Reflecting on the Holiday

So we come to the last blog post of the holiday. I wonder what image best sums up an amazing three weeks away. 

I think it is the awe of seeing the West Wall of Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim.

Even now the details of the various images on the West Wall surprise and thrill me.

Highlights

 

As I look back there are a few things which stand out, but in mentioning them I realise there are loads that I could include which space would not allow. 

After the impressiveness of Trondheim, the one that comes first to mind is arriving in Olden and seeing Drew in his 'home' element

with the rushing water at the centre of the valley

and getting that sense that in this town everything is very Drewish, even down to the sparkling water.

Then there was walking on the top of the Opera House in Oslo, which even know seems like a crazy idea, but was great fun.

Also Drew meeting a friendly troll (and a whole woodland of them) in Bergen.

In terms of achieving a long term aim, crossing into the Artic Circle for the first time in our lives has to be at the top of them.

Seeing a Church rolling from one place to another in Kiruna is also a memory you couldn't plan for, but thoroughly enjoyed at the time. It still seems unbelievable that you can load a church onto a trailer and move it, ever so slowly for two miles.

Finally, the pleasure of feeling we were coming 'home' as we arrived at the Thon Partner Hotel Kungsborn hotel right next to Central Station in Stockholm.

To Note

It was also impressive to note Drew's courage in overcoming his fear of heights (or as says: of drops) in the funicular in Bergan, in the cable car in Loen, 

on the bridge and the cable car in Tromsø 

Unexpected delights

There were also the unexpected delights which brought brightness to the whole holiday. One that comes to mind is the two ferry journeys that the bus took between Bergen and Olden - who knew a standard service bus would use a small ferry boat to cross the Fjords and what a delight each of those little unexpected journeys would be for us.

The delight of seeing a Cruise Ship leaving Olden as we arrived. It turns out, I found out later, that a former student of mine, Stephanie Richards, who studied with Linda (one of our regular blog commenters) on the Moodle in Schools project, taught by Professor Norah Jones, Catherine Naamani and I, was on that ship; with them being forced to make an unplanned stop in Olden due to the Storm Floris which was battering the UK and Norway at the time. That was a relief for Drew too, as he now knows why this, unscheduled ship was in the Fjord on that day. 

The comfort of the trains both the Oslo to Bergen and the Trondheim to Bodø ones was another real pleasure of the trip.

A special mention also has to go to Thon Hotels, who in no small part made the holiday, by providing great quality accommodation, in excellent locations with brilliant breakfasts. The hotels became a key part of our successful enjoyment of the trip and getting to sit next to the founder (at least of his statue) was also great fun.

Though the window in Room 502 of the Radisson Blu in Tromsø has to win the prize of the best view from an hotel in the holiday, by day

or by twilight

though the balcony of the Olden Fjord Hotel gave it a good run for its money. 

Memorable Meal

While all four of the Michelin starred restaurants were excellent, for me it is Fagn, in Trondheim, that stands out as the most memorable as the Head Chef took the effort to engage with us and explain what had inspired him in his cooking, that with the quality of the whole service, makes it the great foody find of the holiday for me.

That being said only one of the meals we had disappointed, the lack of heat in the Vietnamese meal at Lille Saigon was a disappointment, 

but one out of twenty two is a remarkable record. [Co-pilot's note: I must, dear readers, give an honourable mention to the delights of Bastard Burger - I know some people don't like burgers on principle, but it was a damn good tasty bit of dinner.]

Travel 

In the 22 days of the holiday we travelled a total of 2,500 miles (excluding flights). It was 1,354 miles by train, 867 miles by coach/bus, 188 miles by ferry and 20 miles on the underground.

In addition we walked 144 miles, an average of 5.75 miles a day which is equivalent to 12,450 steps per day, well above the somewhat random target of 10k a day.  Our longest walk day was 13 miles or 28,000 steps on the Sunday in Oslo. Our shortest walk day was .83 of a mile i.e. 1,800 steps, this was the day we travelled from Olden to Trondheim and, after two long bus rides, walked one block to the amazing meal at Fagn. 

Thankfully, our walking helped balance with our food consumption. I left Wales at 12 stone 10 lbs (80.74 kg) and returned at 13 stone 6 lbs (85.28 kg) - I reckon it would have been a lot more than that without the walking. 

Issues

We had a remarkably easy holiday in terms of what went wrong. Most years there have been somethings which have not worked - this year was so much easier than some of the past ones. Everything seemed to work as well, indeed better, than we might have expected in advance. 

The only challenges: 

(a) the inability to get photos off the camara 

(b) the absence of a functioning launderette in Trondheim.

were both annoyances rather than major problems and were solved in one day in Trondheim. Though I suspect I'd have finished the blog a day or two earlier if I hadn't had that big catch-up with photos, it didn't spoil any aspect of the holiday.

Overall it has been fabulous.

Thanks

Thanks to all of you who have made this journey with us, with comments on the blog, on Flickr and on Facebook/BlueSky - they have been a great help and encouragement both for informing the journey and for correcting my mistyping/misspelling. I suspect there are many more spelling errors to catch, so if you see any please let me know.

So, until next year, when we seem to be heading towards Portugal following Richard Sharpe in Wellington's Peninsular Campaign, farewell and see you soon. 

The journey home

Today's post is probably a bit prosaic as we head home, but here is a brief outline: 

Early Morning

I woke up at 3.30pm and get to writing the blog from last Sunday in Tromsø. Drew wakes up at 5am and I make us a cup of English Breakfast tea, and later an Earl Grey tea, each. Drew reviews the blog post and adds his elements to it and it gets published just after 6am

Ablutions start at 6.30am...

Breakfast

The idea of late breakfasts at the weekend seems rather quaint to me. At home my breakfasts on weekends tend to be two or three hours before my weekday time of 6.30!! But here it is 7.30am, so that's when we have it.

I start with the same things I've had for the last three days. A chia pudding and yogurt with nuts, seeds and raisins.

Drew decides to repeat yesterday's delights with dark bacon and dark mushrooms plus a potato or two.

I then head over for my last plate of pickled herring, as usual in Sweden, this is two types - peppercorn and mustard, this is accompanied by pickled vegetables - today this included pickled beetroot, pickled radish, pickled cheery tomatoes, pickled gherkins and pickled things I don't recognise (Google when I use search on the photo suggested they may be a fake brain prop, I can see why they suggest that, but I'm sure they aren't) 

I also have a Knäckebröd and Rågbröd

to mop up the pickling juice.

Drew has some white bread with two eggs, so the yolk can soak into the bread.

Back to the room

We go back to the room at 7.55am and I write a second blog post about our journey from Tromsø to Kiruna. This involves lots of happy memories and some rambling about our reading/TV watching habits. 

With that drafted I do my weekly check on our stocks and shares, while Drew is checking the blog post. I then post it.

We pack and check we have everything we need for the journey home. 

Arlanda Express

We check out from the hotel by the app at 11.20am and drop our keys at the key drop point as we walk up from the room and out of the hotel. I reckon we'll be back at this, our happy place. 

From our hotel room we could see the Arlanda Express on its platform, so it takes us less than ten minutes to walk from the hotel to the train. 

Which leaves at 11.35am and arrives at Terminal 5, our terminal, at 11.50am, exactly 3 hours before our departure.

We get into a very friendly lift

which says "Hello, I just want to say thanks for taking the lift." This sounds so much like the lifts from Zaphod Beeblebrox's ship, The Heart of Gold, in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, that I wonder if a fan works for the lift company. This lift only says it in text, so at least we don't have the synthasised voice of the Heart of Gold's lifts.

Arlanda Airport

We make our way to a self-check in machine 

and then to the luggage drop. We have completed this and the security - fast track was quiet this morning by 12.10pm.

So, it was time to head to the SAS lounge.

We settled in to the lounge. I had a coffee and sparkling water and Drew Pepsi Max, then I had a delightful minty pea soup which was served with croutons and crusty bread to eat with it. 

Drew explores the airport and returns and starts to read his novel while I do some holiday accounting. I've not had a chance since we left Kiruna on Wednesday.

We leave the lounge at 2.15pm to go through passport control. This isn't as smooth as the earlier queues, it takes 10 minutes to go through. So we are through passport control by 2.25pm, then have to walk ten gates to our one where we board and settle into our row 4 seats. 

On the plane

We take-off at 2.55pm (1.55pm UK time) right on time. Lunch is served about thirty minutes later. It is a lovely fresh chicken dish with tabbouleh.

Drew is not as comfortable as me on the flight. He is sat beside a large muscley guy who apologised at the end of the flight for the amount of space he took up. [Co-pilot's note: I, dear readers, was in fear of my life!!! He was massive, his arms were the size of my waist. Some people might think that him falling asleep was a positive, not me, dear readers, because he seemingly started to have night terrors, one sudden move from him and I'd be crushed, flattened, as dead as a Norwegian blue parrot.]

Drew says at one point he had stereo snoring with me on one side and the large fella on the other. 

Heathrow

We landed at 4.18pm BST and disembarked at 4.30pm. Using the e-gates got us through passport control quickly and we arrived at the luggage belt at 4.40pm. My case arrives at 4.48pm and Drew's at 4.50pm.

We take the familiar path through Terminal 2 and use the escalators to get to the Bus Station as the lifts are very full.

We arrive in the Black Sheep Coffee shop at 5.15pm; 1 hour 15 minutes before the coach we are travelling on.

At least here the Americano and the Latte are the same size, I wonder, to myself, if there are Europeans here worrying that their coffee is to large??

National Express

The NX202 leaves at 6.30pm with our cases safely packed under the bus. It wasn't my imagination, the seats are closer together on National Express buses than the VY buses in Norway. Perhaps something for feedback when we get the survey question. As it happens this coach is not full, so it feels very spacious.

We have a peaceful drive stopping at Bristol and Newport on the way. We arrive in Cardiff at 10pm. We don't order the taxi until we get our luggage, which on reflection was a mistake. But I'm not used to using taxis in Cardiff, but as the last 132 leaves at 10pm, it was the only sensible option.

We get home at 11pm and decide to leave clothes sorting and washing until the morning. We get to bed by 11.25pm.

Ekstedt - Flame On

The Fantastic Four are now somewhere through their fifth or six reimagining since I used to be a fan of them in the UK comic Smash back in the 1960s, in those days, hard as it is to imagine, Marvel had no presence in the UK and some clever comic publishers got licenses to reprint Marvel's stories (with British spelling of course) in comics like Smash, Fantastic and Terrific. Even now Johnny Storm's catch-phrase: "Flame On" as he turned into the human torch reminds me of sitting reading these comics in my grandparent's house in the centre of Swansea.  

Well it seems a good title for today's blog as at Ekstedt, the one Michelin starred restaurant in Stockholm, it is all about cooking with flaming fire. 

Why am I here

Like earlier in the holiday when I was in Bergen, my choice of Ekstadt among the 13 restaurants with stars in the city, was influenced by hearing Niklas Ekstadt speak of his commitment to flame based cooking when he appeared with Chris 'Flamebaster' Roberts on his S4C series about Scandinavian cooking. We are glad we made the choice.

While we are here Niklas is in London promoting the opening of his new restaurant Ekstedt at The Yard in the Old Scotland Yard Hotel. I discovered this due to my sister who watches Saturday Kitchen, who told me he appeared there on the morning after our meal at his Stockholm restaurant. 

But while he wasn't here, his brigade did him real justice in bringing his commitment to life (or should I say to flame). 

Getting to the Restaurant

From the hotel it was only nine minutes by bus to the restaurant. This was the route

However, the dotted line from the bus stop to the restaurant wasn't quite as clear. Again Google Maps tried to convince me that where I wanted to be was somewhere other than where it was. Again, if I'd had x-ray vision I could have seen Ekstedt from where Google told us we had arrived, but in fact we need to walk ten yards turn right and walk up another street. On this occassion, the location having evaded both my and Drew's best efforts at discovery I rang the restaurant and the person who answered asked where we were. 

H - We are at Sturegallerian with a Subway opposite

Waitress - walk 10 meters and turn right

H - OK, we have done that

W - Can you see a women in a black jacket waving at you?

H - Yes!!

A simple human wave worked much more effectively than the technology.

Arrival

As soon as we arrived we were welcomed warmly. Our jackets (Macs-in-Sacs) were removed and we were seated in a delightful lounge area.

You can tell I felt relaxed, the tip of my shoe doesn't normally make it into photos unless I'm lounging, I was.

The longue included the restaurant's Michelin plaque and a busy young chef preparing little treats for us.

 

We were asked what we wanted as aperitives and were offered the non-alcoholic drinks menu. 

Drew choose Golden Cider Company, non-alcoholic apple cider

This cider is made here in Stockholm from Apples grown in the Skane region in Sothern Sweden.

I had a drink called a New Nordic Beverage 

This was made by Rålund and was a Sparkling Blueberry Juice, it provided a really fizzy refrshing taste.

We were the presented with the menus and asked if we had any allergies or dislikes.

They then showed us the non-alcoholic drink options for the night and asked us if we wanted to order by the glass or have the drinks to accompany the menu, we choose this of course.

We were given warm towels to freshen up

Again our eagerness to use them means the only photo is of completed ones!

We then received the first of our little tasting plates - Smoked fresh cheese, tomato and raspberries tartlet

The amazing tingle such simple ingredients make on your tongue when prepared by high quality chefs, is just amazing. I could combine these ingredients and probably enjoy the combination, but I could never achieve the level of complexity of flavours they manage here. 

The next dish was Roasted hay, dry aged beef and lumpfish roe in a tiny tart.

Getting the tart into the mouth without any of the hay dropping off was quite a challenge, but we made it!! The exquisite pop of the roe and the long luscious taste of the raw beef were so well combined we felt delighted we were eating somewhere than could manage such flavours. 

Into the Kitchen

One of our favourite UK restaurants - Whatley Manor - has the approach of taking us into the kitchen to meet the chefs and discuss the food. But here it went beyond meeting the chefs into a show.

Given the role of fire in everything this restaurant does one of the chefs, a Greek guy, introdcued us to his colleagues and began to explore what the fire could do.

He talked us through the various processes in the kitchen - fire powered oven, warming box, live flame - while aslo preparing a dish of food for us - The dish is cast iron flatbread, vendace roe and fennel pollen. Though in the photo below it is only in preparation - you can see the flatbreads.

He then introduced us to the Quail that is going to be cooked for us to eat later in the meal in the hot box above the fire. 

Here he introduced us to another colleague, an Italian chef, who demonstrated her mastery of fire cooking. I was so impressed I used the video function on my phone. 

We were also shown the butter churner that had been used this morning to create the butter and whey which are forming part of the dishes to come.

In the meantime I seem to have eaten the flatbread without photographing it. So, we move onto the second dish. This uses the Flambadou, a slightly scary implement used to baste what ever is being cooked. Indeed Christ Robert's nickname 'Flamebaster' comes from his use of the implement. You can see it being used over the scallops here.

Then the roe is carefully extracted. We are informed that this roe is Sturgeon caviar, but it has been extrtacted from the fish by massage, not by killing the fish. The restaurant's fish supplier has had his Sturgeon for so long that each of them has been named and chefs can request the roe by name, as each as a subtly different flavour.

The roe is then added to the basted scallop 

and the Scallop is served. The use of flame in cooking the scallop is so evident in its rich flavouring, a little crunchy with fire on one side, moist and juicy on the other and enhanced wonderfully by the caviar. 

To the table

Having been entertained and informed (and fed) in the kitchen, we are then shown to our table for the night.

The first of the pairing drinks arrives at this time. It is a fermented fruit juice made with rhubarb, gooseberries and cherry blossom, it has the taste of early summer about it. 

The dish with which it is served is blackcurrant fired arctic char, green tomato and cucumber. 

The photo shows it after the crisped blackcurrant leaf is removed, so you can see the innards of the dish. The char, a lovely fish, is gently cooked, remaining juicy. The blackcurrant flavour is picked up in the blackcurrant oil in the sauce as well as on the leaf. The drink works so well with the dish, reminding me of picking berries in sunny days when my parents would take us to Shropshire, to the farm to which my Dad had been evacuated during World War II. Food is so good at evoking memories.

The next dish is prepared before us. It uses some of the whey I mentioned when in the kitchen. The waiter brings a tray with burnign coal on it and then inserts the coal into the container with the whey, so it gets a ember flavour. 

Hopefully you can see it fizzing in the glass container. 

It is served with a very yellow, delightful pat of homemade butter, churned in the wooden churner we saw earlier.

When they whey is ready it is poured over the lovely home made butter 

and served with a sourdough bread for dipping into the melting butter and whey.

What a wondeful way to make a bread course more than just about the bread, but to bring a new complexity of flavour and a clear evidence the the restaurants flame-driven culture.

Before our next course we were served out second drink. Oxidized pears, smoked hay and lemon verbena.

I hope you can see the amazing colour of this drink. The pear flavour is much sweeter than I'd have expected, but the smokiness of the hay and the sharpness of the verbena help to make it another fresh flavoured drink, as must have been the intention. As the next dish might have been called pork with salad.

Though its real title is birch-fired and preserved summer vegetables and Mangaliza 

The taste of summer continues and again the summer tastes of the drink and the summer flavours of the vegatables combine with the fatty, full-bodeied flavours of the lovely Mangaliza, a old breed of pig which has come back into fashion in recent years. There were tiny bits of fried Mangaliza lard through the dish acting as little cruncy treats - wonderful.

A side dish was served with it, a sabayon of pea pods 

Yes, it really is that green. Again the sense of summer, now coming to an end, but with its glories still being captured in the flavours, worked so well.

Our next drink was produced from white currants, Ingrid-Marie and browned butter

a great combination, the white currant with a more gentle profile than its red and black relatives works well with the sweet dessert apple and the rounding-off flavour of the butter, very easy to drink, in fact I did drink it to quickly and the poor sommelier had to come back and give me more before the plump seaweed fired langoustines arrived.

The plates were dressed with celeriac and solaris sauce and a nasturtium leaf. 

Solaris, a white wine grape often used in German fizzy wines, has an earthy hazelnutty type flavour and this works so well with the celeriac which also tastes of the earth in a proud root vegetable kind of way. The langoustine shines through this, the rich butteriness of the pairing drink makes perfect sense to accompany this.

Again we had a little accompaniment to the dish; a doughnut with langoustine shells and sea buckthorn: berries and greens.

It was delightful to rip the doughnut into pieces and use it to mop up the celeriac sauce - yum, how delicious. 

The next drink then made its appearance was Aronia berries, red currant and blackcurrant leaves. Sadly, I seem to have forgotten to photograph it, perhaps as it arrived at the same time as the quail. It had a rich red wine, a claret I think, flavour, ready for the poultry.

This was the second time we had seen the quail, as it was shown to us earlier in the kitchen, before it had begun to cook. Now here it is perfectly cooked and butchered.  

Smoked on juniper wood and served with green peas and rose it tasted lightly gamey. 

Yes, I couldn't resist picking it up by the leg and consuming it. I'm not great at selfies, as I focus my eyes on the button I need to press for the picture, not on the camara lens, but here is the quail ready to go down the hatch.

It was served with a black garlic brioche

this layered loaf was served for dipping in the quail sauce, and it did act as a good mop for the flavour.

We were then asked if we would like a cheese course, an optional element, I, as usual got quite exited until the waiter described the course and focussed on the waffles and elderberry jam. I wasn't convinced it would work for me, but we ordered it anyway.

It was served with a drink of red plums and fennel seed kombucha

the plums gave this a rich flavour and the seeds added an aniseed taste, but not so strong a one as to drown out the plums.

The cheese arrived it was a fondue with baked svedjan gårdsost and wrångebäck two strong Swedish cheeses. 

I must admit I associate fondues with the 1970s, when they had a moment of fashion and would have probably preferred the cheese in chunks. But both of the cheeses, mixed together, here, did have the strength of flavour to survive the melting process and the buckwheat waffles were also much more to my taste than I expected - so I ended up being very happy about it.

As regards the Elderberry Jam and Butter

I ignored them, it is all about the cheese for me. Drew, however, enjoyed the salty butter - almost as salty as the Swansea butter my father used to have according to him.

Our final drink of the evening was cloudberries, black apples and clarified milk 

The darker sharper apples were mellowed by the cloudberries, the milk clearly gave its colour to the drink, but wasn't noticeable as a flavour.

This was served with smoked cream, strawberries and spruce

a combination that was to sweet and creamy for me, so Drew was forced to eat both - he didn't complain! [Co-pilot's note: I did, dear readers, I was as full as an egg.]

This was joined with a woodruff and blueberry delice

the waiter explained the woodruff, the explanation came as a surprise as it is so familiar to me in English cooking, especially in desserts. In England before the reformation it was known as Mary's bedstraw and its smell has long been associated with good health and good sleep. It's flavour was quite delicious as it perfumed the blueberry in this layered dessert.

But there was more on the same theme a wood oven fired cep mushroom soufflé with woodruff and blueberries

Yes, a dessert with mushrooms - it was light airy, not overly sweet and perfect for both of us. 

We were then invited back into the lounge where we were served with a double espresso each and some petit fours.

These were wood oven baked biscuit, elderflower and lilac, Ember baked almond potato and spun sugar, preserved cloudberries, meringue and lemon verbena. Again Drew helped me out.

Then the bill box arrived, we paid and left, having had a wonderful experience and a delicious meal. 

Wood fired cooking is a very ancient way of doing the art, it is something that can, and has, been updated in a sublime way. 

Back to the hotel

We left the restaurant at 10.40pm and walking across the road, the bus arrived at the stop even before we did. We got on and were back at the hotel at 10.50pm. This journey is the 19th use of our 72-hour, 360 krona, SL travel ticket. This means each journey was only 18.95kr that is £1.48 per ride!!