Smorgasbord

By way of a thank you to all the wonderful people who sponsored me in the village we held a Smorgasbord thank you party last night and I had a slideshow prepared. It was so lovely to see everyone who had been supportive, not just in the sponsorship but by cheering me on in my training, whenever they bumped into me and my hounds pounding the beach in preparation. 

We had a table of Swedish style nibbles, along with some delicacies brought home from Kiruna, including smoked reindeer, caviar and glavadlax. Mertz bought some special vodka for the brave, which was taken on ice, but we didn't manage to carve ice glasses like these:

I also found a recipe for 'Love Cake' or Den Du Ved Nok Kage', which my Mother very kindly cooked for the event - it was delicious and rounded the evening off perfectly 

Den Du Ved Nok Kage

Enough to feed 20 people for afternoon tea – you can freeze whats left, but it keeps for a week in the fridge as well.

Stuff you need:

500 grams sugar

5 eggs

400 ml milk

400 grams plain flour

4 tsp vanilla sugar (or extract, if that is what you have)

3 tbsp cocoa powder

4 tsp baking powder

300 grams butter

Icing:

200 grams butter

7 tbs strong coffee

2,5 tbs cocoa powder

3 tsp vanilla sugar (or extract)

150 grams of desiccated coconut

375 grams icing sugar

This is how you do it:

Whisk egg and sugar till light and fluffy.  Sift flour, vanilla, cocoa and baking powder into the mix, alternate with the milk.  Whisk well.  Add the slightly cooled, melted butter at the end and mix well.

Pop the batter into a large baking tin (minimum 20 x 30 cm) and bake on 180 degrees for about 20-25 minutes until just baked through (it’s done when a skewer comes out clean – this cakes goes very dry if over baked, so keep an eye on it)

Make the icing:  pop all ingredients into a saucepan and heat until melted through  (You can also do this bit in the microwave if you prefer).  When the cake has been out of the oven for a wee while (just cooled, does not have to be totally cold), spread over icing and chill until set. Drizzle with a bit of coconut before the icing set, if you wish.

This morning we had a lovely treat made with the leftovers: