My mom, Lena Ostermark
When I grew up in the eighties my dad was a vegetarian. My mom
invented a lot of dishes that would suite the entire family,
vegetarian or not. Our (rare) visits to the restaurant always started
with the question "do you have anything vegetarian?" Every so often,
the answer was "No, but you can eat from the salad buffet". The
salad buffet was a special table with a cooling system and little
plastic boxes filled with cabbage, carrot, corn, minced pineapple and
pickles. Nice. Today that seems very distant.
At a trip to Helsingfors, when I was still in my mothers belly, they
went to a restaurant that managed to serve a proper veggie dish. My
mother successfully adapted and developed that recipe from her memory
and it later became one of my favorites. The main ingredient is
Brussels sprouts, believe it or not. The other one is sauce bearnaise,
an important French sauce for the Swedes. Sauce bearnaise is the
number one companion to a grilled piece of meat with potatoes or
french fries. It's important here too, so I hope it is available as a
ready made abroad, cause making it is kind of complicated.
Other things that come to mind when I think of my mothers
cooking skills is when I, at thirteen, was going home from a
language trip in Hastings, England. All the kids were calling their
parents and asking for their favorite foods after the five week
British food terror. There were pancake and spaghetti bolognese
demands, others wanted meatballs. I for one called home and asked for"Indian chicken curry with seven "side dishes." This was during a time
when there was no jars with ready-made curries to be found in Swedish
stores. She made it from scratch.
I live in Gothenburg and my mother lives in a small community called
Habo. One of my favorite recipes was a gift from my Mom. On
a paper that my mom gave me it it gives credit to the source and says, "inger Johanssons mother's
almond moulds 1973." That date is when my mother received the recipe.
The Brussels sprouts recipe is by no means a traditional Swedish dish but
more a childhood memory that stands for my mothers creativity.
Recipes contributed:
Brussels Sprouts Gratin
Very swedish almond moulds
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