Walnuts in honey, to Parmigiano Reggiano

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Walnut in honey, with Parmigiano-Reggiano from Parma, Italy.

Walnut in honey, with aged parmigiano reggiano hard cheese from Parma, Italy.
J E Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson © 2011

One of the most fun culinary discovery trips is when you take a known concept and add a twist to it. Here, we’re having Parmigiano Reggiano from Kulla Gourmet, a company whose family produces the cheese in Parma, Italy, accompanied with walnuts in honey, produced by another family owned Swedish company, Birgittas Matbod in Öland.

It was during our 2008 visit to Florence, Italy, dining at Trattoria Quatro Leoni we experienced a memorable moment having Italian hard cheese with honey. And since then, we’ve been experimenting with different honey, cheese and wine combinations. (See, A caseinic tour of Europe), trying to find our favourite combination of flavours.

We brought back a few things from the past week’s Passion för Mat food fair, and this weekend lent a serendipitous discovery by combining Swedish made walnuts and honey to our 24 months old Swedish-Italian Parmigiano Reggiano. What’s more? No cooking needed. Simply cut the cheese into squares, lay it on the plate, pour out the walnuts in honey… and enjoy!1

Passionate about food, a walk through Passion för Mat 2011, iGothenburg, Sweden

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Leif Mannerström testing homemade ice-cream.

The Grand Old Man of Western Swedish Gastronomy and Guide Micheline star Chef Leif Mannerström gives the thumbs up of one of the new flavours at the Österhagens ice-cream stall. No surprise perhaps. Stig’s and Inger’s efforts are well known, and recognized by Diplomas of Execellence awarded by the Western Swedish Academy of Gastronomy in 2008 and by the Swedish Academy of Gastronomy in 2010.

Adding the last touches, ahead of opening

Vintage 1960 van crowd puller, used for serving coffee.

Early Friday morning the staff at the Swedish Coffee house Löfbergs Lila were adding the last touches to their stall. Besides coffee, they feature a vintage 1960 French delivery truck with forward opening “girl catching” doors, painted in their corporate colors and rebuilt into a coffee van. Together with the smell of freshly brewed coffee samples, nothing beats this as a crowd puller.
Photo © JE Nilsson for CMC 2011

Yesterday, Friday the 25th of February, 2011 – the forth installment of the food fair Passion för Mat 2011 at Eriksbergshallen in Gothenburg opened its gates for the expectant crowds.

This particular food fair is a crowd pleaser in that its exhibitors are overwhelmingly generous with giving out samples of most everything displayed to be sold.

I had arrived well ahead of opening hours this first day, since I had planned to help some at the booth of the Western Swedish Academy of Gastronomy friends organization. The steady paced group of exhibitors – bright, friendly and enthusiastic – are so passionate about what they do that it’s a joy to be there. Taking my time, I strolled around the expansive hall to say hello to friendly faces who like me, were adding a last few touches to their stalls.

One of the trends today in upscale dining is that the food comes with a story. The produce should be grown as close to the consumption as possible. Both in time and geography. The fish should ideally be alive when it goes into the pot and as one Chef puts it, if we push this just a little bit further, people will need to bite into the cow in the barnyard. So, people here know what they are selling. If they hadn’t baked, cooked or canned everything themselves, they at least knew those who did.

After grabbing a coffee from the remarkably attention grabbing purple vintage 1960 van at the Löfbergs Lila stand, I wandered on.
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Triple chocolate, organic raw cacao chocolate chip cookies

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Chocolate chip cookie with raw 100 percent cocoa, chocolate chips.

Triple chocolate, chocolate chip cookies with Pacari 100% organic raw cacao.
Photo © JE Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2011

The event for all food lovers in Sweden is happening end of this week, Passion för Mat! from 25-27 February, 2011 at Erikbergshallen in Gothenburg.

At this year’s tradefair, as with Passion för Mat 2010, a segment of the very large hall will be dedicated to an open to public Cooking School or Köksskolan, where reknowned personalities from the food industry and celebrity Chefs make their appearance at various hours, tutoring and entertaining the public on how to cook different types of food. What sounds most interesting this year is Friday’s (25th February, 15:00 hrs) focus on the basic raw ingredient of eggs and how best to fry an Omelette, where a competition will be held to see who can serve up the best creation! That, and several tutorials on from how to best cook fish and wild meat to how to cook Vietnamese and Italian, will be topics that pique my interest.
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Valentine’s Day

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Strawberry and banana sponge cake to Valentine's Day.

A simple Swedish sponge cake filled with strawberry and bananas, topped with whipped cream and fresh strawberries.
Photo © JE Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2011

I’d like to share with you all a simple Valentine’s and Birthday cake that we had in Sweden today that’s made of a three-layered sponge cake filled with strawberries and mashed bananas, topped with fresh cut strawberries and a rose. This cake is usually enjoyed in the summer time here because its light texture complements well, the warmth of the summer sun, so it made an early appearance this February, in the middle of winter.

Rose

Rose.

Thank You ALL for a the overwhelming Birthday and Valentine’s Day greetings and Thank You for making my day!

With Love,
Cheryl

Shortbread, an uncomplicated Love

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Shortbread cookie in the form of a heart for Valentine's Day.

Our Valentine’s Day shortbread cookies, being dusted with icing sugar.
Photo © JE Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2011

I’ve been meaning to come up with some very decadent and fancy, most likely chocolate filled dessert this Valentine’s Day in celebration of Friendship, Passion and Love. Most everything crossed my mind from raspberry filled molten lava chocolate cake to Dulce de Leche brownies and chocolate fudge cake laced with Amaretto or Kahlúa.

But after pondering recipes and life experiences, my thoughts often came back to butter cookies and shortbread cookies. Shortbread was central in my life because it was my Mother’s favourite cookie. And it was also what I was immediately offered, crusted over with granulated sugar, first thing I stepped into my grandmother’s house regardless of whether it was lunch or tea or dinner.

Shortbread is, in all its simplicity, decadent and luxurious. What makes it so irresistible is the ratio of butter to flour and sugar that make these cookies melt in your mouth by the touch of the tip of your tongue to the cookie. Breathe over it and you risk having the cookie turn molten between your fingertips!
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Carrot Cake, an unexpected love relation

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Just Carrot Cake.

My favourite version of the Carrot Cake, sans frosting.
Photo © JE Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2011

In preview of Valentine’s Day, here’s a culinary limerence of mine for something as basic and unromantic as the Carrot Cake.

My first encounter with this unlikely creation of the baker’s genius was, I believe, in the late 1980s or early 1990s. Possibly at Starbucks or Hard Rock Café in Singapore and in the company of a group of friends, possibly having some influence on my judgment. ‘Unlikely’, because carrots do not immediately strike me as a cake ingredient even today. Perhaps what sold me, was the frosting.

As all who have grown up in Singapore, I was mostly used to white carrots or radish in fried chai tow kway, a dish usually eaten at breakfast in the country.

But biting through the cream cheese frosting, into the coarse, dense texture of the Carrot Cake, the taste explosion I encountered on the fabulous bake treat after just one try had me head-over-heels in love with this creation. And after arriving in Sweden, I just had to learn to bake my own since it isn’t always that the café around the corner from my place has a tray of Carrot Cake for the buying.
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Meet-up with old friends in Stockholm

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Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson at Stockholm's östasiatiska Museet, the East Asian Museum, Stockholm.

At the Östasiatiska Museet, Stockholm.
Photo © JE Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2011

The Terracotta Army Exhibition currently ongoing at the Östasiatiska Museet in Stockholm plus girlfriends in town and a love for long drives all provided excellent reasons for a cross country weekend getaway from Gothenburg to Stockholm. Whichever way you choose to travel between the two largest cities of Sweden, the time needed is about half a day. If you can flash the corporate plastic and use a cab for the transfers, travelling by air is of course the best.

If you have plans to visit a number of places as we did, and like the freedom, a car ride is worth considering.

There is surprisingly enough, no expressways between Gothenburg and Stockholm but rather three choices of roads. One pretty much okay in terms of speed (E4), one decent (E20) and one, lets be polite and say – scenic – road (E45/E18). Being in no particular hurry we of course chose the last one for the leg up, while the return trip home was made on the E4. The former being an interesting route through a snow blanketed provincial Swedish landscape and the E4 with a few exceptions around the Lake Vättern, pretty much one long stretch of asphalt.

We made it to the Östasiatiska Museet early on Sunday to avoid the mid-day crowds. This exhibition which shows a number of pieces never before exhibited outside of China has so far turned out to be a great success, not in the least because of the fact that the museum managed to make accessible and use some formerly secret military caverns just under it for this exhibition, but the sensation of actually meeting with these lifesized figures – underground – where they were actually meant to be, gives an eerie aspect to the entire experience of it all, where you now and again catch yourself making sure that the figures are actually standing still.
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Sesame seed laced Love Letters – A Chinese New Year tradition unfolded

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Love Letters or Kuih / Kueh Kapit. In Swedish, rullrån.

“Love Letters” or Kuih / Kueh Kapit also, in Swedish, rullrån.
Photo © JE Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2011

These days mark the celebration of the Chinese Lunar New Year, beginning on 3 February 2010 and the day before would be when most Chinese families come together for a large family reunion dinner. My mother’s preference is for a family reunion dinner over “steamboat” or fondue chinoise as it is known in the west, with homemade sambal belachan chili, a variety of sambal belachan laced with a little bit of garlic in which you’d dip almost all food items that come out of the steamy broth before eating. The beauty of the steamboat meal is that the broth is simmering throughout, so you could spend several hours over a dinner that is constantly warm and with freshly cooked food.

Apart from the Lunar New Year’s reunion dinner, there comes with this festivity in my family several signature cakes and cookies that include pineapple tarts, kueh bahulu, kueh bangkit and as below kueh kapit or “Love Letters”.
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The Swedish East Indiaman Gotheborg – and the tiger economy of Sweden

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The Swedish East India Götheborg III was launched in 2003, in Gothenburg, Sweden.

In 2003, launching of the Swedish East Indiaman Gotheborg III
Photo © JE Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2003-2011

My personal involvement in the Swedish East Indiaman Gotheborg III project was so early that I had not myself realized it back then. In the project newspaper GotheborgsPosten that was distributed in 360,000 copies throughout the entire western Sweden in 1996, it was outlined that one of the research objectives that would be targeted was Swedish-Chinese Business Communication. The Professor that in 2003 would arrange for me to receive the Anna Ahrenberg Research Funding Scholarship to help me start a PhD research (graduated in 2009) in doing precisely that, was interviewed. Strange indeed are the paths of life. Today, I go off to work everyday by ferry straight across Wargö Håla, the historic departure point of the Swedish East Indiamen in the western Swedish archipelago. In fact the house in which we live features one of the ship’s actual water provision wells in our very garden.

Currently at work, at the University of Gothenburg School of Executive Education AB, prevalent topics of discussion circle around Swedish-Chinese business relations and the future of work prospects with Sweden’s competitive growing economy that earned acknowledged nods from Swedish leaders, specifically that of its Finance Minister, Anders Borg, of the country being a Nordic tiger economy (ref. Di, DagensPS and Epoch Times). All this showing that the Swedish East Indiaman still has a relevant role to play, more so today than ever in its importance of growing global contacts. Its shared goodwill initially created by the East Indiaman Project is everywhere present.

In the media recently, a passionate discussion has arisen about what to do with the ship, now when its initiating ideas have been completed – the ship built and it has traveled to China and back. What now?

Many suggestions including turning it into a museum, an amusement park and why not – firewood – have come forth. Personally not even at today’s energy prices does the idea of firewood sound very brilliant.

Eventually, the original Founders of the project have chosen to step forth, and in this weekend’s local newspaper GP, have briefly presented their views of how the ship could continue to earn its keep and do much more than that.

The following article were published in GP, in January 22, 2011, as part of the ongoing debate about the future of the Swedish East Indiaman Gotheborg III ship.

H.R.H. the King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia of Sweden disembark the Goteborg III and officially set foot on Chinese soil.

H.M. King Carl XVI Gustaf and H.M. Queen Silvia, disembark the Gotheborg III in Canton, China, 2006.

From the point of view of Anders Wästfelt and the Think Tank Gotheborg, the ship is far from done sailing:

In view of the past few days defensive debate in the media and our City Council, on the future of the East Indiaman Gotheborg, it is time to lift our eyes beyond the horizon. In the right hands the Götheborg III – our ship – is a regional and national asset with huge potential.

She has great future tasks, functioning as a symbol of our community, an inspiration for continued work and as a source of financial revenues. She is well-built and with proper maintenance, she can sail for another 20-30 years.

The project to build a replica of the 1700s Swedish East Indiaman began in 1992 as a private initiative. It was well thought through and enjoyed the support of international shipbuilding expertise, the best marketing specialists, lawyers, economists, politicians, sinologists, university faculties as well as members of the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Swedish Trade Council.

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A winter’s day at noon, in Sweden

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Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson mink fur and pleated skirt, both made in Canada.

Sweden’s position near the arctic polar circle makes the days short during winter and the sun just barely makes it above the horizon. Soaking up some sun beams in our garden. A useful outfit in this weather, a Canadian mink jacket and pleated red wool skirt.
Photo © JE Nilsson and C M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2011

I first visited Sweden during some winter months about a decade ago – imagine how time passes – and my first observation was that walking on water was not by far as difficult as that of my Catholic upbringing had led me to believe. You just needed to wait until it was frozen. Today work and travel make it difficult to find much time to spend in the nature during daytime. A few moments of crystal clear sky and crisp winter air just a few degrees below zero centigrade, was some of the more enjoyable moments of this weekend.

Sweden’s position near the arctic polar circle makes the days short during winter and the sun just barely makes it above the horizon, before it apparently a bit sleepy, drops back down again and leaves us with a long arctic night. No wonder the Vikings felt a mid-winter sacrifice – and a party – were needed to cheer things up.

Even in Asia, at the end of January, the East celebrates the Chinese Lunar New Year. This year some shops in Singapore will even go the length of closing their doors a few days to welcome the festive echoes of Lion Dances rippling across the country in celebration of the Year of the Rabbit. Also a ‘sacrifice’ of some sort.
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