Ostkaka, a photo by Dvortygirl on Flickr.

Mig bekendt findes der ingen traditionel dansk ostekage, så de eneste ostekagetyper, jeg har kendt i årevis, er tysk Käsekuchen og den angelsaksiske cheese cake.

Men Google er jo et genialt værktøj, når man skal finde obskure opskrifter, så det tog ikke lang tid at finde en opskrift på rigtig
ostekage fra Småland.

Til forskel fra de mere velkendte typer er der ingen bund i en smålandsk ostekage, og man bruger ikke ost, men mælk og osteløbe.

Jeg prøvede at bage den, sidste gang mine forældre besøgte os, men forsøget var ikke nogen ubetinget succes. Ostekagen smagte lidt som en sammenfaldet soufflé, men det skyldes måske nok, at vi begik den fejl at spise den varm — den blev bedre efter et ophold i køleskabet.

Den var dog ikke direkte dårlig, og jeg prøver nok igen, men måske følger jeg næste gang en anden opskrift.

Buchwider Bräu α₂

Although I was pleased at the time, I later came to view it as a bit of a failure — it wasn’t really pleasant enough to be enjoyed on its own.

I therefore decided I would try again. I more or less used the same recipe before, but I used a different yeast (Wyeast Bavarian Wheat Blend instead of Wyeast Bavarian Wheat).

I’ve tried one bottle so far, and although it’s somewhat better than my first Weißbier, it’s still not quite right. There’s nothing wrong with it, but it lacks a certain fruitiness.

I guess I’ll need to try again next year!

Buchwider Bräu ι₁.

My ι₁ is a clone of Caledonian Deuchars IPA, using a recipe from CAMRA’s Brew Your Own British Real Ale.

I think it’s a very pleasant beer, and my dad praised it highly when he and my mum visited us two weeks ago. Unfortunately I haven’t got a chance to compare it directly with the real Caledonian Deuchars IPA — I must do that with my last bottle!

Som jeg nævnte i et andet blogindlæg, havde vi forleden besøg af min søster med mand og barn.

Jeg syntes, jeg hellere måtte købe noget lækkert til aftensmad, når de nu var her, og de havde tilbud på svinemørbrad i Metro (eller Makro, som det hedder herovre), så jeg fik fem mørbrader til ca. 100 kr. i alt.

Danskere plejer at regne mørbrad for noget meget fint, men i mange andre lande regnes det for at være lidt for fedtfattigt, så jeg kiggede lidt i mine forskellige kogebøger for at få inspiration.

I “Joy of Cooking” fandt jeg så en opskrift på “Kentucky-fried pork tenderloin”, som så interessant ud, og det var den bestemt også. Her er den i fordoblet udgave (til 12 personer):

• 2 spsk sød paprika
• 1 spsk salt
• 1 spsk stødt sort peber
• 1 tsk hvidløgspulver
• 1 tsk tørret salvie
• 1 tsk tørret oregano
• 1 tsk sennepspulver
• 1 tsk stødt rød peber (hvad det nu så end er)
• 1400 g svinemørbrad
• olie
• mel
• 5 dl mælk

1. Hver svinemørbrad skæres i seks lige store stykker, og hvert stykke skæres næsten helt igennem, så det bliver sommerfugleformet.
2. Alle krydderierne blandes, og kødet marineres i krydderiblandingen i 30-60 minutter.
3. Kødstykkerne vendes i mel og steges 6 mm olie i 3-4 minutter på hver side.
4. De stegte kødstykker lægges på et fad og holdes varme.
5. Det meste af olien hældes væk, og mælken tilsættes. Det koges, til man får en god sovs. (Jeg var nødt til også at tilsætte kulør og maizena for at få et godt resultat.) Sovsen hældes over kødstykkerne.

Iflg. kogebogen kan man servere dem til morgenmad med scones, til frokost med boller, coleslaw og tomatskiver, eller til aftensmad med kartoffelgratin og grønlangkål. Vi spiste dem nu med coleslaw og bagte kartofler, og det smagte også glimrende. Selv Marcel, der normalt ikke er ret glad for svinekød (bortset fra bacon), var meget begejstret.

It’s about cooking and blogging, so it’s no wonder that it tickled our fancy (well, my dear wife’s and mine, but even Charlotte seemed to enjoy it).

It’s about a 30-year-old New Yorker, Julie, who decides to cook every recipe in Julia Child’s cookbook (available in two volumes, one and two) and blog about the experience. Simultaneously, we are following Julia Child’s life in Paris, her culinary education and the process of writing her cookbook.

It’s a great movie, and I just wish I had been the first person to get the idea to blog every single recipe in a famous cookbook.

Given that I must own at least a hundred cookbooks, would there be any merit in blogging a random recipe every single days for the next thousand and one nights?

I decided to brew a Christmas beer this year. It’s a Belgian-style beer, somewhere between a dubbel and a trippel, with added cinnamon.

I measured the alcohol contents to 7.2%, but I wonder whether I made a error — it definitely gets you drunk very quickly indeed!

Merry Christmas and a happy New Year to all the readers of this blog!

Although I bottled my η₁ two months ago, I haven’t blogged it till now because its beautiful reddish colour never showed up in the photos I took of it. (The trick turned out to be to use a tripod and no flash, of course.)

Anyway, η₁ is a rye beer, brewed in the style of a German Weißbier with the addition of crystal rye malt (to be precise, I used 400 g pearl malt, 2000 g Munich malt, 1600 g wheat malt and 1000 g crystal rye malt).

It’s quite an interesting beer, surprisingly light and with a hint of Danish rye bread.

Unfortunately I used too much priming sugar, so you need to be careful when opening it!

All our kids love Ikea meatballs, and fortunately you can buy them frozen in their food shop.

However, last time I was there they handed out free recipes for this signature dish of theirs.

There are a few translation errors in the recipe, and the amounts are wrong for our family, so I thought it’d be useful to post a version for 8 people with the errors corrected:

Meatballs:

• 1 kg beef & pork mince
• 2 eggs
• 400-600 ml cream (or milk) and water
• 5 tbsp finely chopped onion
• 100 ml breadcrumbs
• 4 cold boiled potatoes
• 8-10 tbsp butter or oil
• salt
• white pepper
• allspice

Fry the onion until golden in 4 tbsp lightly browned butter. Mash the potatoes and mix the breadcrumbs with a little water. Mix all the ingredients and season with generous amounts of salt, pepper and ground allspice. Shape it into 60-80 round meatballs and transfer them to a floured chopping board, then fry them quite slowly in plenty of butter.

Cream sauce

• 200 ml double cream
• 400 ml water or beef stock
• soy
• salt
• white pepper
• (2 tbsp plain flower)

Deglaze the pan with the boiling water or stock. Strain this and mix in the cream. Thicken with flour if you like. Season well.

Serve the meatballs with the gravy, freshly boiled potatoes, lingonberry jam, a green salad and either cucumber salad or gherkins.

Shortly after my ε₁ I decided to brew something completely different: a stout.

I used a recipe that was supposed to produce something similar to Guinness, but I must admit it doesn’t taste like that (and the foam isn’t white).

However, if you forget about Guinness, it’s actually a very nice stout, dark and earthy. I wonder whether I should have added a wee bit of liquorice — I think it would have suited it well.

By the way, I guess I ought to summarise Buchwider Bräu’s current naming scheme:

• α: German Weizen
• β: Belgian wit
• γ: Maibock
• δ: Irish red ale
• ε: Kölsch
• ζ: Stout
• η: Rye

I took a brief brewing holiday after my δ₁ disaster, but last month I then fired up the kettle again.

I decided to brew a beer in the style of Kölsch, and I’m very happy with the result. I don’t think I’ve ever tasted a real Kölsch, so I obviously cannot compare it to the original, but the result is a very pleasant beer with a fruity nose.

It’s also quite strong at 5.9%, but it’s very mild and drinkable.

My only criticism is that it has too little flavour to be drunk after a darker beer, and it doesn’t really shine with food.

However, for drinking on its own or with a bag of crisps it’s definitely the best beer I’ve brewed, and I’ll definitely brew it again.

Brewing notes: The yeast I used was Wyeast 2575 Kölsch II, and that’s definitely a yeast I would recommend to others. On a different note, I’m still having head-retention problems — I hope I’ll resolve that soon.