The 3-Week Plan: Day 8 and 9

Day 8 in the plan said pickled herring. The husband didn´t feel like it and took me out to a restaurant. We went to one of our regular places, Mediterran, where a pair of brothers from Kosovo (we think) make Italian food, and very well, too. I had Spagetti Bolognese and the husband had Pasta a la Casa, which is fillet of pork with capers and red peppers.

Elder herring and archipelago herring.

We had the pickled herring today instead (the plan said sausages, but they keep in the freezer). I have written about that before, so I will not bore you with a long tale about that. I bought a new kind, Skärgårdssill (= archipelago herring) and it wasn´t perhaps as good as it looked. It was seasoned with herring roe, which made it taste a bit like Kalles Kaviar, another Swedish speciality which is excellent on a hardboiled egg sandwich. I probably will not buy that one again, but stick with our favourites: löksill (onion herring), svartvinbärssill (black currant herring), flädersill (elder herring), citronsill (lemon herring), and senapssill (mustard herring). There are many more flavours out there, this really is a staple in Swedish cooking.

The sugar is kept in an old
lidded beer jug.

Besides the herring, we boiled potatoes, hard-boiled some eggs, added some lettuce, yellow pepper, and grated carrots. Now, the husband likes his carrots coarsley grated with a sprinkling of lemon on top, while I like mine finely grated, with half a tablespoon of sugar on top, disolving in lemon. The sugar doesn´t really make the carrots taste sweet as candy or anything, but rather brings the flavour out in an absolutely wonderful way, like a spoon of sugar does to a tomato sauce. My mother used to make it like this and to me, it´s the only way.

Also, we had some tunnbröd (= thin bread). Our favourite comes from Dahlberg´s home bakery in Piteå. It has an excellent crunch to it and a strong taste of fennel seed.