Serving Swedish sweets

I love baking - yes, love it. Bread, buns, cakes, cookies, scones, cupcakes, crackers... All of it! But since moving to Seattle, the baker in me has been hibernating together with my pâtissière alter ego, mostly because of a mixure of fear and mistrust towards my gas oven. Sure, there have been some exceptions; I've produced some easy no-brainers like rhubarb crumble pie and Swedish spice cake (mjuk pepparkaka), but nothing that required active yeast or more serious thought.

However, a colleague at the Hutch turned 70 (sic!) yesterday and somehow I had been tricked into promising to bring Swedish cinnamon rolls (kanelbullar) to our little lunch party. Finding everything I needed required a bit of research, the most challenging ingredient turning out to be pearl sugar (pärlsocker) to top off the buns with. I eventually found some from the brand ”Lars’ Own” at Scandinavian Specialties in Ballard, and after some improvisation with the dry yeast I managed to produce some rather tasty and absolutely authentic cinnamon rolls. The mischievous gas oven did indeed pull a prank on me by burning the buns on the bottom with unevenly distributed temperature, but the result was a success nonetheless; everyone seemed to enjoy the treat. One of my colleagues even asked for the recipe, and I had to promise another to make a batch for her birthday too. Fun!

My kitchen has no room for special baking accessories, so the buns had to cool down on my dish drainer. Classy!

I actually made another Swedish speciality for a birthday party on Saturday as well, but that time I chose something simpler: a rich, chocolatey sticky cake (kladdkaka) with chocolate frosting and Seattle blackberries in the batter (picked by me, of course). It was just as yummy as it sounds...

A fun detail was the excitement over the ”home-made” whipped cream I served with the cake; in the land where canned whipped cream is religion, people are apparently vastly impressed by someone actually mixing the cream themselves. Very amusing.

Behold the floating cake!

I'm certainly inspired to take on more adventures in my kitchen after these positive experiences. Perhaps it's time to try a bread recipe or two...?