Archive for the ‘Meat’

Tjälknul

Posted in Meat on October 9th 2009
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Tjälknul.

Tjälknul.

First of all I think I need to try and explain what tjälknul is.

It’s a dish traditional to  northern Sweden. Tjälknul is normally made with meat from elk (roast), but a roast from beef cattle can be used, which is what I had this time, you’d use the same part as you’d use to cook a roast beef. Tjälknul is actually rather similar to roast beef. It’s to be eaten cold, cut in thin slices.

This dish takes it’s time to get done, so it is highly recommended to do it as an overnight cooking. But I promise you all, it’s worth it, and it is really easy to do as it requires virtually no work effort at all. Tjälknul get it’s flavoring from a spiced brine in which it is placed when cooked. Read the rest of this entry »

I have not forgotten this blog

Posted in Meat, Misc, Off-Topic on July 10th 2009
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I know I have lacked in posting here, but I’ve sort of been out of inspiration in the kitchen. Feels as I do the same dishes over and over again. Nothing wrong with that, they are well tested and tasteful, just can’t blog about doing what I’ve already done…

Though I wanna share one small tip about making minced meat sauce. I suppose that most of you do as I were taught to do when I started cooking. That is start with browning the minced meat and then creating the sauce with that as base.

Recently I learnt that there’s an option, that works very well, even better in some ways. The result is a fuller body of the sauce, without adding thickeners. Well suited for large quantities as well.

Start with making the sauce, based on tomatoes or whatever you prefer. When that has been boiled together a few minutes, start adding the minced meat little by little. Remember to stir well while the minced meat gets cooked into the sauce.

When all is stirred in, let it cook for a little while and taste, adding more spices if needed.

The huge advantage of this comes forward when you try and make sauce on a couple kilograms of minced meat and does not have a huge frying pan, or doesn’t want to start frying in one pan and then adding it to a big casserole 🙂

I first tried it when I helped my sister cook for her birthday, we made three kinds of pies, one of them a minced meat pie.

Exploring the qualities of fennel seeds

Posted in Meat on February 23rd 2009
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I’ve been exploring the use of dried fennel seeds lately, it’s a licorice flavor spice so it is rather hard to find a good use for it. Unless you wanna make something taste licorice that is 🙂 It has to be used with caution to just give that little vague extra touch that is hard to pin down.

So far I think I’ve been a little too cautious though, but I will get it right eventually.

Today I made whole sirloin (that’s what I think the part is called in English at least). I used black pepper, salt, fennel seeds and dried chervil to season the meat before putting it in the oven on low temperature (125 degrees Celsius).

When the inner temperature of the meat reached a little over 85 degrees Celsius it was done. Turned out lovely, and the “stock” that had formed in the bottom of the pan was full of flavour, perfect as a base for sauce, or to be used as is. I served it with potatoes au gratin, but I guess other variations of potato dishes will work well also.

I guess you’d like to know what amounts of spices I used as well 🙂 I used about 15 whole black peppers, roughly half a teaspoon of salt and 1 teaspoon of chervil and around 10 fennel seeds. I crushed all the spices in a mortar to a rather fine powder and covered the meat with the spice mix. It won’t be a thick layer, just enough to rub it around the meat. The measurements aren’t exact as I didn’t check the amounts while doing it, they are just estimations.