Lapper, or sveler, is the Norwegian version of American pancakes. Well, other than the fact that you’d get a strange look over here if you tried eating them for breakfast.
They’re squarely in the domain of sweet food – hence they are meant to be eaten for afternoon tea/coffee. Maybe if a class or an organization has a bake sale, they will be featured.
We eat them with butter, or jam, or jam and sour cream, or in rare circumstances – with Danish chocolate spread.
Tag: norwegian cooking
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Lapper
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Norwegian cooking: Komler
So, potato balls. How about them? Every district in Norway seem to have their own variation of these, including the name. And there are different condiments and drinks according to where you are in the country. Even to the point where someone wrote and published a book about it.My Dad’s cousins in Chicago (their parents emigrated from Norway before WWII before they were born) and their families eat it for May 17 celebrations. Their version has been bastardised by the American palate- and they have taken to adding cornflakes to it for additional texture.
My grandmother started making these for us when I was younger. It took me a bit of time to warm up to them, but my youngest sister would eat four for dinner, four for breakfast the next day and four for lunch, until there were no more.
Since my grandmother is in the nursing home, we dug out her recipe for making it.
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Norwegian cooking: Gomme
A lot of the time, traditional Norwegian food does not look particularly appetizing. In many cases, it looks bland and boring.And other times, it sort of looks like a brain exploded. Which is why, if you’re throwing a Halloween bash or a gory themed party, this dish is perfect for the visual aspect.
Gomme/Gome is one of those dishes that have small variations where in Norway you might be.
We tried replicating my grandmother’s version, and since she is from the South-Western part of Norway – we used this recipe as a base.
Gomme is a sweet dish that is meant to be used as dessert, as spread on flatbread/bread or just to be eaten as candied snack.
It’s really about having the time to do it. There is not a lot of active work, except for stirring the pot every now and then, but you have to be present and ensure that it doesn’t burn.
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Norwegian cooking: Russedessert
In my quest to explore the traditional Norwegian cuisine, the time had come to do Russedessert. Essentially, it is cordial mixed with water and semolina (and possibly also sugar) on the stovetop until it has congealed and then once it has cooled, it is whisked into a creamy pudding.The recipe was in my grandmother’s cookbook, but as I wasn’t interested in feeding a family of a hundred… (Slight exaggeration, but the economic cookbook from late 1920, early 1930 is all about feeding many people, cheaply.) I went elsewhere. This recipe in Norwegian states that it is for four people.
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Norwegian cooking: Caramel pudding
I have a memory of watching my grandmother making caramel pudding in our kitchen at home. It might have been either my confirmation or my sister’s christening – since she was making it at our place and not her own. But it would also frequently be among the staples for dessert at Sunday dinner at her place.
For some reason, I’ve always imagined this to be super hard to make. It looks more impressive than it really is, as it is not that hard to make, I would say.
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Scandinavian cooking: Wales kringle
Oddly enough named Waleskringle – I have no idea where the name comes from. If I were to hazard a guess, as it is an old Danish dessert, I would guess that it might have been named when Princess Alexandra of Denmark married the Prince of Wales, although one dictionary say that it is an old Welsh dessert… Can anyone shed some light?This is actually a family recipe. My grandmother dictated it to my Dad when he went off to uni, so he’d be able to make it himself. Whenever we would stop at my paternal great aunt’s house, we would also get it – and it would get scarfed down like we were wild animals in training.
It is basically a profiterole dough, but instead of making profiteroles, you make three rectangular stripes of dough.
My grandmother’s recipe did not include the frozen puffed pastry underneath – I’ve seen other recipes with it, so I thought I would try. Include, exclude – it makes very little difference to the end result.
Other recipes include filling it with custard or jam – we’ve never had that, so I didn’t try doing it this time around.
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Mickey Mouse-shaped Oat Waffles
Norwegian-style waffles are softer than the Belgian ones. There are about as many different recipes as there are households, I’d think. They’re usually heart-shaped, but I couldn’t resist using my sister’s Mickey Mouse waffle-iron.These ones came about when I was cleaning up my diet by doing low-GI for a while after Christmas, but still wanted a treat to serve guests. I’ve used the basic recipe from Norwegian site Det Søte Liv, but tried to adapt a bit to the fact that I was avoiding regular white sugar. (more…)
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Norwegian Christmas Baking: Kakemenn
Quite literally translated as Cookie Men, these are essentially white sugar cookies, with a small change. Instead of baking powder or baking soda, the leavener is horn salt, or ammonium bicarbonate, which gives it a slight “kick” in flavor, and makes the kitchen smell a bit odd while they’re baking in the oven.It’s one of the easy Norwegian Christmas cookies, that is the most common to use with children. I suspect because it is fun to use the cookie cutters of different sizes and shapes, and to paint with food coloring before the cookies go into the oven to be baked, but that’s just the part that I haven’t outgrown… 🙂
We like to find different shapes of cookie cutters, and paint to make things interesting. Men, women and hearts are the most traditional shapes.
They also last for quite some time – some years we have Kakemenn until March. (If some are frozen, we have occasionally eaten them in August, which just feels plain wrong.)
The recipe below is from Tine.
The dough should be made the night before, so it has time to rest.
