This past weekend we were pleased to have Roland and Kerstin as our guests for dinner at “our” house. I decided to make them a typical meal for our family, although I’m not sure how representative it is of how Americans eat. My sister eats like we do, so I guess it counts! The kitchen in this house is separate from the living room, so I wasn’t really able to chat while everyone tried to keep the crostini away from Kerstin’s dog Max.
Luckily I’d made most of the dinner in advance, and only had to cook the pork while they were here. I made an herb and garlic-stuffed pork tenderloin (well, Jon actually prepared the tenderloins for me that morning using herbs from the garden) that I braised with fresh apples and served with an apple cognac reduction. We have pork tenderloin quite a bit at home, and it was fun that they had served us pork as well, Swedish style, so we could compare. I also made a summer wheat berry salad – a new favorite that I discovered in Sweden and adapted for our tastes – and minted peas. We had cheesecake brownies from my beloved David Lebovitz (his recipe is here) that I changed a bit as well. You can’t get chocolate chips in Sweden, so I left them out (David said it was OK), doubled the brownie part, and added a shot of espresso (I didn’t tell him about the espresso, shhhh). In retrospect, I should have skipped one of the eggs too, since the 4th egg made them a bit too custardy without the addition of the chocolate chips. If you make them the way I did, lose the last egg.
Anyway, we had a wonderful time with the kids’ new Swedish grandparents, and are hopeful that they will take us up on the offer to come visit in Florida.
Roland and Kerstin sing the Swedish song – or try to! – to Sara and Sam.
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