Aquavit and gravadlax

I see August has managed to pass by without me writing a single entry on here, but worry not, this blog is not moribund! I've just been out and about a lot, including a few days in Malmo seeing my friends there. I failed to take any photos of our crayfish party but the carnage was not photogenic in any case. I did at least manage to bring back some aquavit.

The Bridge!

After an afternoon sampling the delights of the Malmo festival, visiting various designer-type shops ranging from swanky to trashy, and stuffing our faces with cake at the fabled Hollandia (where I was very glad to be with someone who understood the complex queueing system), my Swedish friend and I went home via the state-owned booze shop which is a place of fascination for me. It's actually nothing like as bad as you might expect and has a pretty good range of stuff comparable to a UK off-licence, but not as cheap.

Here I was able to look at a range of aquavits and to make a change from Linie aquavit which I wrote about here, I went for this Herr Gards one instead. It cost 199 kronor if memory serves, which is about £20, for a 500ml bottle, so is more expensive than the Linie stuff. Also, it's Swedish, not Norwegian.

G and I had some with gravadlax and rye bread the other night which worked very well. I've been storing it in the freezer and it has a lovely gloopy texture when poured. It's aged in sherry casks, has notes of cumin and aniseed and there is a certain resemblance to a lighter style of whisky. The essential accompaniment to a Nordic evening in London.