The Bramble cocktail – England’s finest cocktail

Celebrate New Year’s Eve with England’s finest cocktail, the Bramble cocktail.

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The Bramble is often called England’s Cosmopolitan. It is common on bar menus in England, but is little known outside the country. It was in London I tried it the first time, and it is also in London’s Soho the cocktail was invented in 1984. The Bramble cocktail is easy to make with a perfect balance between sweet and sour. Add to that a delightful colour and charming name.

In England wild blackberries are often called brambles, hence the name. The original Bramble cocktail is made with crème de mûre, a French blackberry flavored liqueur. Here I substitute the liqueur with frozen blackberries and serve it without alcohol. My version is fairly fruity. In all fairness I also enclose the original recipe (source: cocktails.wikia.com). Happy New Year’s Eve!

I substitute the crème de mûre with frozen blackberries for a not complete authentic recipe, yet still delicious drink

The Bramble cocktail – my fruity version (makes 2):

100 ml water
50 ml sugar
juice of 1/3 lemon
12 blackberries (frozen will do fine)
sparkling water
ice cubes

Place all ingredients (except the sparkling water and the ice cubes) in a pan and bring to boil. Blend until smooth and allow to cool. Serve with equal amounts of sparkling water and lots of ice cubes.

The Bramble cocktail – the original:

50 ml gin
25 ml lemon juice
sugar syrup
15 ml crème de mûre
a couple of blackberries
a slice of lemon (garnish)

Make the sugar syrup by boiling equal amounts of sugar and water until the sugar has dissolved. Shake the gin, syrup and lemon juice in a shaker. Add the crème de mûre and blackberries. Garnish with a slice of lemon.

More drinks or lemonade?

Nordic mojito with blackcurrants
Ginger lemonade with passion fruit and lime
Rhubarb lemonade with lime

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Mulled wine with honey and oranges

On the day before Christmas Eve, I finally wind down with a merry glass of mulled wine, ready to embrace Christmas.

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Few things are as stressful as vacation, and Christmas is no exception. In order to achieve all that coziness as you are supposed to have, you should start your preparations in January.

Even though I never bake much for Christmas, nor have any ambitions of being a perfect 50s housewife, I barely manage to keep my head above water. My short-time memory fails me, stress hormones are racing in my soul, and I lurch and stagger like a Christmas-zombie most of December.

But when the day before Christmas Eve arrives and the Christmas tree is standing there in all its splendor, when the little ones are sleeping, when a million snow stars are falling to the ground, when the cats are lying on woolen blankets and my glass is filled with mulled wine. At that moment it is finally Christmas.

Wish you all a Merry Christmas, wherever you are.

My beautiful little Christmas tree santa.

Mulled wine with honey and orange (makes 3-4)

500 ml high-quality juice (preferably black currant or apple juice, e.g. Danish søbogaard)
A thumb of fresh ginger
1 star anise
5 cloves
1 cinnamon stick
2 tbsp honey
2 organic oranges
red wine (optional)

Cut half an orange into thin slices. Squeeze the juice of the remaining oranges. Peel and slice the ginger thinly. Place all ingredients in a pan and bring to boil.

If you want to make the mulled wine without alcohol, let it barely simmer for an hour.

If you want to make it with wine, let it simmer for 15 minutes, then turn up the heat a bit and cook until reduced by one third. Measure the liquid and add an equal amount of red wine. Bring back to boil again and serve.

More Christmas recipes?

Creamy rice porridge “Suzette”
Rice pudding with stardust
Heavenly fruit salad with clementines
French toast with gingerbread ice cream

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Tropical smoothie with mango and spinach. Autumn smoothie with lingonberry and plums.

Spinach is the vegetable never being asked to go to the prom.

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The destiny of spinach is to be the sensible choice. It is not strange kids do not want to eat the green leaves when even adults hesitate. Why should spinach be the sensible choice? Spinach can also be the festive choice. The Chinese deep fry it and serve it as a snack. The Danes make wonderful creamy spinach. The French serve it with a cut of beef. The Indians make their palak paneer brimming with spinach, and the Greek make their spinach pie called spanakopita.

Time for spinach

The spinach has become one of my best friends in the kitchen. It does everything for you. It only takes two minutes to prepare. It has a vibrant green colour that looks good on any plate. And it is superhealthy.

The Swedish National Food Agency in a recent study rated the 40 most popular vegetables in terms of nutrition. This is their top list:

1. Green leaves like spinach and chard
2. Green beans like haricots verts
3. Broccoli
4. Green peas and sugar peas
5. Avocado
6. White beans
7. Leek
8. Cauliflower
9. Lentils
10. Chickpeas

According to the National Food Agency fresh spinach is particularly rich in vitamin K, folate, calcium, magnesium, selenium, vitamin A, C and B6. However it is not a source for iron. Spinach does contain iron, but also oxalates which prevents the body from absorbing the iron. If you need iron, try broccoli instead.

Autumn smoothie with lingonberries and plums.

Tropical smoothie with mango, coconut oil and spinach

This is one of the smoothies we make for breakfast. I serve it to my two-year old son. It is a nice way to make him eat spinach. The smoothie does not contain sugar, but has a sweet taste thanks to the mango and banana. I also add organic coconut oil and yogurt. All together this makes a nutritious and balanced meal with carbohydrates, healthy fat and protein.

1 mango, peeled and pitted
150 ml milk
1 small tub of yogurt
2 tsp organic coconut oil
2 handfuls of spinach, washed

Place all ingredients except the spinach in a large blender and blend until smooth. Finally add the spinach and blend a bit more until the smoothie is speckled.

Autumn smoothie with lingonberry and plums

This smoothie showcases the best local and seasonal Nordic ingredients. Plums and lingonberries may not be the first thing that springs to your mind when thinking of smoothies, but it makes for a comforting morningdrink that keeps you going when darkness and cold settles. If you cannot find lingonberry, use cranberries or blueberries instead.

2 handfuls of lingonberry
4 plums, pitted
1 banana, peeled
2 small tubs of yogurt
50 ml / 1,7 oz apple juice

Place all ingredients in a large blender and blend until smooth.

If you liked this post, you may also like

Ginger lemonade with lime and passion fruit
Nordic mojito with blackcurrants
Rhubarb lemonade with lime
Strawberry milkshake

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Nordic blackcurrant mojito

I love exotic drinks. Drinks with names that remind me of faraway places. Caipirinha, Pina Colada and Mojito. But to some I live in an exotic place, so why not serve a mojito with nordic blackcurrants?

I recently was in London where I ate and drank at the restaurant Wahaca. Their drinks were gorgeous, one of them a mysterious red coloured sweet and sour mojito. The red drink was an Hibiscus mojito.

I remember hibiscus vividly from my vacation in Guatemala a decade ago, drinking a refreshing and cold tea named Agua de Jamaica. In Mexico hibiscus is called Flor de Jamaica and the dried flowers is considered a delicacy and often found in markets. But there are few Mexican markets in Oslo, so I had to figure out something else. Why not make a Nordic mojito using blackcurrants and redcurrants? The result is quite similar in colour and taste.

If you have some leftover blackcurrant cordial (syrup) this is perfect. Second best is to muddle the blackcurrants with sugar. Cheers. Skål!

Nordic blackcurrant mojito (makes 1)

50 ml / 1,7 oz white rum, preferably Havana Club
1 tsp sugar
½ lime
40 ml / 1,4 oz blackcurrant cordial (or a handful of blackcurrants muddled with 2 tbsp sugar)
1 sprig fresh mint leaves
soda water
ice cubes

1. Muddle the fresh mint leaves and the lime gently with the sugar to release their oils.
2. Pour over the blackcurrant cordial and the rum. Stir.
3. Add a handful of ice cubes and top with soda. Stir again. Garnish with a mint sprig.

Such a good drink needs an equally delicious companion, such as potato and beet chips.

More summer drinks?

Blackcurrant cordial (solbærsaft)
Ginger lemonade with lime and passion fruit
Rhubarb lemonade with lime

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A sky full of purple rain

One afternoon after work I hopped on my bicycle and headed towards Ekeberg. I had received the Green Card. I could enter her garden and pick all the berries I wanted. So I climbed the steep and windy roads to Ekeberg, past the villas with the great views, and found myself in Hege’s garden. My goal were the redcurrants and the purple star, the blackcurrants. The minute I started picking, the sky opened up to fill the air with rain. Was it purple rain?

During WW2, when war made oranges unattainable in Great Britain, the British government encouraged people to grow blackcurrants and distributed blackcurrant syrup to children under age two as a source of C-vitamin. More than other natural sources blackcurrants are rich in Vitamin C, even three times more than oranges. They also contain high concentrations of Magnesium, Iron, Calcium, Vitamins A and B and are full of antioxidants called anthocyanins. This is what gives blackcurrants their dark purple colour.

Try to make your own blackcurrant cordial. All you need is a pan, a muslin, bottles and some patience. And sometimes good friends or neighbours.

In this recipe I make a cordial using both blackcurrants and redcurrants. The redcurrants give an extra tart and reddish cordial. Though using about 2/3 redcurrants it is the blackcurrants that dominate the flavour.

Blackcurrant cordial is called solbærsaft in Norway.

Blackcurrant cordial (makes about 750 ml)

350 g / 12 oz blackcurrants
650 g / 23 oz redcurrants
400 ml / 13 oz water
about 300 g / 10 oz sugar

1. First, rinse the currants in water and drain well.

2. Sterilize your jars by first washing them with soap, then leaving them in the oven at 100C/212F for 15 minutes. Take them out of the oven right before you are ready to fill the jars.

3. Put the currants in a large pan with the water. Place the pan over a low heat, then gently bring to a simmer. This may take some time, even an hour. Do not stir. When it boils, turn off the heat and leave to infuse with the lid on. They are finished when the currants have changed colour.

4. Strain the currants through a muslin without pushing the berries. This will take about 10 minutes.

5. Measure the amount of liquid to find out how much sugar you need. You should add at least 1/3 part sugar to 1 liter berry liquid.

6. Return the liquid to the pan, this time with the sugar. Boil briefly, until the sugar is dissolved, about a minute.

7. Skim off the foam (optional) and pour the cordial on sterilized jars.

Music: Purple rain by Prince

For the next post I pose a riddle: What do you get when I am able to pick blackcurrants right after coming home from a trip to London? The result is a Nordic mojito

more summer drinks?

Rhubarb lemonade with lime
Ginger lemonade with lime and passion fruit
Strawberry milkshake

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Ginger lemonade with lime and passion fruit.

Ginger is widely used in a range of beverages such as ginger tea, ginger beer or the Moscow mule cocktail. But it is also wonderful in ginger lemonade with lime or passion fruit.

Ginger has a taste that grows stronger and stronger until it tastes like chili. Lime always brings a kick to food and drinks, but if you want to add a serious tropical twist, add passion fruit.

Passion fruit is one of the most sensual fruits that grows on earth with an extraordinary scent and taste. Looks can be deceiving. The passion fruit looks ordinary, but when halved it reveals a delicate orange-yellow pulp. Look for passion fruits with a wrinkled surface.

Ginger lemonade with passion fruit. The evening I was about to photograph the drinks, it started to rain fiercely. When the rain stopped I discovered that my photo studio, i.e. the backyard, was transformed into the best location ever for shooting a drink: This photograph is literally soaking wet.

This is a simple everyday lemonade that takes you far away. Serve in a jug or in individual glasses.

Ginger lemonade with lime and passion fruit (makes 4 or one jug):

100 g / 3,5 oz sugar
100 ml / 3,4 oz water
4 cm / 1,6 inches piece of fresh ginger
2 limes
2 passion fruits (halved)
sparkling water
ice cubes

1. Peel the ginger and slice thinly. Leave in a pan with the sugar and water. Boil for 10 minutes, then remove the pan from the heat and allow to stand for about two hours. Then add the juice of the 1,5 limes. (The rest of the lime is garnish).Pour the sirup in a glass, about one third of the glass. Add lots of ice cubes.

2. Depending upon which drink you want: For the lime version, add the remaining lime (in slices) and top with sparkling water. For the passion version, add the passion fruit halves (or scoop out the pulp) and top with sparkling water. Stir well.

3. If you want to make a jug, add the sirup, lime slices and passion fruit halves, ice cubes and top with sparkling water.

More summer drinks?

Rhubarb lemonade with lime

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Strawberry milkshake.

Strawberry milkshake made with fresh strawberries and vanilla ice cream is a real treat in the summer.

The Norwegian food writer Henry Notaker once said “Sugar is the Americans’ favourite spice”. I guess he had ketchup on his mind, but you could also add marshmallows in the fruit salad or frying bacon with sugar to make candied bacon. Then there is the love of ice cream. Serving strawberries with ice cream to make milkshake instead of strawberries and cream. Putting ice cream in soda drinks. Having cookie dough or brownies in the ice cream. I might as well admit it: I want it all! When I first arrived in the U.S. I bought the biggest cookie I could see.

But there is another America. Such as the Creole kitchen of New Orleans, the Tex-Mex kitchen of Texas, soul food of the Afro-Americans  or the super food of California. America has small villages like Woodstock where the only supermarket is organic and tiny  seafood restaurants on the coast of Maine serving chowder (soup) and lobsters. You think of fast food? I think of slow food. Barbecued ribs roasted for more than 8 hours. And the very best ice cream from Ben & Jerry’s, ice cream that has been fair-trade for decades.

If you leave out the ice cream, you get the liquado. This is the Latin-American type of milkshake, only healthier. Made only with milk, fruit and sugar, liquado is closer to the name – milkshake!

American food is the ultimate comfort food

And the ultimate comfort place is the diner with its most celebrated beverage: The milkshake. Like the milkshake that has existed since 1900, my journey also started long ago. I do not know when but sometimes in my childhood, a desire coming from the American films I watched on television. One of them being the Thorn Birds, an American TV-series from 1983 starring Richard Chamberlain. I sent him a fan letter, receiving a signed photograph. I did not know at that time that he was gay (well, I did not know that I was either).

But it was still years before I could go to there myself. I had to turn 30 years old. But then I really did it. Landed on American soil at JFK, New York and finally saw the skyline of Manhattan. It was the summer of 2001 and two months before the towers of World Trade Center were to collapse. I made it to the bookstore on the ground level of WTC, inhaling the views from Brooklyn Bridge and having lunch in Central Park. Then taking the bus up north to the little village of Woodstock, forever associated with hippies and the Woodstock Festival that actually took place in White Lake in the neighbouring county. Here I ate my very first American cookie at the café Heaven and got married, before jumping on the train to go, like so many before me, west. To San Diego, Santa Monica and San Fransisco. Dreaming the California dream.

Later I have come back twice. The second time a journey by car from New York to Southern Florida. The third time driving from Memphis to New Orleans to New York. Most of the time I have had decent or wonderful meals. Be it in a backyard in Brooklyn, in an ice cream parlour in Kingston NY, in a live blues club in Memphis or at home as a guest.

The milkshake was invented around 1900 with its predecessor dating back to 1885.

Strawberry milkshake (makes 4):

1 punnet strawberries (500 g / 17 oz strawberries)
4 large scoops of vanilla ice cream
200 ml / 7 oz milk
2 tbsp sugara (optional)

1. Wash and hull the strawberries and pat dry. All ingredients should be cold, so put the strawberries in the freezer for an hour.

2. Assemble the strawberries in a large blender. Add the milk and blend well. Add the ice cream and blend until smooth.

Music: Chris Isaac.

Also with strawberries:

Eton mess, my English summer flirt
Panna cotta with strawberries

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Few things bring childhood back as much as rhubarb. Few things evoke summer as rhubarb does.

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In my mind there is a garden, I would have shown it to you
A north wind garden facing an open fjord
There a childhood is still waving with the rhubarb
The word rhubarb is a word of summer
(“You should have been here” by Kari Bremnes)

I hodet mitt har æ en hage, æ ville ha vist dæ den,
En nordavindshage ut mot en åpen fjord
Der vaie fremdeles en barndom ilamme rabarbraen
Ordet rabarbra e veldig et sommerord
(“Du skulle vært her” av Kari Bremnes)

In my childhood’s garden in the North of Norway our rhubarb was also facing an open fjord. The hardy plant defied the Norwegian summer and thrived in our garden. My mother made rhubarb soup or rhubarb compote from the green stalks. Today I buy my rhubarb from the shop, but my mother keeps some in the freezer waiting for me.

Reds are sweet and greens are sour

There are several types of rhubarb. Some are deep red or green while others are red skinned or speckled. The red is sweeter than the green, hence it is more popular. The red skinned rhubarb yields a pale red colour if you cook it with the skin.

Whatever variant you use, avoid the leaves as they are toxic. The rhubarb itself is also toxic (along with spinach and beets), but then you have to eat several kilos. Moderation is the key. To quote the Norwegian journalist Joachim Lund: ”Health in every drop, poison in every pint”.

Marcie in a coat of flowers
Steps inside a candy store
Reds are sweet and greens are sour
Still no letter at her door
So she’ll wash her flower curtains
Hang them in the wind to dry
Dust her tables with his shirt and
Wave another day goodbye

Marcie’s faucet needs a plumber
Marcie’s sorrow needs a man
Red is autumn green is summer
Greens are turning and the sand
All along the ocean beaches
Stares up empty at the sky
Marcie buys a bag of peaches
Stops a postman passing by
And summer goes
Falls to the sidewalk like string and brown paper
Winter blows
Up from the river there’s no one to take her
To the sea
(“Marcie” by Joni Mitchell)

From my great aunt I have learned that mixing rhubarb with sugar will produce rhubarb juice. Adding sugar to berries (you only need a couple of spoons) will always produce a nice coating of juice (called macerating) and this enhances the flavour. Because rhubarb is so sour, it tolerates a lot of sugar, hence it produces a lot of juice. This is an advantage. Add as little water to the lemonade as possible – let the rhubarb and lime shine.

Rhubarb lemonade (makes about 1,5 litre)

600 g rhubarb
400 g sugar
3,5 limes
1 litre water
ice cubes

1. Wash the rhubarb stalks and trim the ends. Cut the stalks into pieces. If the rhubarb is red skinned or speckled, leave the skin on if you want the red colour. Place them in a pan with the sugar. Let the rhubarb rest for at least an hour – the sugar will produce rhubarb juice.

2. Now add the water and bring to boil for only a minute. Leave to cool for the flavours to develop.

3. Transfer the rhubarb to a sieve and push it through with a spoon, collecting all liquid in a bowl. Now add the juice of 3 limes.

4. Slice the remaining lime as garnish. This makes a pretty strong flavour, so you can add a lot of ice cubes without diluting the wonderful flavour. Or add rum, but that is a different story.

Next time I will make a rhubarb tart that my great aunt used to make. She made many cakes and watched many summers pass by with no one to call her own.

More rhubarb recipes?

Rhubarb crumble
Rhubarb tart 1938

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