The people at Årstiderne have a wonderful service where you can subscribe to a regular delivery of organic produce.

I choose a mixed case myself that’s delivered every other week. It comes with some pages with recipes the week’s products.

This week I got: cherry tomatoes, peaches, melon, green beans, bellpepper, cucumber, apples, salad, and a cabbage.

What I really like is that it triggers me to cook differently. I have no idea what to do with the cabbage for example Good recipes are welcome. It’s a spidskål (spitskool/savoy cabbage).

I went out for dinner yesterday, and I just have to share the menu:

Norwegian Lobster with avocado; Accompanied by a Spumante Brut

Antipasti part 1; Accompanied by a 2003 Vintage Tunina
- Carpaccio of monk fish marinated with fennel and mango
- Gnocco alla romano in flavour of swisschard
- Bombolone of carrot, graced by codfish
- Gnudo of Scorfano, dazzled (!) by mozzarella with a fumetto of lemon

Antipasti part 2; Accompanied by a 1989 Brunello di Montalcino
- Carpaccio of veal in company with carletti pesto
- Polentina looking for a chicken’s liver pate (hehe)
- Lamb in carpione, in love with a reduction of balsamico
- Camone pomodoro, in harmony with panzanella

Primi piatti; Accompanied by a 1998 Tignanello
- Risotto al salto, in harmony to mushrooms and spinach
- Orecchiette rolling into artichoke in flavour of mint

Secondi piatti; Accompanied by a 2000 Valentino Brut Zero, and a 1988 Barolo
- Grey mullet on a salad of melon in ginger’s flavour
- Guinea fowl filled with chicory, in harmony with marinated egg plants

Formaggi; Accompanied by a 1997 Amarone
- Nico’s sorbet of mango
- Formaggi in controluce

Dolci; Accompanied by a 1997 Recioto (VERY nice)
- Cream of white chocolate and coffee, emphasized by a rhubarb sorbet
- Coconut mousse served with foam of passion fruit in love of mango

Finished off with a superb macchiato and a 1969 whisky

Go there, every single dish was a piece of art!

In the category of Danish Oddities, I bring you Chokoladepålæg. Somehow they thought it was really efficient to make thin layers of chocolate to put on your bread. I think it’s just really an excuse to put an extra thick layer of butter on your bread to make the broken layers stick instead of falling off. Did I also mention that butter almost always is salty here?

Why can meal delivery in Amsterdam, and most other dutch cities, be free (usually at a minimum order of 10 euro/74 dkk) and must cost a fortune here in Copenhagen? For example, I’m craving for Indian or Thai food right now, but I have to go for my fridge leftovers..

The only positve side of this is that Amsterdam is filled with annoying scooters and mopeds while Copenhagen is not. I’m not yet sure what I’d prefer..

I received a very unexpected gift from a good friend yesterday. A jar of Dulce de Leche from Argentina! Made with milk and sugar boiled until it starts to caramelize, it’s very lovely on some fresh baked bread on a sunday morning with a nice machiatto. It’s apparently being imported into Denmark, so go out and get it!

One of the most disgusting things in danish ‘cuisine’.. Fiskefrikadeller, aka fiskedeller. YUCK!

My good friend Robin was over for the weekend and we ended up in Magasin Du Nord, the most awesome shopping mall in Denmark, and…. the whole cooking department was on a 30% sale! They sell the whole range of Le Creuset pans there. If you know these pans than you probably also know that 30% off one of those pans is quite a good deal. Needless to say, I went home with a new skillet and a big casserole I found out that Le Creuset makes tagines too, I think I’ll get one of those next time.

Also: These pans need to be used, so I’m inviting everyone for dinner!

We
had an awesome cooking event yesterday with Hello. With 19 people we
went to this cooking school in Nørrebro. After a welcome drink and a
short introduction, we were divided into 4 groups who all got appointed
various tasks.

Within our group we divided those tasks, and I was made responsible
for the cheese dessert together with my charming colleague Amalie. I
must say, it’s quite hard to cook if the recipes are in a language you
don’t understand Good thing I had help. Let’s see if I can remember the recipe..

Ingredients (I’m really not sure about the amounts):
- A thick slice (3cm) of Fourme D’Ambert cut in wedges (use one wedge per person)
- A scraped vanilla bean
- A cup hazelnuts
- A cup walnuts
- A cup almonds
- Maple syrup
- 1 dl dark rum
- 1 dl orange juice
- Tablespoon of Szechuan pepper, crushed in a mortar
- 2 types of bitter lettuce (could’ve been radicchio, but I’m not sure) sliced in small pieces
- 1 dl Balsamico
- Black pepper

Prepare the nuts:
Heat the maple syrup in a skillet until it’s caramelized.
Add the vanilla bean scrape.
Add the rum, and light it (watch your fingers) and wait till the flames are gone.
Stir in the nuts and keep stirring while the syrup thickens.
Add the orange juice and the Szechuan pepper.
Keep stirring while it reduces and thinkens.
Set aside.

Prepare the salad dressing:
Put the balsamico in a saucepan.
Add freshly ground black pepper to it.
Heat and reduce to half.
Set aside and let it cool down.
Mix the salad with the balsamico dressing when it’s cooled down.

Preheat the oven to 250C.
Put each cheese wedge in an oven-proof little bowl.
Heat the bowls in the oven for about 3 minutes (until the cheese is molten).

Our special touch:
Pour some Calvados over each bowl. Add some red peppercorns to garnish.

While the cheese is still hot, add the caramelized nuts to each bowl.
Add a bit of the salad to each bow and serve.

Enjoy this with a glass of fine Riesling, possibly even a Gewürztraminer or Canadian icewine if you can get it