Fourth of July in Sweden!!
Trip Start
May 27, 2008
1
17
31
Trip End
Aug 27, 2008
Lomma,
Skåne,
Sweden
Friday, July 4, 2008
-3 Racks of Pork Spareribs with BBQ sauce (imported from the states via my luggage)
-Homemade Mac & Cheese (not from the blue box mind you)
-Corn on the Cob
-Chocolate Chip & Marshmallow cookies
-Long neck Budweisers
-Jalapeno cornbread
So on July 3rd I went down to the Lomma centrum and grabbed my longboard and proceeded to collect some of the items on the list
American Flag in Sösdala!!
. With my backpack in tow I went to the Systembolaget which is the nationally run alcohol stores and got 12 Buds at 13.90:- a pop (around 2.33 dollars each..YIKES), a necessary addition. I had two clean tshirts in my bag so I arranged the bottles just so I didn't have a disaster on my back while longboarding down the street. Many pounds heavier I rode slowly back down to Mårtenssons market to grab some supplies for my cookies. I figured I could make those in advance so good to get it done. For some reason the idea of a chocolate chip is to foreign idea to Swedes...because they only have blocks on chocolate that you have to tediously chop into small bits to get something that can pass as a chip. Then grabbed some vanilla and I think I had the rest of the ingredients at home. So off I went riding precariously down the street carrying ingredients for baking and 12 bottles of Budweiser hanging on my back. I successfully made it home and tossed the Buds in the basement fridge to chill and went about the baking. The sucky thing about cooking in Sweden is the conversion. All recipes I find or want to use have non metric measurements. It is such a pain. But google is a blessing and does all the conversion for me. From cup to dl and oz to grams, and off I went again wishing I have chips instead of a piece of chocolate because it takes forever and the block of chocolate is not conducive to chopping. Luckily one of my saving graces was having KROQ (my local rock station from SoCAL) to listen to while I was cooking, streaming live from the web
Making Cookies
. I detest Swedish radio especially during the summer because they play all the same songs all the time and sometimes you can only handle hearing Enrique Iglesias sing "Do You Know" or Timbaland spout about "The Way You Are" one to many times before you want the radio to implode on itself. The soothing rock tunes kept my HiHoing like the seven dwarves in a mine of gems..."it's off to work I go..." I made about 3 dozen cookies...and my own creation of a U.S.A cookie. Big letters...it took up the whole oven those three cookies. It was sweet. Unfortunately I didn't take a picture of it...but it was good stuff. Once Staffan came home from work we headed to Burlöv Center to go shopping for the rest of the supplies. Unfortunately corn is not as abundant as in the states and they dint have them in husks most of the time. I really wanted to get them with the husk on so I could grill them and keep the flavors in, but that was a no go. So we settled on some choice canned corn kernels. Swedes don't care much for the processed cheese as we all do in America and have lots of fresh cheeses in big wedges and triangles that you have to cut yourself. I settled on some 12 month aged cheddar for the mac and cheese, which is Mats' favorite cheese so I had hoped he would like it. The spareribs were no bigs and easy to find, but the cornbread was a problem. Last time I was in Sweden we were somewhere and I was able to find some box of Jiffy at a store in the America section (a shelf mostly consisting of maple syrup, Dr. Pepper, Pop Tarts, Box macaroni and cheese, marshmallow fluff, BBQ sauce, and other funny things) sadly this was not the store that had the cornbread mix. We went to two other stores and no cornbread mix. So Staffan said he would check another store by his work the next day to make one more attempt to have my cornbread.
The next day I made the mac and cheese and thanks to the careful teachings of Jimmel did not mess it up to badly. Also having some really nice cheese helped as well. The rest I left up to Staffan to complete the grilling...as it is his forte. Per, Emil & Viking came over to partake in our American feasts and drink my American beer. It was a nice day and we were able to sit outside on the deck. Unfortunately Staffan didn't find the cornbread...so I am really curious now to where we found this and will make sure to buy multiple boxes the next time I find it. But everything else was good to go and I also got some fresh watermelon to top it all off. Mats went searching for fireworks for me but because of all the moving around stuff because of the house showings...he had misplaced (aka forgot where he put them), but he did happen to find his horn from New Year's Eve in Boston. Haha. The food was good stuff and for a moment I was back in the states having a backyard BBQ. Good times all around.
Happy Independence Day!
