God Jul, Thor, Goats, Santa

So far Sweden has been filled with things that are sorta kinda familiar.  From all the time we spent in Germany there are little things that strike me and memories come flooding back.  Now, Id imagine if I went back to Germany this would be 10 fold but for now I will take the Swedish version of my childhood memories.  

 Do you ever go visit some place and find this piece of art or statue or pottery or jewelry that looks so perfect, so beautiful that you buy it and bring it home...but then somehow when you are no longer in that situation surrounded by the colors, smells, shapes, sounds, and that beautiful piece of artwork just doesn't quite make perfect sense.  The best is when its in its element and it makes sense.  It all fits and looks like it should.  Well, for the past 15 years or so, my mom has had these Christmas ornaments that I've ever really quite understood.  They are a set of straw ornaments.  Why did she buy them?  Maybe they were hand made? At least they were a set.  But, Ive never really like them - or its not that I didn't like them, rather they just never seemed to fit with all the other eclectic ornaments we've collected over the years.  With these straw ornaments there are some wall hangings we have as well, they too are made from straw and wheat and other various dried plants.  Well, all this rambing is because now that I am in Sweden, I see these things everywhere - and it makes perfect sense.  It is all so organic here when it comes to the christmas decorations.  Im surrounded by farm houses that are all red with white trim, horses and now snow.  But still, I can now see why my mom got those silly little straw ornaments.  

There are some strange Swedish Christmas traditions that I am learning about.  Granted, they are strange simply because Im not familiar with them, but for sure they are different.  And maybe calling them tradition is the wrong word.  However, these things are everywhere in Sweden and I find them endearing.  

There are these Christmas pigs.  It is tradition to have a Christmas ham, so there are little piggies all over the place.  What's better is the Christmas goat or Yuel goat in Sweden the modernized version is the  Gävle Goat.  Those guys are very interesting.  They even had a HUGE one like 20ft tall in Örebro.  The crazy thing is I am learning, that some Swedish Chrismas traditions aren't that old.   The modern evolved version of the Yule goat was started in 1966 when Stig Gavlén came up with the idea of a giant goat made out of straw.  This goat thing has gotten out of control in that almost every year when the gigantic goat is erected, somehow people burn it down.  Its become a tradition to vandalize or destroy and for sure burn the goat.  Now, technically this Goat actually started WAAAAY back...as far back as to pre-Christian days. It is known that in old agricultural Scandinavia, the last sheaf of corn bundled in the harvest was credited with magical properties as the spirit of the harvest and saved for the Yule celebrations, called among other things "julbocken" (the Yule Goat).    Another popular theory is that the celebration of the goat is in connection to Thor, who rode the sky in a chariot drawn by two goats, Tanngrisnir and Tanngnjóstr. He would ride them to a banquet, slaughter them and let everyone eat them.  He would awake the next day and feel guilty, bang his hammer on the ground and resurrect his precious livestock to have them have 1 more year of servitude.

 A man-sized goat figure is known from 11th century celebrations of Childermas, where it was lead by a man dressed as Saint Nicholas, symbolising his control over the Devil. Or even an better

version has Santa not giving presents to people, but demanding that they give him presents instead.  He rides around on the goat demanding booty and plundering every year.  

The icons of Santa and the Christmas children seem to be all over the place.  I really like the Santas because they are more Gnome or elf like than Big White Fat Guy Santa. 

 Ginger bread men are really big here.  I never really understood it, but man the cookie called pepparkakor is soooooo good.  I was never a big fan of the american version of gingerbread, but here its not as sweet.  

The Swedish mushroom is not a historical tradition, but seems to be picking up popularity.  You decorate your advent candles with these mushrooms.  These shrooms are poisonous and deadly to eat, but pretty for decorating your for the holidays.  Its very strange simply because by the time Christmas comes around there are no mushrooms anywhere to be found.

Swedish candy & crack

Ive done the whole cookie exchange thing....seems to be lots of women gathering in a kitchen to bake and make some delightfully decadent cookies, then everyone goes home with tins of an assortment of treats.  Well, here in Sweden cookies aren't as big of a deal as candy.  At least from my perspective AND because of the lack of chocolate chips - which to me is a universal indicator of a cookie consuming country but Im biased.

In Sweden I learned to make candy.  And from what I can tell, the results look exactly like what you get from the store.  There is no difference in presentation which for some reason to me was so impressive.  For instance, you can almost always tell a home baked chocolate chip cookie from a store bought cookie.  There is just something about it.  I don't care if its the over priced pepperage farms or the kebler toll house, they never look like mom's cookies - and mom makes the best cookies!  Here, the candy we made, put next to candy purchased from a store - I couldn't tell the difference 95% of the time.


There were 9 of us ladies all busy in Lynns house from 1:30ish to 7pm.  It included a very nice squash soup dinner followed by Christmas porridge in which I learned you need milk, cinnamon  butter, or syrup (or all in combination) to really eat it properly!

However, lets get on with the types of candy/holiday food we made.  I will not go into all of them in grand detail because we made over 17 different kinds (I lost track) of candies...

It's all about "Knäck", a Swedish christmas candy, that actually translates to.. crack. Really. I find that pretty funny. Especially since many people also find it horribly addictive. It's really a creamy almond toffee - but that doesn't sound half as fun.   

Lussebulle or lussekatt  The buns are baked into many traditional shapes, of which the simplest is a reversed S-shape. They are traditionally eaten during Advent and especially on St. Lucias Day, December 13.

I don't know what these are called, but they are this wonderful hazelnut chocolate nuget stuff wraped in marzipan which is then dunked into some sort of chocolate coating of your choice (white, dark, milk etc.)  

One of my favorite was white chocolate saffron truffles.  Anna was making these without me being aware, but Im going to get the recipe from her!  Granted it will likely be in swedish so I will have to translate it.

Personally, I made 3 items that actually didn't turn out 1/2 bad.  I made my grandmothers Rum Balls, then some Coconut balls that didn't quite form properly because I put them outside in the snow to cool and it froze *oops*  I amended the recipie by putting in chocolate chips and orange flavored crazins.  Johanna made something similar but her's was a long log that she drizzled chocolate over the top.  Johanna also made the Christmas porridge for us to eat after dinner.

We had white chocolate lingdonberrie truffles, chocolate candied ginger truffles, german walnut chocolate chip cookies made by our resident german Henrikka.  It was funny because she had to weigh all her ingredients.  I don't remember this from being in Germany, but I was only 4-7 years old. 

Henrikka also made this other candy which is some traditional swedish treat that I can't recall the name.  It was like hard toffee or another version of crack.  Only, Lynn decided to hand wrap each piece.  Henrikka is cutting it with a knife, but what was best is to use scissors and cut it.  At some point its a lot like taffy and if you get it during that time you can use scissors.  

We had these peppermint things that is simply sugar, peppermint, vinegar and one other ingredient...you dribble it onto wax paper and then dollop it with a bit of chocolate.  

Because I had some extra time as other people were cooking, I also decided to make some fudge.  Now, evaporated milk is not called that here in Sweden and there is none in Lindesberg as most Swedish people do not cook with evaporated milk.  Some of you may realize that fudge or quick fudge recipes typically call for evaporated milk.  then you add the marshmallows.  Well, with sweetened condensed milk you do not add the marshmallows...so it worked out OK because there weren't many of those in great supply.  Malin made some sort of rice crispy treat with cranberries and pistachios...only they were flat...like squished pancakes of a treat.  Tasty, but flat and not as gooey as a good rice crispy treat.     My fudge was a bit odd only because I made dark chocolate and when I thought I was adding vanilla flavoring, I accidently grabbed the peppermint and splashed it in.  By this time I had already added the cranberry chunks.  So, peppermint, cranberries and then I did top 1/2 of the tray off with walnuts - which in the end it all wasn't bad...but not complementary flavors.  Stupid peppermint.