Tag: recipe

My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar – 17 December (Konfekt – homemade sweets)

DIANE IN DENMARK1 Comment

Welcome back to My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar!  Join me every day in opening a new door.  Once again, I’ve got a host of goodies to share with you – traditional Danish Christmas recipes, traditions, songs, games, decorations, crafts and landscapes…  So sit back, relax and enjoy!

17 DECEMBER

I went a bit mad at the weekend when I was at the supermarket.  Not only is our house bursting with enough nibbles, sild (herring) and julebrygto sink a small Armada, behold this little lot!

These are just some of the ingredients we’ll be using tonight to make lots and lots of yummy Danish konfekt – small, homemade sweets.  Let’s see, we’ve got copious amounts of marcipan…

…and Danish nougat (a very soft brown fudge, not to be confused with French white nougat or Spanish túrron)…

…and some dried fruits (we like to use dates, apricots and crystallised ginger).

And plenty of chocolate – less is not more when you’re making konfekt! 😉 You’ll typically see konfekt served at Christmas, as party food or at the end of a meal instead of dessert.  Here’s what we’ll normally munch on when watching the day’s installment of the children’s tv Christmas calendar…

Need a few ideas to get you started?  Take some marcipan,  a large bar of chocolate and whatever else you have on hand: dried apricots, dates, Smarties or M+Ms, tiny marshmallows, coconut, icing sugar, edible gold, food colouring and tiny paper cases…  Roll out the marcipan and cut into shapes.  Or take a date and ‘stuff’ it with marcipan, then dip in chocolate.  Or cut up some apricots, and put a piece inside a ball of marcipan and roll in icing sugar, coconut or chopped nuts.  Soak some raisins in cognac for a couple of days, then spoon into tiny cases and cover with chocolate.  Anything goes!

Enlist the help of some little elves.  Though keep your eye on them because they eat rather copious amounts of marcipan etc while they work…

If you want to be more creative, just ‘google’ pictures of konfekt. You can do nougat-filled-yule-logs, coconut balls, boozy flavoured marcipan etc, etc, etc…  (If you’re a Danish marcipan freak like me, then you must try making a fabulous Danish cake – Mazarinkage.  My recipe for that is right here.)  But this is our family-favourite-five-minute-konfekt.  The hardest part?  Waiting it for the chocolate to dry! ;)

Velbekomme!  And don’t forget to check back here tomorrow when we open the next door!

Diane :)

My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar – 5 December (Æbleskiver)

DIANE IN DENMARK4 Comments

Welcome to my My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar!  Join me every day in opening a new door.  Once again, I’ve got a host of goodies to share with you – traditional Danish Christmas recipes, traditions, songs, games, decorations, crafts and landscapes…  So sit back, relax and enjoy!

5 DECEMBER

It’s really dull and dark in Copenhagen right now, so thank goodness for all those wonderful candles and fairy lights that make it hyggelig!

I’m bringing you this post today, Friday, because if you want to try making these little beauties yourself over the weekend (along with some of those pebernødder, perhaps?), you’ll need to beg, borrow or steal a special piece of kitchen equipment!  So what are we making?  [Or at least, what is my husband making…but more on that below.]   Æbleskiver (Danish Christmas donuts).  Now, if you happen to have kids, there’s a good chance that – even five days in to December – you are already thoroughly sick of the sight of the darn things!  ;)  ‘Cos they’re served at every single nursery, school or family party.  But, hey ho, I can always manage to eat just one more of them (my record at one sitting is about 15)…

æbleskiver

Now, you can buy pretty decent æbleskiver frozen in bags from the supermarket.  But if you’d like to have a go at making them yourself, then read on.  Just make sure you set aside a whole morning, afternoon or evening for the process, because they are time consuming to cook.  It’s always my husband who makes these (this is the one, I repeat, one time of the year that he ever cooks) and he uses his Dearly-Departed-Dad’s recipe.  And before you all start screaming that, “but my family uses a recipe with yeast,” or, “we always puts pieces of apple in ours”, or, “is it glutenfri?” – there is no universal æbleskive recipe.  Every family has their own version – this is ours – and it works for us!

So, on with the show.  You’ll need one of these dinky pans. No need to buy one just for the occasion – try asking a Danish neighbour or friend if you can borrow one! :)  Don’t live in Denmark?  Then try amazon…

 

For 30 donuts you’ll need:

  • 3 eggs

  • 3 tablespoons sugar

  • ½ teaspoon salt

  • a quarter litre of kærnemælk (buttermilk)

  • 2dl milk or cream (I’d go with cream, my Danish hubby sometimes uses milk – boo!)

  • 250g plain flour

  • 2 teaspoons baking powder

  • ½-1 teaspoon ground cardamom

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Mix the first five ingredients in a large bowl until it’s fairly frothy.  Easiest with an electric mixer.  Gradually mix in the flour, baking powder and ground cardamom.  Make sure it’s well mixed, then leave to rest for about 15 minutes.

Heat up your donut pan, put a tiny bit of oil or butter in each of the holes and fill each hole about two-thirds of the way up (they’ll swell up). When there are lots of bubbles on the surface of each donut, flip over.  In my husband’s family the tradition is to use knitting needles…  We used size 3 ;)  But a skewer will do.

When the little donut balls are browned on both sides remove from the pan.

Serve warm with icing sugar (or granulated sugar) and jam.  To eat them the Danish way:

  • each person takes a plate

  • put a spoonful of (icing, caster or granulated) sugar and jam on to your plate

  • put two or three donuts on to your plate

  • dip the donuts into the sugar and jam on your plate

  • repeat as necessary

Velbekomme!  And if you can’t eat them all today, don’t worry.  They freeze perfectly.

Don’t forget to check back here tomorrow when we open the next door!

Diane :)

My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar – 3 December (Pebernødder game)

DIANE IN DENMARK4 Comments

Welcome to My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar!  Join me every day in opening a new door.  Once again I’ve got a host of goodies to share with you – traditional Danish Christmas recipes, traditions, songs, games, decorations, crafts and landscapes…  So sit back, relax and enjoy!

3 DECEMBER

Yesterday I gave you a recipe for making pebernødder (“pepper nuts”) and told you that there’s a game you can play with these small rounds of yummy goodness.  Mus! “Mouse!”

Arm yourself with a (large – it’s Christmas after all!) supply of pebernødder and line some up in a row.  Five, six or seven is a good number to start with…

The first player decides which pebernød is going to be the mus or “mouse”.  Keep it a secret from your opponent!  (I’m just pointing it out here so you get the gist of the game.)

Player 2 starts eating pebernødder.  One at a time.  Slowly.

But if they pick up the one you earmarked, you shout out ”Mus!”  and they have to stop eating.   And that’s the end of their turn – ha! 😛

mus

Then you replace the pebernødder which have been munched – so you have a total of five, six or seven again – on the table.  It’s now Player 2’s turn to decide which one is “Mus” and Player 1′s turn to start eating.  And you keep taking turns until a) you run out of pebernødder or b) you get sick of eating pebernødder…  If you don’t feel you can trust each other (hmmm, siblings, anyone?), then you can cross off your ‘Mus‘ on a piece of paper before your start, so you have proof!

Held og lykke and velbekomme!  And don’t forget to check back here tomorrow when we open the next door!

Diane :)

My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar – 2 December (Pebernødder)

DIANE IN DENMARK2 Comments

Welcome to My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar!  Join me every day in opening a new door.  I’ve got a host of goodies to share with you – traditional Danish Christmas recipes, traditions, songs, games, decorations, crafts and landscapes…  So sit back, relax and enjoy!

2 DECEMBER

Okay, it’s time to get your pinnies on – we’re baking!  Yep, a lot of Danish families get together at Christmas in order to bake.  Not cakes – there’s no Danish version of the British heavy-fruit-packed Christmas cake or French bûche de noël (yule log).  No, they bake lots of different biscuits and cookies.  My daughter was invited over to her friend’s house on Saturday afternoon and they baked several tins full…

Today we’re making pebernødder – ‘pepper nuts’.  Small, spicy, crunchy biscuits that are a) good to eat and b) an essential ingredient in a Danish Christmas game.  But more on that tomorrow! 🙂

pebernødder

 

You can, of course, just buy them at the supermarket or from your local baker.

But they’re pretty simple to make.  So on with the show!

First of all you’ll need:

  • one egg

  • 125g of sugar

Beat these together in a bowl until you get a pale yellow frothy mixture.

Then add this lot to the bowl:

  • 250g plain flour

  • 125g butter (I always use Kærgården)

  • ½ teaspoon of baking soda (natron)

  • ½ teaspoon of cardemom (stødt kardemomme)

  • ½ teaspoon of ground ginger (ingefær)

  • ½ teaspoon of cinammon (kanel)

  • ½ teaspoon of ground black pepper

Beat them again and then scrape the mixture out of the bowl…

…and into a plastic bag.  Throw it in the fridge for an hour or so until the dough hardens up.

Cut off chunks of dough, then roll them into long sausage/worm shapes.  Take a knife and cut the sausage into small pieces (about the size of a small cherry).  Roll them into little balls.

Place them on a baking tray (I always use baking paper for easy clean up) and pop them into a warm oven – 200c/400f.

Bake them in the oven for about 15-20 minutes until they look dry and are beginning to turn a pale golden brown.  Let them cool off and then you can a) eat them b) play with them (more on that tomorrow) or c) put them in little cellophone bag or boxes to give away as presents.

Velbekomme!  And don’t forget to check back here tomorrow when we open the next door!

Diane :)

I heart Danish comfort food! (Part Eleven – Sprængt okse/and)

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This morning it was dark and pouring with rain when my kids biked off to school.  I put on my waterproofs (no such thing as bad weather – only unsuitable clothing!), got on my bike and battled the wind and rain down to the beach…in order to strip it all off and enjoy my ritual morning skinny dip in the sea with a friend.  Life is good!

Got home – starving as usual – and feasted upon a piece of ryebread with slices of that Danish classic, sprængt oksekød (salted beef)…  Life is really good!

The beef was left over from last night’s dinner of hot sprængt oksekød, carrots, tatties and peberrodssauce (horseradish sauce).  (Not the most attractive dish, I grant you.  Unless you’re a big fan of grey meat?)

It’s a very easy dish to make and the cooking method is the same, whether it’s duck or beef.  Boil one litre of water and about 300g of cheap table salt for a few minutes until the salt dissolves.  Let it cool and add your piece of oksebryst (beef, about 500g) or andebryster (4 duck breasts).  Let them sit overnight in the salty-as-an-old-seadog pickling liquid.

The next day, pour off the salty liquid and cover the meat with fresh water.  Bring to the boil and remove any white, foamy stuff.

Add a carrot, bay leaf, a sliced onion and a small handfull of peppercorns, pop the lid on and simmer gently for about an hour.

Remove the meat, leave to cool down slightly and then slice thinly.  While it’s cooling down, you can be getting on with the peberrodssauce.  Now, traditionalists will make the sauce by starting with a roux, adding some of the cooking water and then adding horseradish and some milk or cream.  I decided to go with this modern (and easy peasy) version from Karoline’s “Granny’s Food” cookbook…

You simply take about 3 large tablespoons of creme fraîche (38% fat) and 3 large tablespoons of crème fraîche (18% fat) and put them in a little pan along with 3 tablespoons of grated horseradish (you’ll find tiny pots of it in the chiller section, keeps forever), salt, pepper and about ½ a tablespoon of sugar.  Heat through gently.  I added more sugar ‘cos I like it that way…

Heat through gently.  I added a bit more sugar to mine – because that’s the way I like it! The peberrodssauce turned out really good  and tasted great – both hot last night and cold this morning.

After dinner, DDH (dear Danish husband) gave me his verdict on the sprængt okse.  “Well, it looked and tasted like it’s meant to…”  Praise indeed! 😉

Velbekomme!  Have a marvelous Monday!

Diane 🙂

I heart Danish comfort food! (Part Ten – Frederiksberggryde)

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We’re now into week 42 (the Danish school’s half term holiday week) so I won’t be posting this week as I shall be ‘hygging’ with my DDH and our kids.  ♥

But I thought – hey – I had better leave you with a recipe for another Danish classic – another warming dish – just the thing for those cold and blustery autumn evenings. Especially as it’s now dark by 7.30pm – yikes!  This is Frederiksberggryde.  When we first moved to Copenhagen, we had a flat in Frederiksberg and the restaurants in the area used that name…  But in other parts of Denmark it’s known as mørbradgryde.  A one pot stew with bacon, pork and – the defining ingredient – those teeny tinned cocktail sausages.  Yep, those discount ones that you’re embarrassed to be seen buying! 😉

You’ll need:

  •  an onion

  • a piece of pork filet (svinemørbrad) – about 500g

  • bacon

  • a couple of tins of cocktail sauages (skinless if possible) cocktailpølser

  • flour (to thicken) mel

  • paprika

  • tomato purée tomatpasta

  • stock / boiling water and a stockcube (any flavour will do) bouillon

  • cream (fløde)

  • rice or potatoes or mashed potatoes (kartoffelmos) to serve

  • a bit of greenery to make it look ‘healthy’

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Chop up the onion, bacon and pork filet into small pieces.

Fry in a bit of oil until they brown slightly and add in the cocktail sausages.

Time to throw in a tablespoon of flour (this will thicken the ‘sauce’), a tablespoon of tomato purée and a couple of teaspoons of paprika, plenty of salt and pepper.  Give it a good stir, so everything gets coated.

Add in your stock (just enough to cover) – you’ll probably need about half a litre.

Then comes the best part…the cream!  Add as much as you like! 🙂  This is comfort food, folks, not paleo/nordic/raw…

Looking good!  Let it cook through on a medium heat for about 5 minutes (or until the pork pieces are cooked through).

Serve hot and add a little fresh herbs (chopped chives or lots of parsley) if you want to make it look less stodgy.  (And lots of vegetables or a salad on the side, if you absolutely must.)  We ate ours with rice the other night.  But Frederiksberggryde also goes down well with boiled or mashed potatoes – yum!

Have a super Sunday and an awesome autumn break!

Diane 🙂

 

What a (Copenhagen) Mess!

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No posts from me last week, as my family from Scotland were visiting.  And they seemed to have brought our typical (fickle!) Scottish weather with them in their suitcases… Yep, the start of the week was bright but chilly.  Then it warmed up and we had a few glorious days of heat and sunshine.

Then, come the weekend, it all went terribly wrong.  Thunder, lightning, torrential rain. And, to top it all off, flash flooding.  Which has left Copenhagen (and other parts of Denmark) with traffic chaos, water-logged buildings and a (very) sorry trail of destruction. Great summer weather? 😛  On our last night together (co-incidentally the very last day of summer, Sunday 31 August) I prepared a very traditional Danish dinner.  First up was Forloren Hare (Danish “Mock Hare”).  Which is the best meatloaf on the planet.  Honest!  Cross my heart and hope to die!  If you don’t believe me, see my recipe I ♥ Danish Comfort Food (Part Two).  Which I served with baby pots, carrots, lots of lovely sovs (“gravy”) and some freshly made Killer (Danish) Cucumber Salad.

But now for a (I admit, very tenuous) link to the mess after the flooding in Copenhagen! 😉  For dessert I made something my DDDMIL (Dearly-Departed-Danish-Mother-in-Law) often served.  There was never any official name for this summery pudding but, as it looks very like Eton Mess (or the Scottish “Cranachan”), I’m going to dub it “Copenhagen Mess”…

Take some fresh raspberries and strawberries (chopping them up into small chunks, if they’re on the big size).

Crush up some Danish makroner, and sprinkle them on top.

Don’t know what makroner (“macaroons”) are?  They’re small and very light.  And crunchy.  A cross between a biscuit and a meringue. With a strong taste of almonds. Nothing to do with dainty French macarons!

Whip up some cream and mix the whole lot together.  Not a pretty sight, but yummy!

If you really want to go the whole hog, then grate marcipan over the top.  Otherwise, just dig in.  (You can serve it with some vanilla icecream on the side.)

Velbekommen!  Bon appétit!  And here’s to the return of the warm, sunny weather – which returned yesterday morning in full force!

Diane 🙂

 

A slice of Danish teatime (Great Dane-ish Bakes, Part One – Hindbærsnitter)

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Okay, so you all must have guessed by now that I love Danish food.  I’ve got a series of posts on Danish comfort foods, plus another on Danish pastries/wienerbrød.  And now I’m starting a new one.  Great Dane-ish baked treats!  Woop, woop! 🙂

Today we start with…hindbærsnitter!  Literally “raspberry slices”.  We have a similar thing in Scotland called German (or Empire) biscuits.  Basically it’s two slices of shortbread, sandwiched with raspberry jam, then lots of lovely, lovely white icing on the top.  Here are some hindbærsnitter that we made ourselves.  Exhibit A.

And this is one we bought from the bakers.  Exhibit B.

They’re easy, peasy, lemon squeezy to make.  Ready to make them?  You’ll need:

  • 350g plain flour (12 oz)

  • 200g butter (7 oz) (be warned – margarine will NOT work!)

  • 150 g sugar (5 oz)

  • 1 egg

  • raspberry jam

  • icing sugar

  • sprinkles or, as I used, freeze-dried raspberries 

First of all, tip the flour and butter into a bowl.  Mash it together with a knife or a fork.

It should start to look like breadcrumbs.

Then add your sugar and egg, and work them in – the mixture will change colour slightly.

Use your hands to bring it into a ball.

Put the ball of dough into a plastic bag and place in the fridge for about 30 minutes (because we don’t want the dough to be too soft).

When it’s firmed up, roll it out between two sheets of baking paper – that way, it won’t stick to your rolling pin 😉  You’re aiming for a long log of dough.  Make sure it’s rolled out fairly thin.

Let the spreading begin!  Spread raspberry jam over the bottom half of your log.

Flip the top half over the bottom half, so you can’t see the jam.  Use the baking paper to help you, as it will be very floppy at this stage!

Use a fork or knife to squish down the top half to the bottom half.  We need to seal in the jam, so that it doesn’t leak out while cooking.  (Been there, done that…)

Bake in the oven at 175C (350f) for about 20 minutes.  Keep an eye on it!  You want it just turning a pale golden colour, not dark.  And then let it cool off…  Before thoroughly smothering it with white icing and your choice of topping.

Who wants to lick the bowl?  Me, me, me! 😛

Then it’s time to put the kettle on, cut some nice slices, round up your friends or family and dig in. Velbekomme!  Bon appétit!

Diane 🙂

Necessity is the mother of invention. And of homemade koldskål.

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As the Danes say, “Nød lærer nøgen kvinde at spinde”.  Necessity teaches the naked woman to spin.  And that’s exactly what I ended up doing on Wednesday.

Okay, so I wasn’t exactly sitting in my birthday suit, in the front parlour, at the wheel spinning a yarn.  No, I was forced to make koldskål from scratch.  To give you some background:  Tuesday was one of the hottest days of the year.  So when I opened the door of the dairy refrigerator at our local IRMA supermarket, the proverbial cupboard was bare.  What, no koldskål?!  Not even one measly carton of the addictive white stuff?  “Sorry,” said the friendly IRMA man, “just can’t keep up with demand.”  You will remember, dear readers, from my very first post about koldskål in 2011 that those crazy Danes are C.R.A.Z.Y. about the stuff.  Yep, there is a direct correlation between high temperatures and sales of koldskål.  Were we heading for koldskål shortages?  As we stood there chatting about the weather, guess what I spied behind him?  That dreaded (Danish) root of all evil –  lakrids (liquorice)– strikes again.  I mean, for heavens sake, liquorice salt?!  Blech and double blech! 😛

But, as usual, I digress!  I remembered something about making it yourself and – lo and behold – when I started checking out the different cartons of kærnemælk (buttermilk), there was a recipe on the back.  Saved!

The recipe was: “Beat 2 pasteurised egg yolks, 2 tablespoons of brown sugar and the seeds from a vanilla pod (we used vanilla powder) until frothy.  Carefully stir in the buttermilk.  Add a couple of tablespoons of lemon juice if desired.  Serve with cornflakes, kammerjunker (little plain biscuits) or slices of fresh strawberry.”

So that’s what we did.  And – by jingo – it tastes just as good as the readymade stuff! And it’s – selvfølgelig – dang cheaper than the readymade stuff… [said the canny Scot] So we ate half of it, there and then, and poured the remains back in the kærnemælk carton, to keep it cool in the fridge for another time.

Fast forward to today, Friday.  DD12 and her friend have just biked home from school and have polished off the remains.  Hmm, time to get naked and start spinning! 😉

Have a fabulous Friday and a wonderful weekend!

Diane 🙂

 

My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar – 11 December

DIANE IN DENMARK3 Comments

Welcome to My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar!  Join me every day in opening a new door.  Just like last year, I’ve got a host of goodies to share with you – traditional Danish Christmas recipes, traditions, songs, games, decorations, crafts and landscapes…  So sit back, relax and enjoy!

11 DECEMBER

Okay, it’s time to get your pinnies back on – we’re baking again!

Today we’re making pebernødder – ‘pepper nuts’.  Small, spicy, crunchy biscuits that are a) good to eat and b) an essential ingredient in a Danish kids’ Christmas game.  But more on that another day!

You can – selvfølgelig – buy pebernødder in any supermarket.  But last year we decided to make them ourselves…

First of all you’ll need:

  • one egg (1 æg)

  • 125g of granulated or caster sugar (sukker)

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Beat these together in a bowl until you get a pale yellow frothy mixture.

Then add this lot to the bowl:

  • 250g plain flour (mel)

  • 125g butter (I always use Kærgården)

  • ½ teaspoon of baking soda (natron)

  • ½ teaspoon of cardemom (stødt kardemomme)

  • ½ teaspoon of ground ginger (ingefær)

  • ½ teaspoon of cinammon (kanel)

  • ½ teaspoon of ground black pepper (sort peber)

Beat again and then scrape the mixture out of the bowl…

…and into a plastic bag.  Throw it in the fridge for an hour or so until the dough hardens up.

Cut off chunks of dough, then roll them into long sausage/worm shapes.  Take a knife and cut the sausage into small pieces (about the size of a small cherry).  Roll them into little balls.  Or get some little nisser (remember those?)to roll them into balls…

 

Place them on a baking tray (I always use baking paper for easy clean up) and pop them into a warm oven – 200c/400f. 

Bake them in the oven for about 15-20 minutes until they look dry and are beginning to turn a pale golden brown.  Let them cool off and then you can a) eat them b) play with them (more on that another day) or c) put them in little cellophone bag or boxes to give away as presents.

Velbekomme!  And don’t forget to check back here tomorrow when we open the next door!

Diane :)

My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar – 8 December

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Welcome to my My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar!  Join me every day in opening a new door.  Just like last year, I’ve got a host of goodies to share with you – traditional Danish Christmas recipes, traditions, songs, games, decorations, crafts and landscapes… So sit back, relax and enjoy!

8 DECEMBER

Today it’s Sunday – the second Sunday of Advent.  So tonight we’ll be lighting the next candle in our advent decoration and enjoying some æbleskiver that my husband made for us yesterday.

And what is in the glass?  Gløgg!  A nice cup of Danish mulled wine to keep us warm and cosy on this dreich night…  We had our first snow on Friday night but now the temperature has risen again and we’ve got rain – boo! 😉

Ready to glug, glug, glug our gløgg, gløgg, gløgg

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Every family has their own favourite gløgg recipe or brand they like to buy.  Go google gløgg recipes and you’ll see just how many variations there are – some for kids, some absolutely full of snaps that are lethal! 🙂  Just do your own thing and don’t listen to the purists.  I warm (and keep warm) our supermarket gløgg in my crockpot but a large saucepan on a low heat will do the job just as well.  Don’t boil it or you’ll lose the alcohol!  But make sure to add a large bowlful (or packet) of sliced almonds and raisins to your red wine concotion.  For me, it’s the act of fishing for the ‘bits’ at the bottom that turns it into a true gløgg experience…

You can buy ready mixed bags of almonds and raisins from Danish supermarkets

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It’s also tradition in our family that we drink gløgg on Lille Juleaften (Little Christmas Eve – 23 December) along with our homemade æbleskiver.  Mums!  [as the Danes say for ‘Yummy!’)

Skål!  Cheers!  And don’t – hic! – forget to check back here tomorrow when we open the next door!

Diane :)

My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar – 6 December

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Welcome to my My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar!  Join me every day in opening a new door.  Just like last year, I’ve got a host of goodies to share with you – traditional Danish Christmas recipes, traditions, songs, games, decorations, crafts and landscapes…  So sit back, relax and enjoy!

6 DECEMBER

The last of yesterday’s storm (code-named “Bodil” in Denmark, “Sven” in Sweden) is still blowing outside but luckily no damage here – though I just looked out the window and can see that one of our rhododendron bushes got uprooted and is now lying at the bottom of the garden! 😛

Anway, today let’s talk about traditional Danish Christmas baking.  So what are we making? [Or at least, what is my husband making…but more on that below.]  Æbleskiver (Danish Christmas donuts).  Now, if you happen to have kids, there’s a good chance that – even six days in to December – you are already thoroughly sick of the sight of the darn things!  ;)  ‘Cos they’re served at every single nursery, school or family party.  But, hey ho, I can always manage to eat just one more of them (my record at one sitting is about 15)…

Æbleskiver! Danish Christmas Donuts!

Now, you can buy pretty decent æbleskiver frozen in bags from the supermarket.  But if you’d like to have a go at making them yourself, then read on.  Just make sure you set aside a whole morning, afternoon or evening for the process, because they are time consuming to cook.  It’s always my husband who makes these (this is the one, I repeat one time of the year that he ever cooks) and he uses his Dearly-Departed-Dad’s recipe…

You’ll need one of these dinky pans. No need to buy one just for the occasion – try asking a Danish neighbour or friend if you can borrow one! :)  Don’t live in Denmark?  Then try amazon…

 

For 30 donuts you’ll need:

  • 3 eggs

  • 3 tablespoons sugar

  • ½ teaspoon salt

  • a quarter litre of kærnemælk (buttermilk)

  • 2dl milk or cream (I’d go with cream, my Danish hubby sometimes uses milk – boo!)

  • 250g plain flour

  • 2 teaspoons baking powder

  • ½-1 teaspoon ground cardamom

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Mix the first five ingredients in a large bowl until it’s fairly frothy.  Easiest with an electric mixer.  Gradually mix in the flour, baking powder and ground cardamom.  Make sure it’s well mixed, then leave to rest for about 15 minutes.

Heat up your donut pan, put a tiny bit of oil or butter in each of the holes and fill each hole about two-thirds of the way up (they’ll swell up). When there are lots of bubbles on the surface of each donut, flip over.  In my husband’s family the tradition is to use knitting needles…  We used size 3 ;)  But a skewer will do.

When the little donut balls are browned on both sides remove from the pan.

Serve warm with icing sugar (or granulated sugar) and jam.  To eat them the Danish way:

  • each person takes a plate

  • put a spoonful of (icing, caster or granulated) sugar and jam on to your plate

  • put two or three donuts on to your plate

  • dip the donuts into the sugar and jam on your plate

  • repeat as necessary

Velbekomme!  And if you can’t eat them all today, don’t worry.  They freeze perfectly.

Don’t forget to check back here tomorrow when we open the next door!

Diane :)

My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar – 5 December

DIANE IN DENMARK3 Comments

Welcome back to My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar!  Join me every day in opening a new door.  Just like last year, I’ve got a host of goodies to share with you – traditional Danish Christmas recipes, traditions, songs, games, decorations, crafts and landscapes…  So sit back, relax and enjoy!

5 DECEMBER

There’s a hefty storm a brewin’ in Denmark today – going to hit us in Copenhagen this afternoon and will blow for the whole evening.  Bringing with it sleet and snow…  So we’re being advised to batten down the hatches and stay indoors.  So how about getting cosy and enjoying some homemade konfekt? Which is the Danish word for little sweets – usually involving copious amounts of marcipan, Danish nougat (a very soft brown fudge, not to be confused with French white nougat or Spanish túrron) and chocolate.  Hooray! ;)  You’ll typically see konfekt served at Christmas, as party food or at the end of a meal instead of dessert.  Here’s what we enjoyed in front of the telly last night, watching the day’s instalment of the children’s tv Christmas calendar…

Start with a pack of marcipan (at least 250g), a large bar of chocolate (200g) and whatever else you have on hand: dried apricots, dates, Smarties or M+Ms, tiny marshmallows, icing sugar, edible gold, food colouring and tiny paper cases…

Enlist the help of some little elves.  Though keep your eye on them because they eat rather copious amounts of marcipan etc while they work…

 And then just let your imagination run riot.

If you want to be more creative, just ‘google’ pictures of konfekt. You can do nougat-filled-yule-logs, coconut balls, boozy flavoured marcipan etc, etc, etc…  (If you’re a Danish marcipan freak like me, then you must try making a fabulous Danish cake – Mazarinkage.  My recipe for that is right here.)  But this is our family-favourite-five-minute-konfekt.  The hardest part?  Waiting it for the chocolate to dry! 😉 

Velbekomme!

Storm or no storm, hope you have a fantastic evening.  And don’t forget to check back here tomorrow when we open the next door!

Diane 🙂

 

My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar – 3 December

DIANE IN DENMARK2 Comments

Welcome back to My Danish Christmas Advent Calendar!  Join me every day in opening a new door.  Just like last year, I’ve got a host of goodies to share with you – traditional Danish Christmasrecipes, traditions, songs, games, decorations, crafts and landscapes…  So sit back, relax and enjoy!

3 DECEMBER

Christmas in Denmark just isn’t Christmas without…snaps!  (Also known as akvavit or brændevin).  I got this recipe from one of my DDSILs (Dear Danish sister-in-laws) back in 1999.  It tastes of coffee and orange so, though not really suited for drinking with sild (herring), it’s a lovely wee warming drink on a chilly afternoon.  You don’t live in Denmark and can’t get snaps?  Never fear, you can also make it with a bottle of neutral vodka.  Ideally it needs to sit and brew for 35-40 nights (but will be perfectly drinkable after a couple of weeks) so, if you want to make some for the coming festive season, you’d better get your (ice) skates on! 😉

You’ll need:

  • one orange (appelsin)

  • 30-40 cloves (nelliker)

  • 100g soft brown sugar (brun farin)

  • 40g coffee beans (hele kaffe bønner)

  • vanilla pod (vanillestang)

  • bottle of neutral snaps, e.g. Brøndums or vodka (en flaske snaps uden ‘smag’ som Brøndums) 

First of all, find a very large glass (e.g. pickling) jar that will be big enough to hold the snaps and the orange. Stick the cloves into the orange. Or get one of Santa’s little helpers to help you… ;D

Mmm, it’s already beginning to smell of Christmas…

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Put the brown sugar into the jar.

Add the coffee beans.

Pop in the orange and the vanilla pod (split in two, if you’re so inclined).

Pour in a bottle of neutral snaps or vodka.

Clamp the lid down and give the jar a good shake.

And now comes the hard part…waiting all those long days and nights before you can drink it!  (Though go ahead and shake the jar occasionally, if that would make you feel better.).  When the time is up, you can sieve it through a coffee filter, or just pour out what you need straight from the jar.

Skål!  Cheers!  God Jul! – which, as you will remember, has nothing to do with God…

Don’t forget to check back here tomorrow when we open the next door!

Diane 🙂

 

DIY Danish Summer Champagne – Hyldeblomstchampagne!

DIANE IN DENMARK

Kid you not, we’ve just had a full week’s balmy, hot, sunny weather in Copenhagen.  Almost 30 degrees celcius today (86f) – summer is here!  And is set to leave us again because thunder and torrential rain is on the way… 😉  But, hey ho, at least our hyldeblomst (elderflower) bushes are in full bloom.  Now, hyldeblomst is generally considered a weed – they just appear in your garden, wanted or not. I think they’re actually quite pretty – small creamy coloured flowers which turn into crimson berries in the autumn. We’ve ‘lucky’ to have two large bushes in our back garden…

The Danes drink elderflower juice all year round – you’ll find it in most bars and cafés.   I used to make my own elderflower cordial until one year when I couldn’t get hold of the required sachets of citric acid – and discovered this recipe for Hyldeblomstchampagen – Elderflower Champagne.  Easy, sassy and soooo good! 🙂

Cut about 10 small elderflower heads (in full bloom – not the ones turning pale brown) and shake them gently to get any little bugs out… 😉 Do not rinse the elderflower heads.

Pop them in a very large pot (or split the ingredients between two pots), to which you add a roughly chopped lemon. Pips n’ all.

Pour over 750g sugar (just over 1 lb) and 2 tablespoons of white vinegar. White wine vinegar if you have it.

Lastly, pour over 4½ litres (roughly 9 pints) of cold water.  What, absolutely no yeast required?  No, it’s one of those marvels of science!  Give it a good stir round, cover and leave for at least 24 hours in a cool place.

The next day you can strain it and put it into sturdy glass bottles. A word of warning: it gets really fizzy, so you need bottles which won’t pop!  Screw top wine bottles are really good.

Leave the bottles in a cool, dark place. You might want to wrap them in a plastic carrier bag – just in case they ‘pop’.  Natural yeast will work it’s wonderful magic and – after about 6 weeks – you’ll have the most fantastic, golden, summery champagne which will make even the French turn green with envy.  Serve really cold.  And be careful when you open the bottle!  (Lock animals and kids indoors and wear firework goggles…)

If you leave it longer than 6 weeks, it will start to lose some of its fizz (and be less alcoholic) but still be drinkable.

Skål og god sommer!

Diane 🙂