Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

Chocolate cakes – heaven on earth.
Photo © JE Nilsson and CM Cordeiro-Nilsson 2009

I love chocolate and with that, anything chocolate. In Singapore, it was a favourite past-time of mine to explore cafés, eateries and bakeries in search of very good chocolate cakes, chocolate desserts and that exceptionally rich, warm cup of hot chocolate to complement the events of the day.

I have specific chocolate cakes to fit specific moods and chocolate cakes to suit the weather or the time of day. And I went absolutely berserk when Marcel Desaulniers’ (2000) Death by Chocolate: an astonishing array of chocolate enchantments hit the bookstores in Singapore almost a decade ago.

In Sweden, I was crushed when I my first chocolate cake craving hit (which wasn’t too long into my stay in Sweden) and found that I had nowhere to go to, to buy that perfect chocolate cake.

I needed to bake one if I wanted one.
Continue reading “A rich chocolate cake, to complement any event” →

Swedish crayfish
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson and Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2009

The season for these Swedish crayfish usually begins in early August, where the entire month of August is dedicated to crayfish parties around Sweden. But a neighbour had brought home a large catch of these and they thus made their way to our Midsummer table.

A significant difference in seafood sold in Sweden and in Singapore as I found out, is how most seafood in Sweden is sold pre-cooked in dill marinated brine, so that crayfish, prawns, crabs and lobsters often taste heavily salted with a hint of dill when you buy them off the shelves at the grocers. As such, cooking Singapore chilli crabs out of pre-cooked dill marinated crabs in brine, doesn’t quite give the desired results, as one can imagine.

Crown dill marinated and brine cooked crayfish.

Through the years though, I have found some use of brine boiled prawns bought off the shelves in Sweden, such as making quite good Hokkien prawn noodle soup from the peels. Just add butter, onion and sambal and you will have a broth that is reminescent of those sold at the Singapore hawker centers.

Crayfish bodies are usually 5 – 6 cm in length. These are shelled in the same manner as a large prawn.

Crayfish doesn’t need much to enhance its flavour. One of my favourite ways to have Swedish crayfish is to peel them and have a small pile of them with a little dollop of mayonnaise and a squeeze of lemon. Crayfish meat also makes a perfect topping on bread, and one or two crayfish sandwiches with a fresh blade of salad will make a most enjoyable meal!

And on the Swedish table, crayfish is often downed with snapps!

Fresh from a strawberry farm in Sweden.Photo © Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson and Jan-Erik Nilsson for CMC 2009

I’ve always known strawberries to come bottled in sweet jams. In fact, ‘strawberry’ as a flavour was so common when I was growing up in Singapore, where you have them in almost everything from milk to kiddy toothpaste, that I thought strawberry was common commodity even without actually having tasted the real fruit.

My very first encounter with a strawberry farm was in Genting Highlands, Malaysia when I was about eight years old. Genting Highlands is about an hour’s drive from Kuala Lumpur and I found it a scenic region with cooler temperatures than the tropical heat of the lowlands. I remember Genting Highlands because every morning, the grounds of the hotel where we stayed would be covered in thick condensation, a cool fog that made you feel as if you were walking in clouds.

I liked strawberry jam but the experience of visiting a strawberry farm in Genting Highlands, changed my understanding of strawberries completely! I remember my parents buying farm made strawberry jam from the farm we visited, and after one taste of what I thought was the most decadent strawberry jam, I never liked the highly processed versions found on the sheleves at the Singapore grocery stores.

The strawberries, just before they disappeared!

The digression on Genting Highlands strawberries is just because Midsummer weekend is around the corner here in Sweden and we’ve tried our best, in the past few days, to seek out freshly picked Swedish grown strawberries. And today, we found some!

These strawberries are smaller and a deeper red than the hydroponically grown strawberries that are also found at the local grocers. So for those in Sweden, home-grown Swedish strawberries are in season right now and it’s a recommended buy!

A light stew in sugar and they make a perfect topping to ice-cream or have them fresh atop some traditional strawberry fruit cake with cream!

Serve with some full flavoured red wine and a few slices of fresh bread to wipe up those last drops of olive oil with.
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson for CMC 2009

There is something with the Swedish early summer that makes me crave for the specific Greek blend of flavors that goes so well with the smell of outdoor barbequing, a drop of red wine and a comfortable chair.

Greek Salad

For a Greek Salad you just need some feta cheese, some fresh and flavourful tomatoes, some crisp and fresh onions, some large black ‘Kalamata’ olives and some olive oil. Slice, dice and give it a quick stir. I love kalamatas for their taste and often think I should have them in as many salad dishes as possible, Greek or otherwise.

Serve with some full flavoured red wine and a few slices of fresh bread to wipe up those last drops of olive oil with. A full lunch does not need to be more complicated then that but the possible combinations are endless.

Tzatziki

A superbly simple dressing that goes well with this salad or as a side dish to barbecued lamb, is the Greek yogurt based tzatziki.

To make, start with some shredded cucumber, drizzled with a teaspoon of salt and let it drain for some 20 minutes. Flavour some thickened yoghurt with 2 crushed cloves of garlic, 1 tbs white wine vinegar and 1 dash of olive oil. Stir, mix and serve. It gets even better after being refrigerated overnight.

Sprinkle the shredded cucumber with a teaspoon of salt and let it sit for about 20 minutes to drain.