Schultüte - school cone

I was an au pair in Germany, Tübingen, over 10 years ago. I flew over in autumn and shortly after my arrival, the older girl of the family began her school as a first-grader. That was the first time I ever realised the concept of a Schultüte.

I had visited Germany many times during the summer months and always admired the pretty and colourful cardboard cones I saw at Müller for example. I never knew what they were for until I saw the small 6 and 7 year olds with their oversized backpacks, clinging to their cones.

It was such an adorable idea that I decided that I would make one for my child when the time came. And now it has.

The idea of a Schultüte is to do what people everywhere do when their children start school; to equip them with the goods they need. But somehow I like the idea of handing out all the items as a colourful, prettily wrapped gift. I have made one before to our neighbour girl when she started school but now I got to do the same to my own daughter.

A dvd for fun.

A small flashlight for the dark winter mornings when she will be walking to the bus stop.

Xylitol chewing gum and xylitol pastils to keep her teeth healthy.

Notebooks of various sizes.

Magnets. 

Pencils and a pen sharpener.

Stickers that glow in the dark - an essential part of any school year.

Scented crayons (did you not just love the scented erasers and stuff back in the day??) and some markers.

Initial.

 In Finland, there are no tütes and making one did not seem like a good idea. So I bought a pretty Marimekko gift bag instead.

I hope she likes her Schultüte. (I will decorate the bag later on.)

I hope her school years will be a safe and happy time.

Super-simple and crunchy bread rolls, gluten free - too good to be true?

Once I started eating gluten free bread, it seemed like all hope of ever getting a crunchy crust in a bread was lost. Then, all of a sudden, it was not. It was actually about an hours labour away. If, by labour, you mean mixing up a couple of ingredients with a fork, letting the dough rest for about 30 minutes and baking them in the oven. I like to call it lovely labour, because it really is just that.


Please indulge yourselves with my

Simple and crunchy bread rolls

7,5 dl warm water (at about 40 degrees C)
1,5 tbsp psyllium
1,5 sachets of dry yeast
1,5 tbsp honey (sugar will do, too)
1,5 tsp salt
1,5 dl rolled oats (gluten free)
2 dl oat flour (gluten free - you can also use buckwheat)
approx. 3-4 dl gluten free flour

Method

Pour the warm water into a large bowl. Add the psyllium and stir well. Let the psyllium swell up for a couple of minutes, stir again and add the yest and the honey. Mix well. For the mixing, all the way through, use a (wooden) fork. No need to get your hands dirty with this dough! Also, using a fork will mean that the dough will be wet enough.

Add the rolled oats and the oat flour along with the salt. Mix well.

Gradually, about 1 dl at a time, add the rest of the flour until a somewhat loose dough is formed. Again, the dough must be wet enough for you to still be able to stir it with the fork!

Cover well (I have to admit, for this dough, I like to use a large Tupperware bowl which I can seal tight. Once the lid pops (if I have time for a second run, if not, I just scoop the dough out instantly), I re-set it and wait for another pop.) and leave to sit and rise for about 30 minutes.

 The dough after 30 minutes. 

Take out baking trays, cover them with baking sheets and ladle the dough directly onto the trays. The rolls will look weird at this stage, but do not worry. Once you get them into the oven, the will go lovely and round.
The dough should yield for about 12 rolls. Sprinkle with flour (or something else) and place them into a hot oven.

Bake at 230 degrees C for about 30-35 minutes. Make sure that the crust is hard before taking them out of the oven! Also, knock the rolls from below - you should get a hollow sound if they are ready to be taken out. The rolls might start getting quite dark and feel even too hard when you finally do take them out. But please bare with me; if you take them out too early, about 5 minutes later they will go flat. When they are properly baked, the inside will be chewy and you WILL have a great crunchy crust - even on the next day. And the rolls will be nice and round, not flat.

Hot from the oven.

Enjoy my dears!

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