The feel of Fiskars

Last week I visited Fiskars village with my daughter. The village is located in South Finland, very close to Tammisaari. It originated over 300 years ago as an industrial factory (mind you, as much as a factory can exist in those times) and today it is a home to many designers and artists.

I visited the village for the first time around 10 years ago with my university. It was September or October and the place was mind-blowingly beautiful. Before my daughter was born, I went there again with my husband but for reason or another, he was not too impressed.

Last week we had some mother-daughter time and I decided we should visit Fskars again. After all, it´s only about an hours drive from our home.

We both thoroughly enjoyed our time. I felt so at peace there and wondered how far I have come from my dreams 10 years ago of living in an old red brick building, surrounded my oak trees, history at my finger tips. I am not saying I am disappointed with my choices, quite on the contrary. But isn´t it silly, how a place or a space can touch your soul so profoundly that even 10 years later, you feel the aftershock?

So, maybe I am having an early midlife crisis (oh dear....) or then I am just feeling nostalgic. But it is good, I think, to go back to the things you love the most. Do you know what your architectural style is? I just realized mine; 1900 red brick industrialism. I grew up next to Finlayson factories near Tampere and went to school overlooking an old organ factory; both red brick buildings. Did I just get used to them? Are the memories of childhood making those spaces so dear to me? Or did they just affect my sense of style at a delicate age?

Either way - visit Fiskars, it is so worth it! :)

We stayed at the beautiful Hotel Tegel. I loved it.

The room was immaculate. I pretty much always enjoy hotel rooms, at least on some level, but - admittedly - I also almost frown at something. Here, everything was perfectly to my taste. My daughter loved it, too, by the way. (Especially those Iittala pillow cases by Klaus Haapaniemi.)

The scenery is so pretty.

Desico candle factory is also situated in Fiskars. I do not like scented candles at all, but the colours are great!

At the Fiskars museum, there are craft shops for kids. We had a magical moment in the sunshine with a lovely young lady playing the kantele and (here) the jouhikko. She sang so beautifully and the notes, lyrics and melody took my back to my childhood hobbies (Finnish folk music and folk dancing). Thank you again, we both thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. (Kids get to try the instruments, which was great.)

At another shop, there was a lady reading old Finnish tales of hölmöläiset (goofies). I do not think they have had a more eager listener! :) My girl had cookies and drank juice whilst eating every word the lady read. Maybe not so interesting to all children, but my thoughtful little one sure liked it.

Red brick buildings - is there any other way to end this entry?

Satukakku - fairytale cake

The first time I had a satukakku, a fairytale cake, was when I visited my aunt in Turku. She had bought this cake from Aschan and until today, the Aschan cakes were the only satukakkus I had ever eaten. I later moved to Turku so I sometimes bought it, but for the last 6 years (since my gluten free diet began) I haven´t had any.

So, it was about the time to have some!



Ingredients:

Vanilla custard
5 dl milk
1 dl cream
1 tsp vanilla sugar (you can use vanilla seeds or a vanilla pod, too)
4 egg yolks
2 tbsp caster sugar
2 tbsp corn flour

In a sauce pan, bring to boil the milk, cream and vanilla sugar.
In a bowl, mix together the yolks, sugar and corn flour. Once the milk mixture bubbles, pour the hot liquid over the egg mixture in a steady stream, whisking constantly. Once combined, pour the mixture back to the sauce pan and gently warm up until the mixture thickens. Remove from heat once it bubbles. Set aside and leave to cool. Continue with making the dough.


Cake dough
5 dl milk at 45 degrees
2 tsp psyllium
2 sachets of dry yeast
1 tbsp cardamom
2 dl caster sugar
2 dl rice flour
about 4-5 dl gluten free flour mix, add to the dough a tablespoon at a time

Warm up milk to about 45 degrees. Pour it in a large bowl (preferably to an electric mixer bowl such as KitchenAid or similar) and add the psyllium. Whisk together lightly and leave to swell for about 5 minutes. Add the yeast, sugar and cardamom, whisk together and again, leave to stand for a couple of minutes.
Then, add the rice flour and about 1 dl of the gluten free flour mix. Begin to whisk at a medium speed. Taking your time (the mixing process should take about 5-10 minutes in total), begin adding the gluten free flour mix a tablespoon at a time. For quite a long time, the dough will be very sticky - but you are creating air bubbles all the time and letting the dough take in the flour. At some point, when you add the flour dose, for a short time, the dough will come off from the sides of the bowl until again spreading out all over the bowl. After this, add one more tablespoon of flour, whisk well and leave the dough to stand for the short time while you make the filling.


Filling
150 g marzipan / almond paste
100 g margarin
50 g butter
(for a more sugary version, also add 2 tbsp of sugar - I like to control the sweetness with the icing)

Place all of the ingredients in a medium sized bowl and whisk thoroughly with an electric mixer, until well combined and somewhat fluffy.


Take out a pie dish (diam. approximately 30 cm). Butter the dish. Pour some flour over the dough so that you can scoop out about 1/4 of the dough. Place the dough onto the pie dish and with the help of flour, pat it evenly to the bottom and sides of the dish. Note that the dough is soft. This part should be relatively easy, though. But be prepared for losing your nerves in the next stage - I know I did.... :) At this stage, pour the custard on top of the base. The custard should fill the base almost all the way. All will not fit in - save some for later.

Flour your working surface and with plenty of flour in your hands, scoop out the rest of the dough. Pat it with floured hands and gently and easily, with a rolling pin, roll the dough to some kind of a square that is about 1 cm thick. This you should manage, although the rolling pin will probably stick to the dough a couple of times.

Once you have a shape, take your filling and scoop it out to small heaps allover the dough. You probably can not smear it over the dough because the dough is so soft, but heaps are fine!
Next, roll the dough into a cylinder and cut out the uneven ends.
Continue cutting slices that are about 2 cm thick and place them over the base that is covered in custard. I put in 7 slices.

Heat the oven to 200 degrees.

(For the rest of the dough, continue slicing. Place the slices to cupcake tins / paper forms and spoon over the extra custard. Bake at 200 degrees for about 10 minutes, let cool and pour over a sugar icing. (See below.) Once hardened, enjoy!)

Leave the cake (and the extra slices) to swell for about 20 minutes.  (If you want, you can sprinkle some sugar on top of the cake.)
Once ready, place the cake in the oven for about 20 minutes. The dough should get a nice brown colour and the custard should thicken and bubble.
Take out of the oven, leave to cool and finally, garnish with a simple sugar icing. (If you want, you can sprinkle some sugar on top of the cake.)

Icing
2-3 dl icing sugar
about 2 tbsp cold water

Mix together until combined and until a desired consistency is formed. Spoon over the cake (and the baked slices).

Simple as that! ;)

Ikea Nipprig - news for spring 2015

Ikea has newbies not only for the autumn (http://colourmepolka.blogspot.fi/2015/02/ikea-sinnerlig-ilse-crawford-for-ikea.html ), but also for the spring 2015.

This time, too, the feel is natural, even handmade and ecologic. I am not sure how eco-friendly it actually is, but Ikea sure knows how to style the photos. The photos are lush, green and beautiful.

The prices are quite good, too. At least according to the Italian Ikea´s website:
https://nuovecollezioni.ikea.it/nipprig/

This collection is seemingly not featured in Finland - or at least not at this stage. Not sure why, spring and summer will eventually come to the North, too. (And I can not wait!!)


Enjoy the tropical cool and hot of these photos!

Photos from:
http://www.ikea-download.de/15_03_NIPPRIG/s21.php

IKEA Sinnerlig - Ilse Crawford for Ikea

Ikea is doing it again - launching a great new collection. The designer is the fabulous Ilse Crawford.

These beauties will be out in August 2015. I can see myself getting rid of the old daybed of ours and replacing it with this pretty thing. I also like the rug, the basket, the bench and the pendant light....
What do you think?

The photos are form:
http://style-files.com/2015/02/06/ilse-crawford-designs-for-ikea/

and

http://mueblesueco.com/accesorios-ikea/la-nueva-coleccion-ikea-sinnerlig-apuesta-por-los-muebles-de-corcho/

Mazarin cakes with raspberry (gluten free)

Mazarin is a small cake with (I think) Swedish roots. In Finnish this tiny delicacy is called masariini or mazariini. The cake consists of a pie crust filled with sugary almond paste and topped with a sugar glaze. There are versions with an additional jam put in and those are my favourite - especially the raspberry version.

Hope you enjoy these, too!



MAZARIN CAKES
Yield: about 15
Bake at 190 degrees (Celsius) for about 15 - 17 minutes

Pie crust:
300 g gluten free flour (I used a mix of everything I had in the cupboard)
200 g butter, at room temperature
100 g icing sugar
1 egg
2 tbsp almond flour
a pinch of salt

Using your hand, mix all of the ingredients together. The dough will be very soft at this stage, so you need to cool it for about 1 hour. If you are pressed for time, pop it in the freezer for a while. Top tip! When you start pressing the dough into the molds, take out a small portion at a time. The warmer the dough gets, the more difficult it is to get in place. One mold will need about a size of a golf ball of the dough.



Once cool, press into molds. Ideally, the mazarin cake molds are oval shaped, aluminum molds, and just about 2-3 cm in height. I could not find such at any store so I used small silicone cupcake forms instead.

FILLING
300 g marzipan
150 g butter, at room temperature
3 eggs
1 tbsp gluten free flour
About 1 dl of raspberry jam

Take out an electric mixer and beat the marzipan and butter smooth. Add the eggs, one at a time. You will get a rather loose batter. Mix in the flour.

Once you have the pie crust inside the molds, smooth about one teaspoon of raspberry jam to the bottom of each mold. Next, add the marzipan filling. Fill the molds up to about 3/4, or even slightly more. Bake at 190 degrees for about 15 minutes, depending on the size of the molds.

(If you want, you can omit the flour from the filling, but at least for me, without the flour the filling foamed to the sides. With the flour, once you bake them, the filling should rise up like a ball. Once you take them out of the oven and let them cool, you should get an even top.)

Once the crust gets a light brown colour, take the cakes out of the oven and remove from pan to cool. Once somewhat cooled, remove the molds (if you are using silicone molds - no need to remove the aluminum versions) and cool completely.

GLAZE
200 g icing sugar
3-4 tbsp cold water
(food coloring)

Mix all the ingredients together and using a spoon, cover the inside of the pie crust with the glaze. Leave to set. If you are pressed for time, but them in the fridge and the sugar will harden more quickly.

Enjoy with tea or coffee - I especially love these as a dessert for breakfast. :)