Arctic Cloudberry: potato

Fat-free crispy and fluffy potato wedges and farewell to lockdown - hopefully!

22:02

Husband returned to work today. I was late for my first Teams call because getting him out the door proved to be a two man job. I made him some healthy warming porridge for breakfast to keep him going, then helped him get dressed (he just needed some assistance with the cuff-links to be fair), prepared a takeaway coffee, gently rushed him so he wouldn't be late, which he took really well being up 4-5 hours earlier than during the past 14 months, and finally ordered him a taxi to the office where he could pick up his company car.

Even our cat (our neighbour's cat really, but both we and the cat have our doubts about that arrangement) was shocked to see husband up at that hour. He came to the kitchen window (the cat) to tell it was time to serve him some brekkies, but when he saw husband he jumped back thinking there must have been some sort of a disaster or that he'd accidentally entered an alternate universe,

I am of course really happy that we are getting back to normal little by little. We saw a friend over the weekend for the first time since the start of the lockdown for a coffee and a walk in a park, which was really lovely. I even dressed up especially in a nice flowery dress. Husband commented that finally wife looks nice referring to my uniform of jeans and a black long-sleeved t-shirt of the last 7 months and the jeans and a black short-sleeved t-shirt the 7 months before. And it is nice to think that soon we can see the loved ones we haven't been able to see for over a year. We are going to Liverpool to visit husband's oldest son in a couple of weeks and we are possibly more excited than before our American road trip some years ago. I feel the flowery dress making another appearance.

And of course there are no words for the suffering and grief that this pandemic has caused so many families.

But I am also a bit sad, because I will see husband so much less now. Normally (=pandemic-abnormally) he would be sitting here with me in his leopard fleece onesie and red woolly socks watching football, but instead I'm alone with just James Martin on Food Network to keep me company, We also won't have time to have proper dinner together every night, particularly when I start to go back to the office and travel more. We won't do our daily walk 2-3 times around the local park every night. And I will miss our Friday afternoon cleaning sessions, he used to put the Lambada album on in the living room and we would clean to the happy latin sounds. He'd do all the hoovering and mopping, I'd clean the bathroom and kitchen and dust etc, Afterwards we'd have a cuppa in the kitchen and then go for our daily walk twice around the local park before shower and dinner.

It wasn't always this sunny and pretty, but sometimes it was.

Our little local park

But there you go. I am in no way hoping that the pandemic should continue, I'm just saying that we adapted to this smaller, quieter, simpler life and there were silver linings that we may find ourselves missing.

One thing I won't particularly miss is cooking together. We tried this a few times. Not a good idea. We are both very bossy in the kitchen, I can be a bit bossy in a variety of situations, so that was to be expected, but husband is a very chilled person. Although clearly not when he is cooking. Jesus. Anyway we did amazing pizzas last Saturday. In the end. Come to think of it, we don't get along that well when we are cleaning either, hence the choreography where he starts in the front room and I start back of the house in the kitchen and then we pass each other somewhere in the middle and again go our separate ways like two ships floating on peaceful waters.

But onwards and upwards towards freedom and return to society. I may not be able to cook for us every night, but I have identified two challenges that will liven up my cookery horizons for a while: healthy light dinners and make-ahead food that is easy for husband to heat up when I am not around.

The reason for the healthy light dinners is that as a result of lockdown and middle-age, or maybe sloth (not enough proper exercise) and gluttony (too much homemade pizza) body is not as streamlined as it could be (understatement). And since at some point I have to squeeze into proper clothes, maybe even a suit of nonstretchy material, and people will see me also from neck down, something must be done.

The first recipe of a healthier kind is this excellent recipe for fat-free oven wedges I copied from my very talented Finnish blogger friend. I did tweak the spice mix a little just based on what I had in my cupboard, for instance I didn't have umami-powder, but I'm intrigued and I feel that I really should have, I love umami. But the key learning here was, that the fat-freeness doesn't take anything away from the experience. Why on earth have I splashed around with all that oil for years. These are just fantastic without a single drop of oil.

These are great served as a side to any kind of protein or would make a nice snack with a light yoghurt and dijon sauce.

Fat-free potato wedges with a peppery venison and tomato stew

Lighter potato wedges

1kg of potatoes

Spice mix:

2 tsp smoked paprika

pinch of cayenne pepper

2 tsp umami powder (optional)

2 tsp ground onion

2 tsp ground garlic

Pinch of white pepper

Salt (herb salt if you have)

Pre-heat oven to 200-225 C.

Wash the potatoes and cut into wedges. Mix well with the spice mix making sure all of the wedges are well coated. Cover a baking sheet with non-stick baking paper. Bake in the middle of the oven for about 30 minutes giving them a bit of a shuffle halfway through the baking. They are ready when nice and golden brown, fluffy on the inside and crispy on the outside.

anchovy

Around the world in 14 dinners Sweden - Jansson's Temptation another man's torture

11:36

beef

Sailor's Steak - My mother's recipes

22:42

Sailor's Steak or Sailor's Beef (Swedish Sjömansbiff or Finnish Merimiespihvi)

Husband and I have now been in Corona-lockdown for a little over a week. He finally got home last week after being stuck in Iran for several very anxious weeks. Fortunately I stayed incredibly brave and strong. Stoic even.

I may have burst into tears on horrified workmates on the odd occasion.

I may have shouted at and hung up on some Foreign and Commonwealth Office people, who to be fair (to me) were complete dickheads.

And on the day he was finally flying I texted and WhatsApped him possibly a bit too frequently to make sure everything was going to plan. He had two plane changes and I had to make sure he wasn't falling asleep somewhere in between or waiting at the wrong gate or in some other way messing it all up. When he got home he said he almost blocked me.

And obviously I burst into happy tears when he finally walked through to the arrivals at Heathrow. But other than that and maybe a few too many glasses of red wine to calm my nerves I was a picture calm resilience.

So in a way this week having husband back to me safe and sound has been a happy one. But naturally the ever more worrying news from around the world have taken the shine off things.

I know it's only been a week and there will be so many more. But days already blur into one. One day I was on a conference call wondering why no-one else was joining. I started messaging people possibly slightly accusatorially asking if they were planning to join. They said they were, the next day. I had been looking at the following day's calendar and had actually missed another call earlier in the morning, a really interesting training session on mobile gas detection (!?!) so I was gutted.

The other day husband was asking me if he had had a shower that day. I said I thought he had, but couldn't be sure. So he took a peak into his lounge pants and noticed that he seemed to be wearing a new pair of boxer shorts, so he took that as a sign that a shower had taken place.

I keep calling my dad who is slightly prone to pessimism at the best of times to keep his spirits up. My parents are in their 80s and dad had made some mathematical modelling and come to a conclusion that he and mum would not make it through this. So he had come up with the idea that they should go out and try and get it now when hospitals still have intensive care capacity. He reckoned if they get it later they will just be left to die. I suggested that another possible strategy would be to stay in and not get the virus at all. He saw some promise in the thought and said he's give it a think.

On a slightly more optimistic day he told my sister that he thought he definitely would not survive this, because he has some weakening of lung function from an influenza and subsequent pneumonia, but mum might have a chance. My sister told him not to worry, she would look after mum. He felt my sister could have shown a bit more emotion about his possible demise.

Toilet paper hoarding left me with this delightful option.

We are well stocked for food. My freezer and cupboards are always full. I just came back from Finland with more lovely game meat and some fish and smoked goodies. I also have a substantial stock of tinned smoked mussels which of course is essential in a global virus lockdown situation like this.

And before husband got back I went out to get some things to prepare, because we can't visit shops until we know he hasn't caught the virus on his travels. It's starting to look likely he hasn't, we are on day 10 now.

All the supermarket home delivery slots have been booked up in our area, but I managed to order 15 bottles of wine from Aldi this week which will keep us on a cheerful mood. And eventually I found a company delivering food boxes and ordered a delivery because we were running low on milk and fresh veg. There was milk, eggs, bread and butter and all sorts of fresh fruit and veg. I was particularly delighted to find a little carton or fresh raspberries and an avocado!

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For some reason I seem to have accumulated lots of potatoes. Probably because I have bought lots of potatoes. And there were some more in the box. I love potatoes. A potato to a Finn is the same as pasta to normal people. A meal is not really a meal if there aren't any potatoes. I pretend sometimes with my rice dishes and orzo and other silliness. But in my heart I know a proper dinner table needs a pan of boiled potatoes and a jar of pickled herring.

My mum, who is my cooking inspiration and idol used to make a dish called Sailor's Steak. It's a traditional Finnish dish, although Swedes obviously claim it as their own and I suppose it's possible. I'm usually up for these fights but now I'm thinking it doesn't matter, whoever came up with it should be knighted. The dish is a brilliantly simple but tasty bake with beef, onions and potato. I actually have never made it before and if turned out perfect. I made it with lamb leg steaks because that's what I happened to have and it was amazing. But next time I will do it with beef, that's the original way.

Sailor's Steak or Sailor's Beef (Swedish Sjömansbiff or Finnish Merimiespihvi)

(serves 4)

700g beef or lamb (topside, brisket, lamb leg steaks or similar)
2 yellow onions
4-5 large potatoes
Vegetable oil
Butter
Salt
Black pepper
330ml bottle of beer (lager)
300ml beef stock
Bay leaf

Cut the meat into approximately half an inch / 1 cm thick small steaks across the grain (around the size of a match box). Flatten them with a meat tenderiser. Some recipes call for dredging the meat in flour, but I don't bother with that.

Heat oil in a pan and brown the meat on both sides. Season with salt and pepper. Remove to a plate.

Peel and slice the onions thinly. I used a mandolin for ease. Do the same with the potatoes, although you can leave them unpeeled if you like. Sauté the onions in a pan until they soften, don't brown them. Remove to a plate. Sauté the potato slices until they start getting some colour.

Take a large baking dish and start layering the ingredients. You can use a large dutch oven if you like. It does't really matter how you want to layer things, but maybe start with some potato, then meat, onion and another layer of potato. Finish with a layer of potato.

Pour the stock and beer in the pan you have been using to fry the ingredients. Warm it up, season with salt and pepper. Pour in the baking dish. It should come to about 1cm from the rim. Add water if you don't have enough or if you have too much reserve to add during the cooking if necessary.

Add a couple of knobs of butter on the top of the potatoes. Cover with foil and bake in a 180C oven for 2 hours. Then remove the foil and bake for another 30-40 minutes until the potatoes on the top are brown and crisp. Check the liquid during the cooking a few times and add if it looks it's getting too dry. It's not supposed to be a soup in the end, but there should be some sauce left.

Let rest a little before serving.

Arctic

Sauteed reindeer soup - greetings from Finland

18:45

Summer holiday is over. We had an absolutely amazing week in Finland visiting friends and family. The weather was even more unbelievable than the gorgeous summer we've enjoyed in the UK this year. The temperatures were around 28-30 C every day and even the lake water was 28 C. I was out there on my lilo slapping horseflies till 10pm.

We were treated to so much amazing food I could write about it the rest of the year. And maybe I will. One recipe at a time.

We drove around quite a lot visiting my three brothers, friends, my cousin and best childhood friend and my parents of course. Husband's kids were with us squeezed to the back seat of our hired Volvo V40 which would comfortably fit 4 normal sized people, but with these cyclopes normal laws of physics don't apply. They actually couldn't sit with their necks straight, which obviously is just academic since they never sit straight anyway bent over their smart phones like drooping flowers. Only less fragrant.

The other complaint from my otherwise adventurous entourage were the numerous mosquitoes, bees and horseflies. The warm summer has been kind to our bitey and stingy little friends. I don't mind them that much, if I feel someone biting me I just kill it, won't scratch the bite and that's it. But apparently that is not a viable strategy, much arm flailing and little-girly screaming, endless scratching and crying over the bites must ensue. The kids came up with a theory that the insects prefer fresh foreign flesh and blood and don't touch us natives. That is not the case I informed them, it's just that we have manned up and don't howl and wail about it incessantly.

And proof of this was my dad who was bitten by something at the lunch table in the garden. He was lunching in the normal Finnish holiday outfit - a pair of swimming trunks from the 1970s. We call them his phantom pants, see below why. So dad was feeling something untoward on his belly and smacked the poor beast dead with one smooth move. Judging by the mess on his belly the insect had clearly managed to already export quite a bit of blood from him. Dad just wiped away the mess with his napkin and continued slurping down his salmon soup while kids slightly hysterically laughed at the bloodshed.

Separated at birth.

So the first of our awesome culinary treats to be featured in the blog has to be this sauteed reindeer soup. My cousin and his husband had invited us for lunch and served this as a starter followed by smoked salmon with lots of different sauces and dips and salads.

I have never had this version of a reindeer soup before and asked my cousin's husband who was the brains behind this soup for detailed instructions. I had to try it immediately when we got back home. Luckily I had both reindeer meat and smoked reindeer cheese in the freezer. I am never knowingly understocked in Arctic goodies.

The soup turned out fantastic although the potatoes apparently were the wrong shape. Our hosts had actually gone to the trouble of shaping the new potatoes to resemble the Lappish small oval Puikula-tatties. I am an industrious wife, but it seems this is were I draw the line.

Sauteed reindeer soup

Rapeseed oil (or butter for taste)
1 onion, chopped
400g reindeer (thinly sliced)
water (about 4 cups in total)
1 stock cube / pot (game or beef)
6-7 potatoes, peeled and cubed
2-3 carrots, cleaned and cubed
Salt
Black pepper
150 g smoked reindeer cheese (or Philadelphia cheese)
Sour cream (optional - I added a couple of tablespoons)
2 tbsp fresh flat leaf parsley - chopped

Heat the oil in a frying pan and saute the chopped onion. Add the thinly sliced meat and brown lightly. Pull the meat apart while frying, so you end up with very small pieces.

Pour the meat and onion mix into a deep sauce pan, add enough water to cover. Add the stock pot, salt and pepper. Bring to boil and let simmer until meat is really tender, around 30-45 minutes.

Add the potatoes and carrots and enough water to cover the ingredients. Cook until the vegetables are done, about 15 min.

Add the cheese and sour cream if using. Mix well until the cheese has melted. Check seasoning and sprinkle with the parsley.

Serve with toasted dark rye bread and butter.

bake

Superfood fish pie

14:21

capsicum

Warming game soup with tomato and root vegetables

11:53

cauliflower

Cauliflower and chèvre purée - so delicious and elegant you would never guess how easy it is

22:21

This goat cheese and cauliflower mash is either an elegant silky accompaniment to some delicately cooked lamb or a robust and comforting bed on which to serve the weeknight protein of choice.

I got the idea originally from my sister. Her husband's sister had served them lamb with a cauliflower and chèvre purée which apparently had been restaurant quality and with the amount of l'accents should bloody well be.

Our surroundings at the moment are not restaurant quality, everywhere is covered with boxes of tiles and a layer of dust regardless of my obsessive but futile daily mopping and dusting. We have the world's most useless builder doing our bathroom and it's taking forever. But at least because we have to go shower at the gym we will get some accidental extra exercise and in the end we may be slightly less perfectly fresh but our buns will be steel and abdomens can be used as dinner gongs in Downton Abbey – the Movie.

It is a bit of a palaver though because every time you go to gym you forget something critical, like clean clothes and after the workout and shower you have to go home commando in sweaty running pants. Or you forget your towel and have to skulk around the dressing room starkers and wipe yourself dry with the side of your palm.

Husband is not as enterprising or persevering so tonight when he forgot his towel he just turned back defeated halfway and asked if there was a chance of a nice dinner instead.

And of course there was because I was dying to do this cauliflower concoction.

I had a couple of haddock fillets, nothing exciting but pretty lovely when seasoned to perfection and fried in a bit of oil and butter. But the real excitement of the evening was the cauliflower and goat cheese mash. I made it a bit more robust, even left it rustically (rustic is kind of like lazy but stylishly and intentionally so) lumpy rather than pure until silky smooth. I also did it a bit more filling with half cauliflower and half potato. But you could do it with just cauliflower.

Husband initially questioned the smell emanating from the kitchen, but when I assured him it was a totes legit smell of boiling cauliflower and nothing to do with the bathroom works he relaxed and happily consumed a healthy portion of the mash and fish.

Cauliflower, potato and goat cheese mash

Cauliflower and chèvre mash

400g cauliflower

400g potatoes

salt

water

150g soft goat cheese

2 tbsp of mascarpone or butter

Remove the stalk of the cauliflower and cut the vegetable into pieces. Peel the potatoes and cut into chunks. Put the cauliflower and potatoes in a pan and cover with water. Add salt. Bring to boil and simmer until vegetables are cooked. Drain reserving some of the water.

Add the chevre and mascarpone or butter. Mash or blend until smooth adding water depending on how thick or thin you like it. Check seasoning and add salt if necessary.