fika – Page 2 – Scandelights

Höganäs saluhall, Sweden

Published on May 4, 2016May 4, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

One of the days I was in Skåne in the south of Sweden my parents and I did a road trip to a fab food market I wanted to visit. As it was a glorious day we also took a drive by the coast and stopped for ice cream on our way home.

But we started our trip at the food market, which also holds other shops, a restaurant and a café.

We decided on fika instead of a cooked lunch and had a lovely prawn sandwich with lettuce, eggs and mayonnaise on sourdough each, followed by something sweet. I mean, who can resist all this?!

We all chose different things, but it was all delicious! As you can see we love our buns; here’s a cardamom bun, cinnamon bun and one called butterkaka with custard (and berries).

We then had a look around the other shops for a while. There were some nice interior ones and this one with the ceramics Höganäs i most known for.

We saved the food shopping to last and walked around the shop taking in all the inspiration. Shops like this are a rarity in Sweden so it was nice to see one done well. The produce looked lovely, the baked goods smelled divine and there were lots of interesting pantry items you would struggle to find in a regular supermarket.

The only thing we were surprised not to find was a fish counter but the staff happily gave us direction to the most amazing food shop around the corner, so we got to buy everything we wanted, and more, in the end.

Well worth a visit if you’re in the area! Next time I want to try the restaurant as well.

Höganäs saluhall, Bruksgatan 36Z, 263 39 Höganäs, Sweden

Fika at Slottsträdgårdens café, Malmö, Sweden

Published on May 19, 2015May 19, 2015 by Hanna2 Comments

Fika is one of my favourite Swedish words. It covers a whole range of foods that you can have with a cup of coffee or tea. Openfaced sandwiches. Cake. Biscuits. Cake and biscuits.

In my parents’ house we have a lot of fika . If you get up early you have fika in between breakfast and lunch, and for lunch, if you’re not having hot food, you can have fika again. Then you have afternoon fika and after-dinner fika.

Two weekends ago when I was in Malmö on the Sunday I had fika with my parents and we went to probably the cosiest café in town, Slottsträdgårdens café, located in the park near the castle (the museum). The grounds are wonderful right now with a tulip exhibition and flowering cherry trees.

You can either sit in a green house or outside; we did both as it was chilly when we got there but later when the sun came out it was nice to soak up some sun outside.

For the fika my mother and I both had the raspberry and rhubarb crumble with custard while my father had a cinnamon bun. We also had coffee and organic juices and iced tea. All very good!

Slottsträdgårdens kafé, Malmöhusvägen 8, 211 18 Malmö, Sweden

Wonderful Skåne!

Published on September 4, 2014 by HannaLeave a comment

I hope you don’t mind me paraphrasing Denmark’s slogan (Wondeful Denmark), but I find it suitable since Skåne (the most southern region in Sweden) was in fact Danish until 1658.

Anyway, this part of Sweden is where I was born, and although I love London I love coming home to my dear Skåne too. Usually I spend time on the beach in the summer but the weather was just as bad as in the UK (grey, rainy and windy) so I had to occupy myself differently. It was a lot of lunch and fika and excursions to countryside shops and similar.

One Saturday my parents and I drove to the beautiful Österlen, the eastern part of Skåne, where we had fika (coffee and pastries) at Olof Viktors, looked at boats in Skillinge Harbour and went to various antiques shops. We also stopped by Gunnarshögs Gård just before closing to buy some of their wonderful cold-pressed rapeseed oil.

One day I met up with a childhood friend at the fish restaurant Johan P, now also located at Malmö Central station, for a prawn sandwich on Danish rye bread. We were hoping to try Saltimporten Canteen, but we were too late to get a table. Next time.

Another day, when Carina and I were on our to the beach, we stopped at Märtas in Höllviken for a egg and prawn salad sandwich and enjoyed it outside in basking sunshine. Half an hour later when we reached the beach it was cloudy and cold again.

The sandwich was great though, and the shop/café really cute.

My last Sunday in Skåne I went to the annual antiques fair at Katrinetorp, like most people. It was incredibly popular, probably partly because of the torrential rain. I bet IKEA was busy too!

For lunch I met up with my bestie Emma at the festival in town; Malmöfestivalen but it was an anticlimax walking around in the rain with soaked shoes. I quickly decided on a langos with sourcream, caviar and red onions while Emma had a chicken wrap.

Another day with seriously bad weather (I so picked the wrong week and a half to go) Therèse and I were about to have lunch at the harbour in Smygehamn, the most southern point in the country, but it was so windy we got a takeaway instead. At the fish smokery they have lovely individual sandwich cakes with seafood. They’re quite creamy but really good.

As you can see I got my seafood sandwich fix during this trip, it’s something very Scandinavian that I can certainly miss in London, although there are a few places offering a decent prawn sandwich there too.

A lovely Sunday back home

Published on July 9, 2013July 9, 2013 by Hanna2 Comments

On Sunday father kindly picked me up from my best friend’s house and on the way home we did what most Swedish people do on weekend mornings; stopped at a bakery to buy fresh bread rolls.

Once we got home we had fika with the rolls, lots of different toppings, coffee, tea and orange juice, on the terrace. Then I went for a wander in my mother’s garden (well, it belongs to both my parents of course, but it is my mother’s domain) checking out the tomatoes and grapes in the greenhouse, the cherry and sour cherry trees and the wild strawberry plants.

Later on we enjoyed a lovely three course lunch, again on the terrace, with some rosé before it was time for me to head to the airport.

The lunch was wonderful, starting with a simple girolle toast with the first girolles of the season, picked by my aunt Pavla in the woods nearby. Then barbecued meat skewers with chicken, pork tenderloin and bacon and a lovely summery salad with new potatoes, grilled pears and blue cheese. Pudding was as simple as can be; vanilla icecream with freshly picked strawberries and wild strawberries from the garden. Absolutely wonderful!

Then it was time to say goodbye and go the airport, but I’ll be back in three weeks time. Can’t wait!

Our Good Friday dinner party

Published on April 11, 2012 by Hanna4 Comments

I went back to Sweden on Friday and after a quick fika (coffee break with cinnamon buns in this case) I whipped up a cheesecake for that evening’s dinner when my best friend Emma and her fiancée Claes came for dinner at my parents’ house.

We started with some bubbly (Crèmant de Bourgougne) and served some olives, pistachios and parmesan crisps as nibbles. It was the first time I made parmesan crisps, but certainly not the last. They were really yummy!

We then sat down and enjoyed my mothers’ roast lamb with garlic, red wine and rosemary and we had a large rösti, creamy sauce, broccoli and carrots with it.

We then served the dulce de leche cheesecake with coffee, bailey’s and whisky. Although I have made it before and loved it, I was still surprised by how divine it is. Just try it!

It was a perfect first evening back home and we had such a great time together. It can be real fun to hang out with different age groups at the same time and I truly enjoy spending time with my friends and parents at the same time.

Parmesan crisps

Choose a good parmesan. Grate it finely and place in piles on baking parchment on a baking tray. Bake in 200C for a few minutes or until the cheese has melted and is golden brown. Leave to cool on the tray.

Friday update and weekly menu

Published on August 26, 2011 by HannaLeave a comment

Wiie, it is Friday again! And for us it is not just any weekend, but a bank holiday weekend with Monday off. Poor Christopher is working the whole weekend, where as I will be going to Gothenburg, Sweden to visit my friend Linus. Best friend Emma is also going there, so it will be a nice weekend with old friends.

I haven’t been very outgoing this week, have just stayed in cooking, baking and sorting out other chores. Oh, and packed my bag for the weekend.

But I still have something nice to report, thanks to Time Out. A Swedish pop-up fika place is coming to Soho Square, last day today. There will be Swedish coffee and cakes and apples from my part of Sweden (the south).

If you need some inspiration for the coming week’s suppers, here is what we’re going to enjoy:

Friday: Nigellas seafood bake with potatoes and homemade mayo

Monday: pork cheek confit

Chorizo casserole with root veg
Caesar salad (have yet to blog about the proper dressing)
Baconwrapped meatloaf and potatoes

Have a great weekend!