Scandinavian Kitchen

If Sweden ruled the world...

  We found this little website (pictures courtesy of same)

 

Oops. A little sneaky one.

SEMLOR - last chance to get your stash

We bake Semlebullar every day fresh and have been doing so for the past few months.  Today Monday 23rd and tomorrow, Tuesday 24th (Fat Tuesday) are the last days we'll be making and selling these little beauties (they are only seasonal), so if you have not yet had your cravings satisfied, we recommend you do so pronto.

You can reserve yours on iwantfood@scandikitchen.co.uk.  We can also arrange delivery anywhere in central London (we use an external courier company and charge cost) - please order by Monday 16:00 for delivery Tuesday (fettisdagen).

Our semlor are £1.95 each.

Bacon advert - is this supposed to make me hungry?

Too many fry-ups = this is what you might end up looking like. Have a carrot instead...

An entry from Sweden's Eurovision hopefuls

We think it is a bit like Joey Tempest's younger bro who neevr made it.  Soz.  Try better, Sweden.

Kitchen Angel (part time) wanted

Kitchen Angel / Superman

We always knew we had Mette on borrowed time - and she is now heading back to Denmark so we need to fill her shoes.  Therefore we’re looking for someone to join our wonderful kitchen team part time (initially - you never know, it might end up full time).

The main job responsibilities are:

·         Daily prepping of open sandwiches, salads and sauces

·        Part responsible for catering and out-of-house bookings

·         Daily baking of wonderful cakes and help invent new exciting ways/foods to keep SK ahead

·         Keeping the kitchen in excellent working order both operationally and with regards to hygiene

·         Responsible for stock takes, rotation and re-ordering of catering goods

The person we’re looking for is:

·         Experienced in the kitchen.  We’re not asking for a top chef here, just relevant all round kitchen/cafe/restaurant experience and knowledge of how working in a busy kitchen should be.

·         Team worker and good people skills – you’ll be working closely with the other Kitchen Angel and will be sharing the responsibilities for the day to day running of the kitchen.

·         Flexible – we’re open 6 days a week and you need to be able to be flexible in your working hours and days

·         Good at a Scandinavian language and has excellent knowledge of Scandinavian food.  The language bit is so you can understand labelling, ordering, recipes and such practical stuff.  The Scandinavian food knowledge does not have to be from a professional side, but can be from a passion for Scandinavian food in general.

If this sounds like you, send your CV and a few paragraphs about yourself to: bronte@scandikitchen.co.uk.  

Please note we do not accept CVs from agencies and while we do try to get back to everyone, if you had not heard back in 2 weeks, we’re sorry, but this means your application wasn’t quite successful this time around.

Swedish Eurovision madness

Sweden is serious about Eurovision.  In fact, so serious that there are no fewer than 6 evenings of singing to decide on the one song that will represent Sweden at this year's Eurovision.

You can watch it all at the Swedish Pub the Harcourt Arms in Harcourt Street - and all the dates you need -as well as how you can buy tickets for these events - is on thier website

http://www.theharcourt.com/

See you there

The Kitchen People

Great music comes from Faroe Islands...

Yep.  It's true.  the little islands in the middle of the great, big sea has produced a fab artist called Teitur.  It is not often that stuff like this comes out of tiny places - so we salute you.

Cows, hold that fart, please.

The Danish government has always been good at finding ways of taxing people.  Their latest proposal is to tax animals as they burp and fart.

You can read the whole article in English here

Photo kindly borrowed from Politiken.dk (thanks, we hope you don't mind)

Trumpet time...

They say good things come in threes.  Well, we'd been quite happy with one of these, but three in one day was also very nice, thank you.

The Evening Standard wrote about our meatballs and winter warmer dishes in London.  The London Lite wrote about breakfasts and we were the Scandinavian entry.

Time Out did a Nordic Special where they features both us and also our wonderful friends at KIDSEN - a Scandi style kids shop in Kensal Rise as well as lots of our other Nordic friends in London.   Read the whole article  here. 

And the survey says... (here are the results from you, the jury)

Thanks for filling in our little survey a few weeks back.  We learnt a lot of things.  Here is a pick of some of the results and answers:

• 95.7% of you rate usgood value for money. 

• Everyone rates our service good or above - with 89.1% rating it "excellent".  Thanks, Mum.

• Everyone rates our food good and above (mostly above).

The best thing about Scandi Kitchen: 

• The people, the food and free hugs are mentioned most

What woould make you come back to SK more often:

• "If you opened a shop next to my house"

• "a helicopter"

What's the least good thing about SK?

• "no meatballs for breakfast"

• "not enough Norwegian music on the stereo"

• "lack of cinnamon buns"

Thanks for all your wonderful replies - we have taken all of them onboard and made a few changes to things around the place.  While we can't do everything, we will endeavour to change what we can.  Unfortunately, we cannot change Westminster parking wardens, the fact that we're not in W4 or that you live in Hampshire, but we can change little things such as new and improved recipe for warm cinnamon buns (and we can make more of them).  Do pop by for a sample - they are delicious.

Love,

The Kitchen People

Time for a re-think, Finland?

Hmmm...  Watch all the pre-selected 12 songs from Finland here as see if you can decide on a winner...  Come back, Lordi, all is forgiven.  Look out in particular for this chap called Rem sort of mid-way through.

A Danish hope? Thanks, Slash

It's official - the Danish Eurovision entry 2009 follows every cliche in history (except, no wind machine - but just wait...)

We're wondering what on earth Slash from Guns'n'roses is doing in the background?  Is it him?  Has he been hiding in a Danish karaoke band? Answers, please...

Our recipe for semlor. Yum yum.

Due to popular demand, here's a nice recipe for Swedish lenten buns: Semlor.  We recommend that you use a really good quality marzipan for this - and that you use fresh yeast.  If you cannot gethold of fresh yeast, tryusing active yeast (needs to be activated in water before use).  Dry yeast is the last choice - but if using that, add to the flour and not liquid.

Swedish Semlor

Makes 12 buns

Ingredients:

25g fresh yeast

75g butter

200ml milk

2 eggs

1 teaspoon of salt

1 teaspoon of cardamom powder

500 ml  sugar

700 ml plain flour

2 teaspoons of baking powder

For the filling and topping, you need:

Good quality marzipan/almond paste (mandelmassa, 50% is the best to use)

Whipping cream (around 500 ml)

A bit of vanilla custard (about 100ml)

Icing sugar to dust

Melt the butter in a saucepan; add the milk so mixture has lukewarm temperature (between 35-42 degrees).

Crumble the yeast into a bowl, and add some of the liquid to dissolve the yeast.

Add the remaining lukewarm liquid, add salt, cardamom, 1 egg, sugar and 600ml of the flour.

Work the mixture into a dough.   You can do this in a mixer on dough hook or by thorough mixing with a wooden spoon.  Cover with a cloth and leave to rise for around 30 minutes.

Sift the baking powder and remaining flour and work into the dough. Knead the dough until it becomes smooth and stops being sticky – either in the machine or on a flour dusted table top.

Cut the dough into 12 pieces, roll into equal sized buns.

Put the buns onto an oven tray lined with baking paper and allow them to rise for 35-40 minutes.   Beat the other egg and use a brush to glaze the tops of the buns.

Heat the oven to 250 degrees C and bake the semlor in the middle for around 10 minutes.  Remove from oven and cover the buns with a cloth and allow to cool on a wire rack – you want the buns to stay quite soft on the outside, which is where the cloth helps.

Prepare the semlor before serving:

Cut a circular “lid” off the top of each bun. Scoop out 1/3 of the inside of the bun.

Mix together the marzipan with the crumbs from inside the bun, add the vanilla custard to make a smooth mixture and use this mixture to fill the holes.

Whip the cream and spoon the cream on top of the bun filling.

Replace the lid of the bun and decorate with icing sugar.

Recipe by Bronte Blomhoj 2009

We even import the weather...

Just in case you are wondering if Scandi Kitchen will be open today despite the heavy snow in London:  well, of course we will. 

So wrap up warm, pop by and join us for a nice mug of hot chocolate and a moan about the weather.

And a hug, if you so prefer.

Love

The Kitchen People (who LOVE snow)

What Kensal Green looked like when some of us left this morning at 6 am...