..and then came Irma: March 2014

Sunday, March 16, 2014

Bowling.. the third..

Finally!

The pins are ready and waiting for the birthday boy!

And I have to say, I did the best job this time and I will hand over the bowling game to little Lav without any concerns.

If someone wants to resew it, here you can find the pattern and sewing instructions.

DIY.. a server’s wallet..

For his birthday Vladimir wanted me to sew him a server’s wallet.

A big challenge for me and it took forever.

Not right on time for his birthday I finished it and I was super proud, because I think I did a pretty good job.

Just Vladimir saw that in a different light and said, that you could beat someone with it! And unfortunately, when I think about it, he is right.

Like with my first wallet my work turned out to be way too big! This time the length and width were correct, but I was a little too generous with the inside pockets and the server’s wallet got way too thick.

3 pockets less and I could’ve brought Vladimir a lot more joy. But this thick thing is just too chunky too use.

Apart from that the seam is not that pretty, because my sewing machine couldn’t really get through the thick layers.

Well, the will is what counts and at some point I may start a new attempt.

And if someone breaks into our house, I know how I can defend myself.

Saturday, March 15, 2014

Bowling.. the second..

pattern and sewing instructions bowling

This time I was way faster to sew the pins. And since they were made out of firm cotton wool, they are also the same height.

I replaced the bear for a horse. Well, it was supposed to be a horse, but it turned out to be a crossover of a donkey and a coati. At least the figure spurs your imagination.

The bowling game was meant for Lav anyway, who would celebrate his first birthday soon.

Vladimir knows Lav’s mom better than me and when he saw my finished pins he just said “Aleks won’t like these. She doesn’t like patterns.”

Of course, the present is for Lav, but somehow as mom you get excited about presents too. If it isn’t enjoyed though, it isn’t good either.

So Plan B. Someone else will get these and Lav will get some without a pattern.

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

A stuffed animal bowling game..

Lav is celebrating his first birthday!

For this occasion I dabbled in sewing a bowling game made out of stuffed animals.

I just started sewing the animal pins, without any sewing instructions and figured I’d just see what happened.

I like to think, that the pins turned out really cute, but they were different sizes and that wasn’t my intention.

I used jersey- and old shirt fabrics. Of course those stretched out in all directions when I stuffed it.

But now I know that if you want to have the pins the same size, then you should use firm cotton wool fabric.

So I decided to reserve the bowling game for Hector’s second birthday. Heki is not that critical and will be thrilled for sure, especially about the ball.

For Lav I will give it another shot.

My dad is the best anyway! Published by Irma..

Fortunately at least Irma made something for him. Otherwise he would’ve gone crazy. Sick on his birthday and nothing to unpack.

For her daddy, who she thinks is the best, she wrote a book and I helped just a tiny little bit.

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Snickers Cake..

Of course there had to be a birthday cake too. Vladimir loves Snickers and since I knew, that cakes like that are out there, I wanted to try it.

For real, the cake really tasted like snickers, but is only made out of sugar and fat! Definitely not for diets.

Snickers cake:

1.3 Ibs shortbread biscuits

3.5 oz peanuts

3.5 oz caramelized, roasted peanuts

7 oz butter

1 tube sugared, condensed milk

1 glass Marshmallow Fluff

5.3 oz peanut butter, crunchy

couverture

1. Let butter melt and mix with condensed milk.

2. Crush the biscuits and mix with butter-milk-mixture.

3. Add peanuts into the mass and stir well.

4. Fill the mass into a form, spread evenly and press into form.

5. Put in fridge for about 30min.

6. After let couverture melt in a bain-marie and spread over the cake.

You can prepare the cake perfectly on the day before. It is necessary to serve it at room temperature, otherwise the cake is to hard to cut.

Freshly baked bread for the birthday breakfast..

Yesterday was Vladimir’s birthday. He loves his birthday and takes it amiss, if he doesn’t get celebrated on a large scale.

Unfortunately the huge party had to get canceled, given that Vladimir was sick with the flu.

Nevertheless I wanted to celebrate him a little, in typical Swedish manner with birthday songs and breakfast in bed.

And so he understands, that I make an extra effort on his day, I wanted to make him a freshly baked bread.

For the stressed house wife ;) I found the recipe in the book Österreich kunlinarisch, Brot und Ausfstriche.

3 Minutes Bread

1 cube of yeast

1 Ibs lukewarm water

1.1 Ibs whole-grain flour

each 1.8 oz flex seeds

sesame seeds

sunflower seeds

2 teaspoons salt

2 tablespoons fruit vinegar

Instead of sunflower seeds I used 1.8 oz walnuts, a handful black olives and dried tomatoes. I brushed the dough with egg and sprinkled poppy seeds on it.

1. Mix yeast with lukewarm water, add remaining ingredients und stir well.

2. Fill dough into a greased form and put into cold oven right away.

3. Bake in NOT preheated oven at 392F for approx. 1 hour.

4. Release bread from form and maybe post bake a little.

Saturday, March 8, 2014

Prinsesstårta..

The original recipe of the Swedish Prinzess Cake is eternalized in the Prinsessornas nya kokbok (the new cookbook of the princesses) from 1948.

The recipes in the book were assorted and published by the legendary home economics teacher Jenny Åkerström.

In this cookbook classic the cake is just called “Green Cake”.

But Jenny Åkerström taught girls at Östermalm in Stockholm, thereunder Princesses Margaretha, Märtha, and Astrid, daughters of prince Carl and princess Ingeborg from Denmark, who apparently where so impressed with the green cake, that later on they renamed it to PRINSESSTÅRTA- princess cake.

In the original recipe the cake’s marzipan coating is green and it doesn’t have raspberry jam in it, just the cake crust, vanilla creme and whip cream.

However today you can find the cake covered in different colors, often pink or white, and the nations agree to disagree, wether raspberry jam should be in there or not.

I definitely belong to the pro-raspberry category and the recipe for the princess cake for my brother’s 40th birthday should also include raspberries!

The following recipe is tossed together from different cooks on recept.nu. For example, I decided on Johan Sörgerg’s vanilla creme, because it doesn’t contain gelatin.

Prinsesstårta

For the cake crust á la Malin Landqvist:

8 oz butter, room temperature

1 cup sugar

3 eggs

1.7 cups flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoons vanilla sugar

For the vanilla creme al Johan Sörberg:

1.1 Ibs milk

2 pieces vanilla beans

4.2 oz egg yolk

4.4 oz sugar

1.4 oz corn starch

1.8 oz butter

Additionally:

1 1/4 cup whip creme

0.7 Ibs fresh or frozen raspberries

1.8 oz powder sugar

3.5 oz fresh raspberries

0.7 oz marzipan

Cake crust:

1. Preheat oven at 347F.

2. Grease a baking form (9.5”) with butter and crumble or cover with baking paper.

3. Beat butter and sugar with mixer until fluffy.

4. Add one egg after the other into the butter-sugar- mixture.

5. Mix dry ingredients and add them into butter-sugar-egg-mixture.

6. Spread dough in form and even out.

7. Bake on bottom rack of the oven for approx. 35-40min. Test with a toothpick, if the dough is done.

8. Let cake cool down a little, release from form and let cool all the way.

Vanilla creme:

9. Bring milk to boil in pot.

10. Split vanilla beans in half and scrape out the vanilla, add to hot milk with 1.7 oz of sugar.

11. Take milk from stove and let stand for 5-10min.

12. Take out firm components of vanilla beans from milk.

13. Mix egg yolk with the rest of sugar and corn starch and add to vanilla milk.

14. While constantly and firmly stirring let vanilla creme boil again, until it reaches a creamy consistency.

15. Take vanilla creme off stove and add butter.

16. Let vanilla creme run through a strainer, so all firm components are removed.

17. Put creme in fridge.

Raspberry creme:

18. Let frozen raspberries with powder sugar boil in a pot, until the raspberry creme is viscid.

Montage:

19. Cut cake crust horizontally into 3 pieces.

20. Beat whip cream.

21. Spread a thin layer of vanilla creme on the first cake crust, then spatter a ring and lay fresh raspberries in between.

22. Place the second cake crust on it and spread a generous amount of raspberry creme as another layer.

23. Mix the rest of the vanilla creme with 2/3 of the whipped creme and spread a little bit of it onto the raspberry creme.

24. Place the third cake crust on it and spread the rest of the vanilla-whip- creme over it.

25. With the rest of the whipped creme, coat the sides of the cake and also mount it on the cake.

26. Roll out marzipan very thin and lay carefully on cake. Just cut the Marzipan, that overlaps the edge, with a stump knife.

27. Decorate the cake as you like. For example, marzipan roses and leaves and a little powder sugar.

Ursprungsreceptet härstammar från Prinsessornas kokbok, som utgavs av den legendariska hushållsläraren Jenny Åkerström. I denna kokboksklassiker kallades tårtan helt enkelt ”Grön tårta”. Men tårtan blev så populär bland prinsessorna Margaretha, Märtha och Astrid, döttrar till prins Carl och prinsessan Ingeborg av Danmark, att den senare kom att kallas just prinsesstårta. - See more at: http://kakbloggen.se/2011/05/prinsesstarta-eller-operatarta/#sthash.kHBgrlmN.dpuf