking by Beatrice Ojakangas. I bought the cookbook for my Kindle a couple of months ago and have been enjoying reading the cultural background. I also love that Ojakangas has organized the recipes by suggested menus, rather than by course. Even as a Kindle fan, though, I didn't like cooking from an e-book, especially when I needed to switch between recipes, so I have ordered a paper copy.

Our menu:

• Frikadaler Ojakangas calls these as fish balls, but I'd describe them as latkes made out of cod.
• Deviled Eggs with Caviar Yum. And beautiful enough to be featured on the cover of the cookbook.
• Jansson's Temptation Potatoes, onions, half-and-half, and anchovies baked together. We made a pan without the anchovies for M. We had made this once before for an Around the World dinner and I think that I liked the first recipe a little better than this one. The original recipe is here.
  
• Christmas salad Apples, pickled beets, red cabbage, and lemon juice. Super easy and a perfect complement to the fish and potatoes.
• Pumpernickel bread (from my favorite local bakery), crispbread, and cheese.
  
• Dessert was gingerbread cookies and See's candies.
  

M's interruption
I really liked the frikadaler, which look like fish pancakes, and the potatoes.
Back to Mom, so I can keep building my Lego Burrow (the Weasleys' house from Harry Potter).

Back to Mom
It's always fun to work together to make Christmas dinner, and in this one, we had a winner: everything tasted great and were relatively easy to make. But, no, we didn't make M try the caviar -- I don't need him developing expensive tastes at age 8!

Thai Rice Soup

I told M last week that I wanted to start making more soups. Soups aren't M's favorite dinners, so I offered to let him pick the first soup. He said he wanted rice in his soup. We searched for recipes and, at the start, most of what we found were for chicken and wild rice soup. Not what we wanted. Finally, we settled on the search terms "vegetarian rice soup recipes -wild" and got some better choices.

As soon as "Vegetarian Thai Rice Soup" popped up, M knew we had a winner and he was right! The soup is called khao tom and is often served for breakfast. We coupled it with baked tofu and some store-bought kim chi and had a wonderful easy dinner.

M said that the ginger was a little spicy but the rice was perfect. And that the baked tofu is his favorite, high praise from him! This is a meal we will definitely repeat soon!

Thai Rice Soup (from ezythairecipes.com)

• 1 tsp minced garlic
• 2 cups cooked rice
• 4 cups vegetable stock
• 3cm ginger, cut into fine matchsticks
• 1/2 tspn white pepper
• 1 tbsp soy sauce, to taste
• 1 spring onion, sliced
• 2 tbsp chopped coriander

1. In a very small amount of oil saute the garlic until golden brown.
2. Add vegetable stock and rice and bring to the boil.
3. Add the spring onions, half the ginger, fish sauce, soy and pepper, stir until it boils again.
4. Transfer to a serving dish, and garnish with chopped coriander/cilantro leaves and reserved ginger.

My simple recipe for baked tofu
1. Drain the tofu and set on paper towels in the fridge for several hours.
2. Brush top and bottom with olive oil and sprinkle Penzey's Sate seasoning.
3. Place on aluminum foil covered baking sheet.
4. Bake at 350oF for 20 minutes.

Simple German dinner

Yes, we're still here. I know it has been a while. After our long hiatus from cooking and posting, we're enjoying a week of great food.

This past Sunday, we made our first Around the World dinner since summer. It was a simple meal: open-faced sandwiches, German potato salad, and homemade Christmas cookies.

M is school, enjoying pajama day on the last day before Winter Break starts. He told me to let you know that he really liked the meal, especially the sandwiches and the potato salad.

German Potato Salad (from epicurious.com)

2 lbs potatoes
2/3 cup vinegar
2/3 cup water
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon cornstarch
4 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon powdered dry mustard
1 scallion, finely chopped

Dice potatoes and cook in boiling water until tender. Set aside. In a large pan, cook vinegar, water, sugar cornstarch and mustard on high heat until it comes to a boil. Reduce to simmer and stir until thickened. Add potatoes, salt, pepper and scallions. Mix carefully to prevent mashing the potatoes.

German Christmas cookies (from cooks.com, we made a 1/4 recipe which gave us 30 cookies)

8 eggs
4 cups sugar
4 oz. chopped citron
4 oz. blanched almonds
grated rind of 2 lemons
9 cups flour
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
2 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. black pepper

Beat 8 eggs. Add 4 cups sugar, beat until smooth, about 15 minutes. Add 4 ounces chopped citron, 4 ounces blanched almonds, (which have been coarsely chopped) and the grated rind of 2 lemons.

Sift together 9 cups flour, add 1/2 tsp. ground cloves, 2 tsp. nutmeg, and 1/4 tsp. black pepper to flour and sift again. Add to the first mixture.

Roll out dough 3/4 inch thick. Cut into small rounds 1-inch in diameter.

Before baking, turn each cookie upside down, put a drop of water on each and bake at 350°F. for 15 minutes.

Happy Holidays from Around the World dinners!

Retro Ornaments Brown Christmas

Turn your unique photos into Christmas cards with Shutterfly.

View the entire collection of cards.

(look for some great holiday Around the World dinners coming next week...)