Porridge

Today´s Swedish word: gröt. Means porridge.

This is my brother sitting at one of the best kitchen tables in the world: my grandparents´, in a little village up north. I associate this table a lot with summer breakfasts, and porridge. My grandfather very often made blueberry porridge for us, blueberries and rye. After all grandchildren had finished eating as much as we could usually there still was a lot of porridge left for grandpa to finish, which he always did squeezing in the last spoonfuls and saying: "ooooh, that was a lot of porridge I ate right there".

Now my brother has taken over the tradition of eating *a lot* of porridge, and he is even "worse" because he has to pour the milk in a bowl by the side to get room for all the porridge he needs to get through the day. This day was a really special day since we all were going to my cousin´s wedding, going on from noon until 3 in the morning. And yes, with great food. More to come on that...

Sister of the bride

Today´s Swedish word: brud. Means bride.

Did you miss me? I have missed myself too! For a couple of weeks my whole mind (almost, I had to spare some space for my exam in law) has been occupied with this gorgeous girl, my dearest sister Helena, and her wedding.

Our flat is a mess, I have barely cooked anything in weeks and the intray is out of control but what does it matter when you get to share such a magic day with all your family and relatives? We also got to tie two families together in more than one way. Not only did these two marry each other but we all got to know each other while preparing for the party. We worked all night on Friday laying tables, making flower arrangements and I prepared small sandwiches with creme fraiche, sundried tomatoes and basil. I also (beforehand!) made the wonderful biscotti with ginger, almonds and pink peppercorns from the passionate cook. A great success with the bubbly and strawberries when the bride and groom had arrived - her riding a large black horse and him walking by her side...

We celebrated all night, eating and dancing and singing, and the next day we had a do in my parents´garden with lunch and coffee with leftover wedding cake. Now I am a bit tired but it will be back to normal in a few days I guess. And our flat will be clean and proper again and we will plan our vacation and I will fill in all the boring forms for my part-time unemplyment. It will all feel better to do all this when I have nice memories like this wedding to think of!

And I will cook again, and blog - about sweets from Germany and LA, veggies, rhubarb and loads of other stuff. And in a month we will head off for another wedding!

P.S. Of course we had cheesecake for dessert! D.S.