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Swedish midsummer supper club with Linn Soderstrom

June 23, 2015 12 Comments Filed Under: Uncategorized



Menu
One hand-made flower and leaf crown for each guest to wear
Home made aquavit with caraway and fennel
Knackebrod with vasterbotten and kalix roe (from the Arctic circle)
Devilled eggs with skagen prawns
3 types of pickled herring: creamy, pickled, and sandalwood with bowls of sour cream, red onion and chives, boiled potatoes.
Vasterbotten cheese and Peter’s Yard crisp bread
Home-smoked salmon
Home-cured salmon with tarragon and fennel from my garden
Potato salad with mustard dill sauce
Charred asparagus spears with grilled lemon and hay smoked oil
Fruit soups: blueberry and rose hip with rosewater with cinnamon bun biscotti
Strawberry, white chocolate cake with whipped cream

It can be a lonely life that of a supper club hostess and chef. You haven’t got the team and camaraderie that you do in a restaurant. Most of the time it’s just you: you doing the shopping and ordering, you doing all the prep, you laying the table, you cleaning the toilet before guests come so that they don’t realise what a slob you are generally, you cooking all the food, every single course, you clearing the table, you doing the washing up, you putting everything away, you doing the laundry, ironing the tablecloths and napkins, you… on your own when everybody has gone home, rubbing your sore feet because you forgot to drink water, going through the evening in your head to review any mistakes, smile at successes. Just you.
This weekend was the most fun I’ve had in ages: I got to celebrate the Swedish midsummer meal with a Stockholm supper club hostess Linn Soderstrom. We’ve worked together before on the ill-fated Global Feast project in 2012 (don’t ask, it was awful) and I was keen for us to do this again.
Linn has been working as a chef in restaurants since she was 19. She’s only 29 now but is a veteran of kitchens. It was so cool to discuss food with a fellow obsessive, to brain storm dishes and ideas, to have a laugh with someone, to piss about in the garden making garlands for our guests while I practised my Swedish, to dress up in traditional Swedish outfits, wear clogs and play Abba.
I’ve just got my Big Green Egg and together Linn and I broached its virginity by smoking a side of home-cured salmon in it. I was taught how to make pickled herrings from scratch with Attika vinegar. I learnt how to culture butter. I got a few new tricks for curing fish.
I’ve come to the conclusion that I AM SWEDISH. My name Kerstin is Swedish. I’ve always fancied Swedish men. I like pickled herring. I identify as Swedish. I’m …transwedish.
Here is the evening in pictures.

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Comments

  1. Alanna Kellogg

    June 23, 2015 at 9:27 pm

    Your supper club looks fabulous! We did a Midsummer party too — it looks like our party was maybe quite a bit bigger (maybe? maybe not?) but what strikes me is how totally different our menus are! I posted ours this morning, http://www.kitchenparade.com/2015/06/smoked-whitefish-spread-on-cucumber.html. The only thing in common? Gravlax! PS I’d love to see the wreaths, I totally thought about doing that, just never got it together.

    Reply
    • Kerstin Rodgers aka MsMarmiteLover

      June 24, 2015 at 10:26 am

      Hi Alanna,
      Yours looks more pan Scandinavian…I should post up a pic of the wreaths…

      Reply
  2. Regula Ysewijn

    June 24, 2015 at 6:47 am

    That really all looks very delicious! Lucky guests!!

    Reply
    • Kerstin Rodgers aka MsMarmiteLover

      June 24, 2015 at 10:26 am

      It was gorgeous. I'd love to do a supper club with you Regula

      Reply
  3. Sally - My Custard Pie

    June 25, 2015 at 6:21 am

    If you two do a supper club I'd have to fly over specially!

    Reply
    • Kerstin Rodgers aka MsMarmiteLover

      June 27, 2015 at 10:57 pm

      It'd be lovely to see you 🙂

      Reply
  4. Pasta Bites

    June 25, 2015 at 10:24 am

    Wow the food looks so stunning! a friend attended and said it was a fantastic dinner…

    Reply
    • Kerstin Rodgers aka MsMarmiteLover

      June 27, 2015 at 10:57 pm

      It was very good!

      Reply
  5. Chloe

    June 26, 2015 at 7:55 pm

    Transwedish, haha!

    Reply
    • Kerstin Rodgers aka MsMarmiteLover

      June 27, 2015 at 10:56 pm

      It seems that many of us are transwedish!

      Reply
  6. Anonymous

    June 29, 2015 at 2:58 am

    This one looks particularly enchanting!

    Reply
  7. Cate Lawrence

    July 9, 2015 at 8:09 pm

    so interesting! I did a supper club for 6 months but found it hard financially and rather tiring. Now I've had a rest and I'm doing afternoon teas instead 🙂

    Reply

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MsMarmiteLover aka Kerstin Rodgers.

Chef, photographer, author, journalist, blogger. Pioneer of the supperclub movement.

This is my food and travel blog, with recipes, reviews and travel stories. I also stray into politics, feminism, gardening.

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Kerstin Rodgers/MsMarmiteLover
My piece in the @hamandhigh about the 3 day @heat My piece in the @hamandhigh about the  3 day @heathostile training course. Incredibly interesting & challenging. Link: https://www.hamhigh.co.uk/things-to-do/hostile-environment-training-9037980 to read more #hostileenvironmenttraining
Supper club dishes from Saturday: pickled beetroot Supper club dishes from Saturday: pickled beetroot eggs, cheeseboard, stracciatella & cucumber, tomato/strawberry/peashoot salad with real balsamic & spruce oil, home cured dill gravlax, smoked salmon, homemade sourdough crisp bread, potato salad with wild fennel & lots more! #supperclub #midsummer #eattherainbow (miss you @linnsoederstroem)
Last nights supper club. My first supper club in 2 Last nights supper club. My first supper club in 2 years was great fun. I’m pleased with my food, the guests were lovely, it looked magical in the garden. But the weather! I even had to bring my duvets from the bedroom out. They looked like refugees. But this brought even more laughter! Next event September
My first supperclub in two years will take place t My first supperclub in two years will take place this Saturday 18th June starting at 7.30pm. Tickets are £50 byo you can book here: https://msmarmitelover.com/product/midsommar-supper-club there are still a few places left. Pescetarian menu. Scandi and botanical influences. #gettingbackonmyfeet #postpandemic #smallbusinesses #supperclub #london
I recently completed the 3 day @heathostile train I recently completed the 3 day  @heathostile training course. On the last day I was kidnapped by ex-special forces for a few hours & learnt how to deal with compliance training & a hostile environment. It was one of the most interesting experiences of my life. 3 intense days of combat first aid, navigation & how to survive in a war zone. I handled short, long guns, mortars, grenades, bullets, and tourniquet & bandaged an amputee. I learnt where to sit in a car, where to hide from a bullet, where to protect myself if in a car. It was brilliant. Highly recommended for any journalists, photographers, cameramen, charity workers, paramedics going into any difficult environment say a disaster or war. The stories from the tutors & the other participants were so interesting. My piece on it out soon. Book a course: https://hostile-environment.co.uk/  They also do jungle & desert training. I’d love to join the Antarctic expedition. Anyway that’s me hooded in the front. #adventures #het #hostileenvironmenttraining #experiences #travel
Bundoran beach, Donegal. I spent a week knocking o Bundoran beach, Donegal. I spent a week knocking on doors, going to libraries, searching through graveyards for my Irish forebears. It’s really hard to find information prior to 1850. I found this in last years trip to Arbroath in Scotland. Headstones wear out, records are lost or burnt in a fire, everybody has the same name and are known by nicknames, successive children have the same first name, that usually means they died and the next one is called by the same thing. Women did have children out of wedlock, and people remarried more often than you’d think, plus families fall out & never see each other again. I learnt that my Irish great grandfather michael went to Glasgow & met a woman who came from a similar place: somewhere wild & beautiful by the sea. Then they and their children came to london. Chasing the work & the money always. Politics and economics matter for they push people around from rural to city. And now we rodgers are Londoners. #ireland #scotland #family #travel #roots
How some of us celebrate the Queen’s jubilee! My How some of us celebrate the Queen’s jubilee! My sister & a random Irishman come for the Rory Gallagher festival in ballyshannon. Sis has pulled already!  #getyourcoat #sexpistols #ballyshannon #rorygallagherfestival #ireland
Tullaghan, county Leitrim, Donegal, where my grea Tullaghan, county Leitrim, Donegal,  where my great great grandfather john Rodgers was a postman, then a tailor, then a pawnbroker. #irishheritage #donegal #myancestry #irish #rodgers #travel
I’ve taken down the previous post as it’s poor I’ve taken down the previous post as it’s poor timing considering what’s happened over the last 24 hours. Being British I’ve not grown up around guns. It’s interesting to be on this course and find out more about the reality of them, although my focus is learning the ‘golden triangle’ of first aid, communications and navigation. But at the same time It’s depressing how in America nothing will ever change regarding gun law. RIP.
Me as a punk. #pinkhair @caplanmelissa Me as a punk. #pinkhair @caplanmelissa
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in June I’m having my first supper club in two y in June I’m having my first supper club in two years: here is the link to book: https://msmarmitelover.com/product/midsommar-supper-club £50 18th June  Saturday night. Byo.
#chelseaflower coming up. Last year I bought these succulents and planted them in a vintage zinc garden sieve. Now they are flowering. My balcony is like a little greenhouse: I can grow aubergines & other plants that usually need to be under glass. #londongarden #may #plants #succulents in the garden
Lemon drizzle cake. The trick is not to stint on t Lemon drizzle cake. The trick is not to stint on the citrus. I used 7: 2 Italian lemons (from Lidl):some ordinary lemons and some limes (18p) at Lidl. Don’t be afraid to mix and match your citrus. I also used buttermilk from @fenfarmdairy in Suffolk from their honesty shop. Last night we ate it still warm from the oven. #cake #lemondrizzle #homebaking #citrus #buttermilk
A Simple tomato, goats cheese and basil salad, spa A Simple tomato, goats cheese and basil salad, spanking fresh asparagus / fried in olive oil, season, then add a little boiling water, not too much, put on the lid, dressed with lemon zest & Parmesan, @fenfarmdairy baron bigod cheese, good bread. This is how I like to eat. Claire’s plates found at the beccles brocante. #suffolk #suffolkfood #supper #dinnerwithfriends  #vintageplates
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Easter Sunday. Daffodil skeletons. Easter Sunday. Daffodil skeletons.
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