I have always loved to cook. Way back in my junior high days, I was saving recipes from magazines, asking relatives for their own favorites, collecting cookbooks…and having fun in my mom’s kitchen. There were some spectacular failures to be sure, and you know something is really bad when the dog won’t touch it! But it has always been a wonderful creative outlet.
I’m of full Swedish heritage and my husband is half Norwegian, so throughout the decades with his family and mine, one social constant has been “coffee and something sweet.” Stop by a grandma or aunt’s house at any time of day, and a plate of assorted homemade cookies and a pot of coffee magically appears. Little did I know–until just this week–that there is a whole Scandinavian culture surrounding this, and it’s called “fika.” A coffee break, really, but it has more meaning, a deeper tradition than that.
In fact, there are many words to describe this, as I just found in the book named, appropriately enough, “Fika.”
Fik or Fikastalle: a place to have fika
Fikapaus: taking a break to have fika
Fikarast: specific times of day to have fika
Fikastund: the moment you have fika
Fikasugen: a craving for fika
Our daughter Emily is an amazing, talented cook, and she is currently fascinated with Scandinavian cooking. She and her husband are visiting us, and every night has been a Scandinavian culinary adventure. We feel very blessed!
Three nights ago she made silky chocolate kladd kaka, the next night was “Swedish Visiting Cake,” so named because it could be made so quickly if one saw visitors on the doorstep. Both were incredible!
Last night was King Oscar’s Success Cake: almond meringue layers separated with and also topped with custard, plus almonds and chocolate on top. Be still my heart!
Note: The Kladd Kaka (not shown–we devoured it too quickly!) took less than ten minutes to bake! She reduced the sugar by two Tbsp, and she left off the bread crumbs on the bottom of the pan. It was perfect! Just the right semi-sweetness to go perfectly with whipped cream. She made all of these in a springform pan.
Here is a link for Visiting Cake: http://bakedbree.com/swedish-visiting-cake
Here is a link for the Kladd Kaka: http://www.saveur.com/swedish-gooey-chocolate-cake-recipe
Do you have favorite traditions or dishes from your own background? Other cuisines that you enjoy? I would love to hear about them!
Roxanne Rustand
The Single Dad’s Redemption, Love Inspired 7/2016
A London Christmas (Sweet Christmas Kisses anthology III) 10/2016
An Aspen Creek Christmas, Love Inspired 11/2016
USA Today bestselling author Roxanne Rustand is the author of over thirty-five traditionally published novels, and four indie novels. Prior to 2007 she wrote for the secular market, but since then has been happily focused on inspirational fiction and sweet romance. A Golden Heart winner in 1995, she has received two RT Bookclub Magazine Reviewers' Choice Awards, and has been nominated for an RT Bookclub Magazine Career Achievement Award. She is currently writing for Harlequin's Love Inspired line, and is continuing with self publishing. She and her husband live in the country with three horses, two goofy rescue dogs, and a half-dozen barn cats.
Oh, your daughter’s cake looks delicious, Roxanne! My family has West Virginia roots (yes, I’ve heard all of the jokes) and one of my favorite dishes was always my Mamaw’s crispy fried chicken. It was the best!
Your daughter’s cake looks delicious, Roxanne! All of my family is from West Virginia (yes, I’ve heard all of the jokes) and one of my favorite dishes was always my Mamaw’s extra crispy fried chicken. Not the healthiest dish, but was it sure yummy!
That cake looks amazing! Will definitely be trying the Visiting Cake- what a great tradition. Lamingtons (bit stereotypical perhaps) are a favourite- especially filed with Nutella. My Mum and god mum make Peach Balls- round balls of sponge cake, dipped in a raspberry sauce then covered with coconut-you then cut them in half and spread raspberry jam in the middle, Basically a leamington but with raspberry sauce and jam instead-YUM!
Your daughter’s cake looks delicious, Roxanne! All of my family is from West Virginia (yes, I’ve heard all of the jokes) and one of my favorite dishes was always my Mamaw’s extra crispy fried chicken. Not the healthiest dish, but was it sure yummy!
Hi Roxanne. I am German and was born in Berlin. In Germany midmorning and in the afternoon one has Kaffee und Kuchen (coffee and cake or a coffee break). My mother was an excellent baker and cook. The family favorite for afternoon or Sunday Kaffee und Kucken is Bienenstich (Bee Sting Cake). Bienenstich is made of a sweet yeast dough with a baked-on topping of chopped almonds, butter, sugar, and almond extract. Often it is filled with a vanilla custard or buttercream. We do not fill ours, but a local bakery sells the filled Bienenstich by the piece. My topping is better than the bakery’s, because I do not use slivered almonds I use a German nut grinder for my almonds. When having guests for Sunday Kaffee und Kuchen, it is served on fine china. Germans love to socialize and even have a special word “gemuetlichkeit” meaning a space of warmth, friendliness and good cheer or good food, good friends, and plenty of time to enjoy it. Difficult to explain with no English equivalent word.
Our favorite German dish is beef rouladen, a must have for birthdays, Easter, and Christmas. My beef rouladen (rolls) are filled with chopped onion, dill pickle and bacon. There are many variations on the filling – many German restaurants use a pickle spear or wrap the entire beef roll in bacon. My kids like mine the best because we are not fond of pickles and with the chopped filling the flavor permeates into my slow cooked rouladen.
Being from South Africa originally we still enjoy many traditional dishes from there. One of my favourite sweet treats is “Koeksisters”, it’s basically a dough that you cut into strips, twist or plait together then fry in oil, then while still hot you place them in a sugar syrup. Delicious!
Hi Wemble! I loved hearing about your own treats–they sound so yummy! !
I’m half Italian and my grandfather shared with me his receipt for spaghetti sauce that takes all day to cook. It’s not too difficult, but the flavors are so good.
My father was French/Greman and he used to make what are called Welsh Cakes every Christmas. They have currants and are fried.
My husband is Japanese and every New Years morning his father makes a soup that has mushrooms, mochi, onions, soy sauce, pork and other things I’m not sure how to say. It’s very interesting. I’ve never really gotten used to it but my children love it.
I guess you can say we have multi-cultural traditions in our family.
I don’t like to cook but I do what I have to do. My husband takes it on a lot, especially when we are camping. While at the beach on vacation we ate at a restaurant that served Swamp Soup. It was so good and while still there I googled the recipe. We’ve already made it at home and it was just as good.
The Bienenstich sounds incredible! All of my pastry favorites–custard filling, and such a wonderful topping! I’m going to look for recipe! :)
Your rouladen sounds wonderful, too. I’ve never cooked German specialties, but we have the Amana Colonies close by, and the restaurants there serve German cuisine family style. I’ve enjoyed their Sauerbraten, Weiner Schnitzel and fried chicken, but I’ve never noticed rouladen on the menu. I’ll be sure to check next time!
That sounds really tasty!! :)
How fascinating, to enjoy so many culinary influences within your family! I can only imagine how wonderful that spaghetti sauce is. Yum!
Swamp soup–now that is an interesting name! :) I’m going to google it and give it a try, too!
My family has a strong German heritage, so we eat a lot of German cakes with Eiskaffee (or Iced Kaffee Latte). I can´t remember a weekend when my mom didn´t have a delicious complex cake baked for our family (like Sacher torte or Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte). Both my grandmas were the same. It was a sweet childhood. I liked to help mom when I was in high school, but haven´t really included the tradition in my own home (yet!). I miss nice afternoon coffee breaks with a slice of cake.
Prscila, you are making me hungry! :) What a lovely family tradition!
Your Scandinavian fika makes me think of Mennonite faspa, a light supper on Sundays… because Sunday Dinner was a Big Meal deserving those capital letters. Faspa would be buns, cheese, pickles, and cold cuts. I’m sure there were plenty of cookies, too, but I remember a huge bowl of canned peaches or cherries on the table for dessert.
The last two summers we have spent 3 weeks in different European countries. Shops that sell coffee and sweets are everywhere.
Your daughter’s cake looks delicious, Roxanne! All of my family is from West Virginia (yes, I’ve heard all of the jokes) and one of my favorite dishes was always my Mamaw’s extra crispy fried chicken. Not the healthiest dish, but was it sure yummy!
I’m not sure if this would be considered a tradition, but I’ve become the family birthday cake maker. All from scratch made to order by the birthday person :-) Of course, my husband doesn’t do any baking, so on my birthday he usually improvises by buying a delicious item from the bakery. He knows what I like!
His mom used to make cabbage rolls, and one day, I’d love to attempt them!
You have a very important position then, as Maker of the Cakes! I decorated the cakes for our family when the kids were growing up. We live on an acreage and raised horse for many years. My most memorable cake: when our six year old son wanted a manure spreader and tractor on his cake…and he wanted the spreader LOADED. LOL! I did everything he wanted in the design…except that I loaded the spreader with flowers. :)
And so wonderful over there, too! I just love how artistic those sweets can be, too. Yum!
So sorry. I meant Priscila but missed a letter!
All of it sounds soooo good. I’ll bet those buns were homemade, and I can imagine the wonderful aroma! And home canned fruit is delicious!
Merrillee, did you find that the pastries and sweets aren’t as sweet as they are in the U. S.? Those I tried in Germany, Austria, England, Scotland, etc. seemed to not be as sweet and I liked them that way. Sometimes, I think we have entirely too much sugar in our desserts.
My maternal grandparents were both from Switzerland, and we have a Swiss bread recipe in our family that is so yummy. It has butter, eggs and a little sugar in it and is braided before putting in the loaf pan. My mom and dad used to make it, and I have some brothers and sisters that make it quite often. Mine never seems to turn out as good as theirs. :(
Mmm. Those look good! And easy…I am all about easy. =)
We have four food dishes from various parts of our family that I would consider tradition. First is homemade chicken and noodles for Thanksgiving. I don’t know that ours are unique, but the main requirement is the noodles have to be sliced as thinly as possible. Noses are turned up at dumpling-like noodles. =) My great-aunt taught me to make them and her mother taught her, and her mother-in-law taught her. So it’s been a family favorite at least since then.
Second is red hot jello, made with strawberry or cherry jello, applesauce, and red hots. That dish is from my grandma (who was my mom’s step-mother) so I don’t know where it came from before then.
My grandpa was raised by his grandparents (born in the 1880’s) and his grandma made salmon salad. I need to get all the ingredients from my mom for that one but it’s big things are the salmon (of course) and peanuts. We think that must have been a special treat because we can’t see canned salmon being a real staple in rural KS in the early 1900’s.
Our last tradition is probably the most unique. My great grandpa liked to make fudge. I don’t know where it came from before him. Conley fudge (as we call it) is unique because rather than being smooth like most good fudge, it’s made as grainy as it possibly can be. It’s a very sweet strong chocolate flavor – very dark in color. It looks like dark colored normal fudge but has a texture similar to hard packed brown sugar. I don’t know of any Conley descendants that don’t like it, but I’m not sure any of the in-laws like it at all.
What fun to hear about your family food traditions, Katy! So interesting to learn about such a variety of favorites. Im fascinated by the fudge. Is it a bit like the grainy pralines sold in the New Orleans area? I remember thinking they looked like caramels, but being surprised by the the different texture. Your fudge sounds yummy!
Your Swiss bread sounds delightful. I don’t think I’ve ever seen something like that, but it sounds wonderful!
I’ve never had New Orleans’ pralines, but they sound great! =)
What is this ‘homemade’ of which you speak? Surely there isn’t any other kind of bun! …. Well, there is now, but you’re right. Homemade then, always.
Chowder is a big deal around here and my husband makes the BEST!!! Beef roast, chicken, potatoes, corn, green beans, tomatoes, (other stuff I can’t remember)… cooked up in a big cast iron pot, it’s delicious!