Glad midsommar!

... or Happy Midsummer to all of you! Before I did anything else this morning I prepared the strawberry cake for this evening when we are having a little party in a cottage by a lake - very Swedish and very nice, I hope. First, though, I will spend all afternoon folk dancing and also helping out in the traditional dancing and playing around the pole. Our strange habit to jump around a phallic symbol and singing "koackackack" like frogs must be described in all guide books. Our town is head quarters for the big medical company Astra Zeneca and every year I stumble apon a totally fascinated Englishman och Australian who wants me to translate what we are doing. Well, I try my best!

Strawberries are what we long for this time of year, next to new potatoes. The ones in the picture are the first I bought this year. They are much more expensive than the German and Polish ones on offer, but if there are Swedish strawberries I want Swedish strawberries, no matter what they cost. They are small and knobbly but the taste is unbelievable! This evening we will have a very traditional meal. First new potatoes, matje herring and sour cream. Then we will grill some meat, and then we will finish with my strawberry cake. The base is a french yoghurt cake, my recipe comes from Clotilde of Chocolate and zucchini. Then I have filled it with a mix of chopped strawberries and vanilla custard. I poured some elderflower cordial in the custard when I made it yesterday but cannot really detect the taste today - will have to experiment more with that since strawberries and elderflower is soo tasty together. Before we eat it we will spread it with whipped cream and cover with strawberries, eat and enjoy the sunset.
And tomorrow, like almost all years, we will try to find some yellow chanterelles. More than once we have found a bunch on Midsummer´s day...