What's next...

Lefse X The Party

Thank you everyone who came out in the snow and joined us for Lefse X.  Karlene and I were just so overwhelmed by everyone coming over to enjoy our home.  In no particular order, thank you to Jenny for the Tyttebaer, Eric for shoveling, Brian and Eric for the wood.  Ron for helping flip and the wings, my Mother Cathy for the rice pudding, Delia for the coffee, and everyone for the company and the special gifts.  

    Other high points.  Our first spilled glass of wine.  A broken gate.  23 empty bottles of wine.  25 empty beer bottles.  A bottle of rum.  A bottle of Akvavit.  

    Best panic attack belongs to Tony Hofstede who upon entering asked me what the red truck with flashing lights was doing in front of the house.  Of course there was no truck, but the seed was planted that a fire inspector might be there wondering if there were too many people in the house.  

    It was great to see everyone, and I think we're just grateful that we have so many good friends, old friends and new friends.  

    Here is the link of photos from the party.  Have fun taking a look.

Lefse X Day 5

Wow, meatball night.  Thank you to Jathan and Eric and Julie and Madeleine who all came over to help.  Thank you to Karlene for not hopping onto Barley's back and riding off into the sunset.  We opened by offering Jathan a Balvenie 17 Sherry cask.  I joined him with the Talisker Distiller's Edition.  Eric brought beer.  We first had to make Tyttebaer sauce.  Turns out I made a mistake on the first run and used 3 and 3/4 cups sugar rather than 3/4 cup sugar. Oops.  $40 in Tyttebaer down the drain.  Man was I upset.  Jenne Van Voorst stepped up and got more berries, so Jenny gets a shout out.  Anyway, the evening.  

 

Jathan getting into the Tyttebaer sauce after I screwed it up the night before.

That's what we call four quarts of sauce.  I hope that's enough.  I found out that our friend Ron Wacks is bringing wings.  I think that we're covered.  

These would be our Sous Chefs if we let them in the building.  On the left is our pup, the Vice President of Quality Control for Bedtime Bones.  On the right is Loki, the talent for Bedtime Bones Creative, and Eric and Julie's pup.  We left them outside to frolic.

This is Eric with 25 pounds of meatball mix.

 

We've just started to roll and brown.

Eric showing off his technique.

The early hero's of Lefse X, Jathan and Erick rolling and browing 25 pounds of meatballs.

Karlene.  Without her there is no party, just guys in the kitchen rolling meatballs.

Lefse X Day 4

Long night both rolling lefse and making fresh batter.  Maybe some holly nog mixed with Flor de Cana 12 year old rum, but that's for another story.  First photo below is what ten pounds of boiling potatos look like.  This is needed for a double batch, which makes about 30 lefse.  

 

Above is the batter after we've added flour before rolling.  We have to let the batter cool for 12 hours before we add flour and start rolling.

This is ricing ten pounts of potatos.  The hardest part is peeling the hot potatos.  Ouch and messy.

Okay, we've added our butter, cream, salt and sugar to the riced potatos.  Now it's into the fridge while I roll yesterday's batch of batter.  The next two photos are from rolling.  It's a bad thing.  What we see is the one lefse has now stuck to the pastry cloth making a hole.  We can recover to a degree, but really can't fix the hole, seen in the second photo coming off the grill.  Eventually this sticking happens enough that I switch pastry cloths.  I have four for the the party.

 

 

Last lefse of the evening coming off the grill, and a taste of Akvavit to celebrate.

Lefse X Day 3

Oh, and we have arrived.  I'll try and load photos of the potato boiling process later.  In the meantime, it's real folks.  The process as follows for those of you unfamiliear.  By the way, you can take classes as Ingebretsen's on Lake Street in Minneapolis.  

 

Above is not from the set of Dexter.  When rolling lefse we get flour everywhere.  So I roll plastic out and cover the kitchen to protect everyting from the flour dust.  Clean up made easy.  

Right, that batter.  Lefse has to come from somewhere and this very sticky substance is the origin.  The bit pot is used for lefse, lingonberry sauce and home made beer.  There won't be any beer.  Couldn't get my act together.  But stay tuned for the lingonberry sauce.

Ready to go.

First lefse coming off the grill.  It's rolled thin, though a little thicker than past years.  I originally used a corn oil based margarin recipe rich in transfat.  I've since changed to a different recipe using real unsalted butter. 

Note the minor bubbling of the lefse.  This is a good sign that the brown spots are appearing on the back side, and it's time to flip.

Rolling it out on my Bethany rolling cloth.  When you can see the Bethany logo it's time to put the lefse on the grill.

Enough said.

Lefse X Day 2

Well, a little more Krumkake, but mostly the tree.  Thank you to the guys at Tree Ranch on East Hennepin.  We like to shop local.  If you've enjoyed the trees that we've had these past many years they were all trees purchased from the tree ranch.  Now, I will give a shout out to those folks enjoying artificial trees.  They are more environmentally friendly, and can look really nice.  But I find that I lose the ritual of shopping for the tree, and I miss the smell.  I guess with all things in moderation.  This is an issue where I'm cutting down the tree.  We try and make up for it by using real plates rather than plastic and paper for Lefse.

Lefse X Day 1

The weekend after Thanksgiving we plowed right into baking Krumkake with the family iron.  Natural gas stove at it's finest, and Akvavit to keep the momentum.  

Above is the set up after the first two, with the grill.

Above is the batter used.  I had to do several batches, roughly six bowls of what you see above in batter.  Seriously, I must really like you people.

Above is a really nice one, reach in color, full in shape.  I must admit, I think I ate this one.  I gave Karlene and Koszi most of the Krumkake with holes.

Lastly, a hard night's work of Krumkake really requires a little Danish Aquavit.

Love Reign O'er me

Just banging out email listening to Love Reign O'er me on YouTube and my computer, like it's in the round.  Why can't Democrats be that beautiful?

Quick, weekend of of shoveling, Aebelskiver, Krumkake and Lefse. All single batches. Details to follow, but no photos yet.

Social Security is Insurance

Former Ambassador Arvonne Fraser has posted an eloquent defense of Social Security this week.  Her point is simple.  It's necessary insurance for when times get tough, not too dissimilar from the FDIC.  Reading about the latest jobs report, and delving deeper in the impact on payrolls, I guess I'm grateful that we still have programs like Social Security and Unemployment Insurance.  Even the FDIC.

Minnesota 2010 Election Results

Just penned a thought at the www.DFLEducationFoundation.org site reflecting on the Minnesota 2010 election results.