BBQ with friends and kärleksmums cake

The other day,  we were invited to a BBQ party from our friends from Germany, who are actually also spending their holidays in Sweden. It is funny for the last 3 years we were not able to meet up either in Spain or Germany, it needed to be a summer vacation in Sweden to meet up again. They rented a house in the middle of the forest in the south Swedish country side and we spent an amazing day together.

Sweden is famous for nature, many many lakes and amazing forests. So if you like all these, you shall definitely spend your next summer vacation in Sweden. Almost all of the lakes are equipped with an picnic area, bath house and toilets, which gives you a perfect opportunity to spend a day outside with your family and friends. And since they do have so many many many of them you will always find your privacy, as the lakes are not overcrowded as we know it from Germany or Spain.

Together with my friend Carola we prepared a delicious pasta salad for the grilled meat, experimenting with different ingredients we could find in the fridge and the garden. The salad taste great the day after too, which makes it a perfect recipe for any parties, where you can prepare some of the food in advance...

Pasta salad with pesto and feta cheese

• cooked pasta
• some fresh tomatoes
• sun dried tomatoes
• feta cheese
• black olives
• green pesto
• salt, pepper
• fresh herbs

Put the cooked pasta into a big bowl. Cut the tomatoes, dry tomatoes, feta cheese and add it to the cooked pasta. Half the olives and chop the herbs (we used spring onions and mint leaves), add everything to the pasta mix. Finally add the pesto and season well with salt and pepper. Mix well and let it rest for half an hour.

The ingredients can vary from what you like and what your refrigerator is offering....The leftovers can be used for a picnic the day after..picnic at the beach, in the forest or one of the 1000 lakes here in Sweden...

For dessert I prepared something typical Swedish, the "kärleksmums" cake...."kärlek" stands for love and "mums" for yummy...so I would call it "Yummy Love cake". It is a classical chocolate cake with a great taste of chocolate and coffee. The cake is addictive and is another perfect recipe for parties...as you can prepare it way in advanced. It taste even better the day after and can be stored in the fridge up to one week, without losing on taste but rather getting better and better. The cake is also perfect to be frozen and can be stored up to two month in the freezer...

Kärlekmums - Yummy Love cake

• 225 g butter
• 200 ml milk
• 5 eggs
• 300 g sugar
• 70 g unsweetened cacao
• vanilla 
• 400 g flour
• 3 teaspoons backing powder

Preheat the oven to 180 C. In a saucepan heat up the milk and the butter till butter is melted. In a big bowl whisk together eggs, sugar and vanilla till all fluffy and sugar is nearly dissolved. In an extra bowl sift together cacao, flour and backing powder. Add one/third part of milk-butter mixture to the egg mixture, mix well. Add one/third part of cacao-flour mixture, mix well. Continue till all milk-butter and cacao-flour mixture is used. Pour the batter into 30x40 cm square baking dish and bake for 20-25 minutes.

• 75 g butter
• 1 espresso cup strong coffee
• 50 g unsweetened cacao powder
• vanilla
• 300 g powdered sugar
• shredded coconut flakes

In a saucepan melt the butter and let is cool for couple of minutes. Add coffee and vanilla, mix briefly. Sift cacao powder and powdered sugar, mix till all the ingredients are well combined with no clumps left. Pour chocolate-coffee ganache over the hot cake and top it with coconut flakes. Let the cake rest.

My chocolate-coffee ganache looks a bit runny (on the picture obove), this is because I used bit more coffee to it, as I wanted the cake being soaked by all the chocolate-coffee goodness as much as possible. 

  

Enjoy!

P.S. Carola Süsse....das ist für Dich. Es war wiedermal super schön Euch wiederzusehen und das nächste Mal sollten wir keine 3 Jahre ins Land ziehen lassen, bis wir uns wiedersehen!!! Küsschen an die kleine Maus!!!