[Sca-cooks] Re: Viking Cookbook - experimenting with the recipes

[Linda M. Kalb]

At 04:37 PM 9/24/01, you wrote [response to query about "Viking Cookbook"]:
> >From an archaeologist I know who I showed this book to, since her
> specialty is Viking age foods quote,
>" Nice book, totally inaccurate but good recipes, a couple are 18th
>century folk recipes, most are modern."
>The guy who published the book runs a conference centre in Scandanavia and
>these are foods his chef
>serves up to business people who come to his Viking Conference centre.
>Some of the ingredients of course
>have been around since Viking times so.... maybe.... some yes some no very
>debatable. Then again they
>dress the people up in Viking costumes complete with helmets ( Plastic
>with horns.) Tell ya anything :-)
>Cheers
>Sandy
>
>
>Fr"jel Gotlandica Viking Re-enactment Society.
>http://www.frojel.com/
>frojel at frojel.com

I was afraid of that.  Thanks!

I did try three of the "Viking Cookbook" recipes Saturday evening after
getting the book.

1. Honey glazed root vegetables.  I had no clue at the time what a swede
was but since only one was called for and in another recipes a 500 ml swede
was needed, I thought it must be pretty big so I substituted a potato.  All
you do is peel and chop the root vegetables, boil them for five minutes,
drain them, brown them on both sides, adding the chopped leeks toward the
end, then adding honey (maybe salt too).  However, my SO helpfully boiled
the vegetables *and* the leeks very thoroughly while I was busy with my son
so they came out too soft.  Yummy otherwise.

2. Forest onion soup.  I had no clue what a forest onion was or what would
be a good substitution but the produce guy said use white onions if you
want a strong onion and use spanish onions if you want a sweet onion.  I
used onions that were underneath the white onion sign but looked to me like
spanish onions I've gotten in the past.  Another substitution I used:  the
recipe called for 150 ml milk and 150 ml cream (didn't say whether it
should be light cream or heavy cream).  My SO only drinks skim milk and he
refused to get cream *and* whole milk.  I felt that the recipe wouldn't
work well with skim milk (I had already a bad experience trying to make
hollandaise sauce at his house using skim milk--it didn't work at all), so
got I half and half, which is half milk, half cream, right?  That sounded
good in theory, but the soup tasted like half and half.  Also, since I left
it simmering while I cooked the other food in hopes that it might
reduce/thicken some more, it got all grainy like soup that's been on the
warmer *all day* at the restaurant.

3. Grilled salmon steaks with game butter on the side.  The butter amounts
must have been incorrect because the game butter (calling for 50ml butter
to go with some small amounts of crushed juniper berries and chopped
chives) was all green using their measurements, not looking at all like the
picture (yellow butter with flecks of green).  Also the 2 Tablespoons of
butter they specified wasn't enough to grill the salmon steaks without
partially burning them, but I added more butter so that at least the second
side didn't get burnt.  The salmon turned out nice and tender and tasty and
only one end on one side got a bit burnt, but since all three recipes
turned out wrong in some way now my SO thinks I'm a bad cook and therefore
not such a good prospect.

Inga/Linda