The Basics

This is my English version of my original food blog I´ve been writing since 2012. My basic food philosophy is very simple and I always try to use all natural ingredients from the Nordic countries. As I am a Finn, I´ll do my very best in trying to offer the best of the Nordic cuisine and the wild grown ingredients, that everyone can pick in our vast forests all over the country. We have in all the Nordic countries a common practise, written in the law, giving everyone the right to pick flowers, berries, mushrooms, herbs and whatever you can find in the forests nearby for your own use or even for commercial use, unless you violate someone else´s private property near the housing. Otherwise the nature is open for everyone.

I am an eager fisherman, mushroom picker and a crayfish catcher (at least trying). I love the TV cooking shows and my MAJOR international favourites are Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsay, although I love many more of them, like Chef Anthony Bourdain. I am not a chef, nor a restaurant professional. I´ve worked it the food industry since 1988 and got familiar with most of the pro´s and con´s regarding food. I have experienced the worst food scandals in Europe and survived them all without no problem whatsoever. My favorite quote originates from an interview with Paul Bocuse. As a journalist asked him whether his creamy and buttery food is unhealthy: "I am a chef, not a doctor". 

I promise to give you my best of the Finnish and Nordic cooking at your disposal.

Quinoa salad with pomme granate, roasted seeds and spring onion

 

Cook the quinoa as instructed on the package. Chill it all. Mix with roasted seed mix, chopped spring onion and pomme graate seeds. Finish it all with some good olive oil, salt and pepper.

Pomme granate deseeding can be quite messy. Do it in  a plastic bag. Put halve of the fruite in a plastic bag and hammer the seeds out in the bag. After this it´s really easy to spoon out the seeds and the kitchen stays clean.

Beetroot risotto

For some strange reason I got an inspiration for this dish in the early morning. Luckily before the shopping tour, so I got everything needed for this delicious dish.

All you need for two persons is:

1 large red beet
1 dl arborio/carnarolirice
1 onion
1 garlic clove
2 dl white wine (dry)
salt and pepper
butter
grated parmesan
fresh thime

Peel and grate the beetroot. Make the risotto the traditional way, but start with the beetroots to make sure they`ll be fully cooked. Finish with butter, thyme and grated parmiggiano reggiano.

Crayfish soup after the crayfish party

If you want to enjoy a proper crayfish soup the day after, save all the shells of the crayfish, but without the intestents inside the head. This makes a delicious base for a perfect soup. 

A lot of people in Finland do the crayfish catching themselves. It is, however, perfect to do the dish with the crayfish you can buy in the supermarkets. I usually drain the small bastards and cook an own liquid with a lot more salt and dill. I normally add some 3 tablespoons of coarse sea salt per 1 liter water.  A good 24 hours in the fridge gives a perfect result. Once you add a good amount of dill, of course. 

This time the soup was made of:

The best shells of 2 kg frozen crayfish
1/2 tube tomato paste
1/2 bottle of dry white wine (maybe a bit more). Save some for the chef!
1,5 litres of boiling water
1 big onion
dill
2 dl creme fraiche
3 dl whipping cream
1/2 dl rapeseed oil
salt and pepper 
a few drops of Tabasco
wheat flour 

When you wake up after a good Nordic crayfish party, you might find yourself in need of some liquid for the thirst, but still for something salty as well. This is the thing.

Rinse the shells and drain well. Put the whole bunch in an oven pan and roast in 250 centigrade until crisp but not burned. Take a big kettle, pour in a good amount of rapeseed oil and put in the crisp shells. Put the full heat on and add a chopped onion, the tomato paste, some wheat flour. Mix a little while and enjoy of the great relief as you pour over the wine. Mix again and add the water. Let the whole thing cook for at least two hours. If you loose too much liquid, add some water. 

Using a colander, pour the soup base into another kettle and finish the soup by reducing it still as you please. If the soup is too this after checking the taste, make a beurre mainie to fix it.

If you have some leftover crayfish tails, make a pile of them on each plate. Pour over the soup and enjoy with a good bread and cheese and, naturally some white wine. Finish with some dill.  You might enjoy a finish with some drops of lemon juice as it can lift it all up to a higher level.

Traditional "gravlax" or sugar salted salmon

This is an extremely popular way of treating the fish, especially, salmon, salmon trout and whitefish all over the Nordics. Some prefer is with a lot of dill, but I manage well without it. My favorite way of eating the gravlax is on a toasted, buttered rye bread as on the picture.

This one is so simple to make. All you need is a piece of bone free salmon (350 g in this case), coarse sea salt and a table spoon of sugar.

Put the salmon on a plate. Cover it with salt and sprinkle the sugar evenly on the fish. Cover with foil and let it rest overnight in the fridge. Wipe of the salt and slice the fish in thin slices. Enjoy!

Butter fried vendance, fresh summer potatoes, yoghurt sauce with dill

The vendance is a real treat. It is a freshwater fish, so you can only catch it in lakes in the Nordics.
At leats in Finland the people by the coast prefer the Baltic Herring instead, but it is prepard the same way.

This recipe is for two persons

350 g deheaded and gutted vendance
1 dl rye bread crumbles (can be bought in shops in Finland)
100 g ghee or just butter
salt and pepper
a few truly fresh spring potatoes
dill
yoghurt or sour cream
sugar
a squeeze of lemon

Clean the potatoes and put the kettle on. Whe the water is cooking add some coarse sea salt. If the water is salty enough, the potatoes start floatin when they are ready.

Salt the vendance and batter them with the rye bread crumbles. let them dry a while in order to let the crumbs to stick better.

Make the ghee: Melt some butter in a kettle. Take aside and let the dry matter sink in the bottom of the kettle. Do not shake.



Make the yuoghurt/sour cream sauce by mixing some yoghurt or sour cream with a small bunch of dill, sugar and lemon juice.

Meanwhile the potatoes are cooking and the sauce is done, take a robust frying pan and heat it up. Pour in the ghee and fry the vendance until crispy and dark brown. Serve it all.

Simple and gooooood!

Butter fried whitefish fillets, parmesan spiced potato cakes and cream sauce with lemon

2 fillets of whitefish (Coregonus lavaretus), deboned and descaled

a few potatoes
juice of a 1/2 lemon
some white wine
1 dl cream
butter

Some sallad of your choice

Make sure that the fillets have the skin on! In my opinion it is the
tastiest part after having been fried in butter. What isn´t?

Cut the fillets to nice portion pieces. The rest can be slightly salted to be eaten later the same way as gravlax.

Pour some white wine and half of the lemon juice into a kettle and cook up. Follow up with cream and let it all simmer slowly into a nice consistency sauce. Give it a final touch with some salt and pepper.

Peel and grate the potatoes and mix with some grated parmesan.
Form into small cake shaped thin piles and fry with butter in a pan.

As the potato cakes star to be ready, take another frying pan and throw in a nice amout of butter. Salt and pepper the fish on both sides. As the butter in the pan is silent and nutty brown, put the fish pieces with the skin side down into the pan. Fry until th inside temperature is around 45 degrees centigrade. In fact, you can also trust your eyes as you can the whiteness slowly rise up onto the top of the fish. When it is almost there, it´s done.

Gather it all on plates. The potato cake in the middle topped with the fish, with the nice brown skin up. Pour the sauce around the portion and sprinkle the rest of the lemon juice on the portions. Enjoy with some dry white wine.

What about the sallad? Either you skipped it or you made it somehow...