Swedish Cinnamon Buns

Swedish Vetebröd recipe from cooking class 1999 during my year in Sweden

My morfar's parents owned a bakery in Siljansnäs, Sweden. Growing up, he assisted in baking and delivering the yummy baked goods. When I spent my sophomore year in Sweden, I took a cooking class AND spent time with my morfar, perfecting learning baking skills. Above is the recipe taken from Vår Kokbok with my notes and an additional "filling" recipe my friend Lillemor (a talented Swedish baker). She tipped me off on the filling years ago, and it makes the buns THAT much better. I promise!

Last week I decided to make Swedish Cinnamon Buns because I was hosting a ladies night AND I wanted to bring them to the Gordon College Women's Lacrosse Team (more on that in another post).

Rising dough... mmm...

This particular dough uses cardamom. Mmm... it makes the kitchen smell so delicious. I love it.

Rolling out the dough

Prepped for the filling.

Spreading the filling nice & THICK!

This is the filling I was referencing above. Special recipe from Lillemor the baker. :)

Sprinkling the cinnamon... it's always good to be generous

Note: The above is my first round of cinnamon... :)

Rolled and sliced, ready to rise.

Rising.

More cinnamon buns rising.

Into the oven.

More goodness into the oven

Outta the oven. YUM!

Swedish Cinnamon Buns

48 buns (love these, morning, noon, night & Christmas)

50 g yeast (5 tsp dry yeast)

2/3 cup – ¾ cup butter

2 cups milk

½ tsp salt

½ cup sugar

1 – 2 tsp cardamom

6 cups flour

Melt the butter in a pan on the stove; add the milk.

Warm it just enough (think baby’s bottle wrist check)

Add the yeast and use a whisk to thoroughly mix it (sometimes I mix the sugar in at the same time), remember, if it

In a separate large bowl combine, salt, sugar, cardamom, and most of the flour. Slowly add the butter mixture to the flour mixture and work it into a ball of dough. Let it rise for 30 minutes (or until it has doubled in size).

Take the ball of dough and split it in half. On a floured counter-top, roll one of the halves into a rectangle about ½ cm thick. Spread it with the filling (your choice) and roll it into a cylinder shape and slice into buns. Repeat with the other ball of dough.

Place the buns on a greased baking sheet and let them rise for 30 minutes. “Paint” the buns with a whisked egg and bake in the middle of the oven at 425 F for 5 – 8 minutes.

Filling

1.)  Spread butter onto the rectangle and then sprinkle cinnamon and sugar. If you like raisins, you can add raisins with the cinnamon and sugar.

2.)  Lillemor's Filling: For a creamier filling: Mix 1 cup powdered sugar, ½ cup butter, 1 egg yellow, and 1 tsp vanilla and spread on top of the dough. Sprinkle with cinnamon

*If you are someone who is nervous about baking with yeast, don't be! It's easier than you would think and if you have questions, please email me! I want you to try this Scandinavian Goodness that is listed and pictured above. And sometimes the yeast does die and your dough may be ruined... but it happens to the best of us. (maybe a story on that some other time)

dinner for 3

Thursday night we had one of Caleb's our friends over for dinner (thanks for making the trip Matt). He was Caleb's best man in our wedding, so now he's technically our friend. (what's yours is mine, what's mine is yours, right?)
Matt is a great guy and he's always there for you to back you up or if you need help. He's been wanting to get together with us for a while, but as you may know, Caleb's been UBER busy. This week Caleb had a little downtime and Matt drove out here for a little dinner, dessert and a visit.
I made a broccoli cheddar soup (courtesy of my coworker Julie, thanks).
Here's the recipe and a few pictures.

Cream of Broccoli Soup

Soup
2 or 3 carrots (depending on size)
1 large onion
2 stalks of celery
3 small potatoes
2 bunches of broccoli (4 cups chopped)
3 cups water mixed with chicken stock cubes OR 24 oz chicken stock
3 tbsp butter or olive oil
salt & pepper to taste

Cheesy White Sauce
4 tbsp butter
4 tbsp flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper (more if you want)
2 cups milk
2 cups grated cheddar cheese (or mix cheese if you need to)

Soup
Wash all your veggies, chop celery & onions.
Add celery & onions to 3 tbsp butter to a large soup pot (I used a dutch oven). Cook on medium heat till the onions start to turn translucent (5 min). Stir every few minutes so they don't burn.
While onions & celery are cooking, peel & chop carrots, potatoes, and broccoli
Add them to the pot
Add chicken broth with a pinch of salt & pepper
Cover with a lid & bring to a boil. Once it is a full boil, reduce heat to simmer and cook till veggies are tender (10-15 min).

Basic White Sauce
Melt butter over medium heat
To add some flavoring, add a little spice (Mrs. Dash, oregano, all spice, etc)
Add flour to melted butter and stir. Cook for 3-4 minutes to take away the flour taste, it will have more of a nutty flavor instead of raw flour flavor
Whisk in milk, as it cooks it will thicken, add more milk to make it thinner, use less milk to make it thicker
Add grated cheese (if you don't have cheddar, you can use other varieties), stir over low/med heat till well blended

Once veggies are tender, remove from heat and add 2/3 of them to a blender. Mix till smooth and creamy, not too much or it will get starchy. Add back to 1/3 in pot (using an immersion blender will make it easier)
Add in the cheese sauce, stir over medium heat until well blended
Salt & pepper to taste

 Note: Sam is concerned because his mamma is taking pictures instead of feeding him...

 Then dessert. Dr. Oetker's Chocolate Lava Cake, Cookies n Cream ice-cream and raspberries. It was delish

 

We took some great pictures of Sam w/Uncle Matt (Caleb & Matt were best friends, practically brothers, growing up, therefore Matt is Uncle Matt). They will be posted shortly :)

weekend celebration

squeezin mamma

mmm... beets are yummy & messy!

eating my toes... tasty

playing in a box w/grandma

peek-a-boo!

 I have not uploaded photos from this weekend, above are a few randoms from the past month...

We drove to Connecticut to celebrate Caleb's grandparent's 60th wedding anniversary. What an incredible story. They married when Henry was 21 and Lucille was 18. Our son Samuel's middle name is Henry after his grandfather and great-grandfather. It was an intimate family celebration at Caleb's uncle's house, and the house deserves a blog post in itself. It was built in 1750 and holds so much history. We got a tour of the "compound". The home was once where Yale students had class when the British invaded New Haven Harbor. If only the walls could talk.
Back to the celebration - Caleb's aunts, uncles, cousins, parents, siblings, nieces and nephew were there for the celebration. We had dinner & dessert together and just had fun hanging out. Caleb's family hasn't seen much of Sam so he was passed from aunt, to uncle, to cousin, and back. Sam was a happy and smiley baby the whole day, until the end when he passed out in Caleb's arms.
It was great to be able to celebrate 60 years as a married couple. That's a feat seldom found these days.
Maybe I can get a few pictures up later.

Sunday we visited Calvary Christian Church, Caleb's former employer. Sam was in such a good mood and enjoyed meeting Caleb's former coworkers and parishioners. Hopefully we can visit again.

Today Sam and I went for a walk with some of my friends, Heather & Robin and with Sam's friends, Owen & Judah. Sam loves his stroller and talked away as we walked around the neighborhood. At the end of the walk I let Sam play on the playground. His favorite part was the swing and sitting in the wood-chips!! He's so fast, as soon as I put him down, he puts his fist to the ground, picks up wood-chips, sticks, leaves, dirt and puts it in his mouth... it was hard to capture on camera b/c I was worried he would choke since most of those items were of choking sizes. Oh well.

Tomorrow we head out on an adventure - Western Mass to stay with my sister-in-law for the night, Malvern, PA to visit with a college friend who had a baby girl one month after Sam was born, Washington DC to visit Shannon and Behr another college friend and her baby boy, Hershey, PA to visit Sadie - we miss her, she just moved from the North Shore, Wyomissing, PA to visit family friends, and then to the Cape to work and finally back home to Hamilton. It's going to be an eventful, whirlwind trip, but I'm looking forward to vacation after a busy work season.

This evening Caleb was working, so I made some baby food for Sam, yeah, exciting I know...
I found a recipe in a magazine, tried it one time and Sam LOVES it. It's called fruit soup.

FRUIT SOUP
approximately 1 ice-cube tray
1 ripe banana
strawberries (maybe 1-2 cupes)
pineapple (1/8-1/4 of cut up pineapple)
1/2 cup water

Put all ingredients into a pot and cook on medium high for 5-6 minutes or until all fruit is soft.
Strain fruit over a bowl, keeping the juice. Pour the fruit into a blender or food processor and add some of the juice. Add as much or little juice as you want. Pour the fruit puree into an ice-cube tray and freeze. Serve 1 or 2 cubes after a meal.
*If you have left over "juice" you can mix it with rice cereal for a delish treat. Sam loved it. Sorry I don't have any pictures of the process...

and a few obligatory pics :)

hanging out on Grandpa's reindeer skin

ooooohh... the mirror is fun!

hi Sam!

kissing the mirror.

I just LOVE this little boy!!

Lussekatt

 December 13th

Santa Lucia & My Morfar's Birthday

Morfar, Mormor, Mom - Summer 2007

It's coming up...

In honor of Santa Lucia...

I baked these...

With this wonderful lady...

heather "pensling" the lussekatt

and they were tasty...

I'm always afraid my Lucia buns won't rise, that I'll mess up the yeast.

But they did, and they nice, tasty and fluffy...

delicious with hot chocolate, or for breakfast or dessert or a snack... :)

 for those of you wondering WHY they're special: they are made w/a saffron, an expensive, but delightful spice that makes the buns a golden color. maybe i'll tranlsate the recipe from swedish some day and post it on the blog, until then, the pictures will have to suffice

{note: heather, i'll get you the recipe even if it doesn't end up on the blog, thanks for baking w/me}

 miss you morfar... thanks for teaching me the art of baking... you would be proud

Lucia buns fresh out of the oven

craving these...

{image}

not really sure why... but i really want some cinnamon chip scones right now!

here's a recipe i posted last year: cinnamon chip scones

starbucks  makes delicious cinnamon scones and i kinda want one right now, fresh outa the oven...

saft: a swedish adventure in the states

earlier in the week i posted about saft

now, i'll detail a little about making it...

first of all - saft is a DEEEEELICIOUS drink you can buy in sweden, and at ikea, but not online, only in the ikea store...

anyway, my mormor is awesome and she makes it from scratch - raspberry, strawberry, black currant, etc

one day i went to russell orchards and decided to pick strawberries... mmm... they were so yummy. i had so many strawberries on hand, i decided to eat some, freeze some and make saft out of some.

google translate says saft = juice - but it's so much more...

basically you use the juice from berries, boil it with sugar to make a concentrated liquid and store it. then when you're ready to drink, you pour a little saft into a glass and mix with water... voila, delicious, refreshing drink :)

here's a photo montage of my attempt. it turned out OK, but it's best to mix berries (strawberries and blueberries, or raspberries, etc) and i added TOO MUCH sugar (who would have thought?)

{first, pick berries and decide which ones you want to use}

 i separated mine into eat this week now, freeze and make into saft ;)

{weigh your strawberries}

this is necessary to ensure you have the right amount of other ingredients

{wash your strawberries}

{slice off the green part}

 

 

{weigh the strawberries again, just in case}

{add water}

{boil strawberries in the water, stirring occasionally - approx 10 min}

{use the spoon to crush the strawberries on the edge of the pot to get all the juiciness out}

{i put a strainer in a bowl for this next part}

{put a cheesecloth in the strainer - this is for straining the berries from the liquid}

{pour the boiled berries into the cheesecloth and let the liquid drain into the bowl}

{let it sit for a 30 minutes to ensure all liquid is in the bowl and not in the cheesecloth}

{pour into a measuring container - i used a glass pyrex one - woo hoo! 500ml}

{pour the liquid BACK into the pot on the stove}

{add the sugar - this is what makes it tasty, stir until the sugar has dissolved}

{cook until it comes to a boil}

{towards the end, this is what you should see}

{there's "skumm" - swedish for foam - you don't want it - so take it off with a spoon}

{it's yummy though - strawberry sugary - mmm}

{i set mine on a plate - and then ate it} :)

{pour non skumm liquid into a container so you can pour into bottles; it's easier w/a funnel which i did not have}

{clean the bottles you're using - i baked mine in the oven, but you can also boil them}

{pour liquid into WARM clean bottles, put on the cap and let cool}

 

 

 

 

saft should be stored at a cool temperature (fridge, basement, etc)

{image}

when you're ready to drink, pour some saft into a glass and add water to taste. i don't know how what the saft to water ratio is... i just go by what tastes good...

for those of you who want to try it, here's the recipe i used:

Strawberry Saft

(500 ml of saft or approx 2 cups):

500 grams strawberries

2 deciliters water (a little more than 3/4 cup or 200 ml)

3 deciliters sugar (1 1/4 cup or 300 ml)

note: it should be consumed within a few weeks, if not, some type of preservative should be added - i don't mess with that, i just drink it!