Weekend with the Fins

Sep 5th 2009
One Comment
respond
trackback

My flatmates from Finland were in town over the weekend. We dropped by Home Club for a bit to see them on Friday night. Hanna and Jori were so sweet to actually bring some Finnish bread I requested for While Jori thought we might get offended by the card they gave us, Iman and I were actually very amused. And the wedding gift was tea towels from Marimekko! It was just perfect. Iman and I love Nordic products and designs. It could sit adorably on the bar table I’ve been wanting to get (when I actually manage to get rid of the bulky dining set).

Jori wanted to check out our new place so I offered to cook dinner for Saturday night. I’ve been craving for couscous and some lamb and asparagus but since I’ve not gone to the market, it had to be minced beef and candle nut in thick curry gravy and roasted cherry tomatoes in herbs. I’ve been crazy with the roasted cherry tomatoes ever since I went to check out Yani’s blog for the recipe. Only this time around I experimented with different herbs and added a dash of balsamic vinegar. Because Hanna is a vegetarian, I cooked another curry gravy but with eggplant and capsicums. The tangy cherry tomatoes gave a twang to the meal. But I thought it could have used another yogurt or creamy side dish. Gael brought desserts of ice cream with Speculoos and some other Belgian almond biscuits which were a good accompaniment to the coffee and ice cream.

It was fabulous to have these 3 best flatmates (Hanna, Jori and Gael) I ever had in one place. We hadn’t seen Gael since the wedding and I did miss him. But as it is when you have many guests around, you don’t really catch up deeply. Think I will have another round with Gael alone.

Hanna was so cute when she asked for a pen and paper so she could get the recipes down. Like on cue, Gael and I got into the makcik mode. I gave Hanna my bag of curry leaves to bring back to Finland. What were Gael and I thinking, “Perhaps you can find them in the Little India in Finland?” I suppose the Indians are not as fast as the Chinese in conquering the world – one Chinatown at a time :p Hanna says she wouldn’t even be able to find different types of curry powder (curry for fish or curry for meat) at the supermarket.

But we learnt one thing that day, buah keras in English is candle nut! Thank you Sue, thank you Google, thank you… you translator thingy.