flødeboller

how do you describe something so simple, but yet so delicious? danes have these very airy treats that they like to call flødeboller, or cream balls. hahaha. ok, so maybe cream puff is a better translation. anyway, a fluffy mix of egg whites & sugar is whipped to a perfect consistency and put into a pastry bag. you then pipe out the fluff onto these simple wafers. the fluffy mixture has the consistency of marshmellow fluff, and is pretty difficult to control inside the pastry bag. once you have piped this onto the wafer, the real fun part truly begins.. dipping it into chocolate. this may seem easy but these little blobs are rather buoyant, so once they go face first into the chocolate bath, they pop right up and that fluff starts to wiggle away from the wafer. then you get fish it out of the bath and make sure that the fluff stays upright on the wafer. it definitely takes talent, but no matter what, these treats are certainly delicious. before they harden, sprinkle them with coconut flakes, sprinkles, or whatever your heart desires to give it that extra touch. (ok, apparently coconut flakes are the only acceptable topping according to my danish blog editor, but i say, hey, be creative and give it a personal touch :))

anyway, as part of our department social/spend quality time outside of work together, we got to go to a chocolatier and make these flødeboller ourselves. it was definitely tons of fun, especially since i have always loved baking and have always wondered what it would be like to be a pastry chef. well, it is hard work, but i definitely recommend it and maybe one day i will be brave enough to try this at home.

check out the pictures of my mad skillz.

piping away

fløde on all the wafers

dipping, fishing, and sprinkling

final product. mmm...

i guess i finally caved.

so, after many years of questions and concerns about my lack of a blog, i have decided to finally give it a go.

i think it is a bit awkward to sit down and type about my day or something funny that happened to me, but i guess i will get used to that with time. i hope that this serves as a better way for people to feel connected to what is going on in my life, and if it sucks, then well, i am sorry to make you sit down and read it.

anyway, let's get this thing started. where to begin? oh yes, i just got back from a lovely minicruise (read: booze cruise) to oslo with my sweet kæreste, morten. that would be danish for boyfriend. it was a very spur of the moment adventure -- we didn't book until tuesday and left for the boat friday afternoon. it was a bit stressful getting out there, more so for me than him. you know that i start to panic when i can see the minutes ticking down to final call for check-in. :)

so obviously we made it on board and settled into our little bitty cabin. after taking a short tour through the duty-free shops, we decided to have a little apero round in the cabin since our dinner reservation wasn't until 21.00 (read: 9pm). after a nice beef carpaccio with parmesan, bread & camembert, and a cotes de rhone, we were on our way to a nice weekend. so i will just speed things up a bit and just give some highlights because clearly this is boring...

buffet dinner on board was spot on followed by night-cap mojitos. we went to the columbus club on board, where they had great live music and dancing targeted for the 40+ age group -- just my style. there were lots of great dancers on the floor with some pretty sweet moves. my favorite was this nice old man, who we called "stripes". he had moves that you haven't seen since 1950. one time he twisted all the way down to the floor and back up again without 1. falling or 2. breaking a hip.

stripes is the one all the way on the left -- the green blob

we got up rather early the next morning to watch the "sunrise", which didn't really exist since it is norway and the sun didn't come up until after the boat docked at 9.30. it was really beautiful anyway. so many quaint norwegian towns along the little islands and the fjord coming into town.

our day in oslo was filled with lots of walking. so much so that my legs and hips are still sore. having both been there already, we decided to take a stroll out to vigeland park to see all the sculptures. it was completely gorgeous with everything covered in snow -- just like a winter wonderland. in fact, the snow was so different than anything i have ever seen before. the crystals were so big that when the sunlight hit the ground, it looked like glitter was sprinkled in.

we then walked back into town to check out the town hall, the peace center (mostly for a pee break), and aker brygge. the harbor was pretty frozen, but made for some good photo ops. the sun was shining so bright that day that you could barely even tell it was still winter at times. well, until you looked at the water.

frozen harbor at aker brygge

nobel peace center

afterwards, we struggled to find a cafe to eat some kind of non-fast food meal. you think america is filled with fast food joints, try oslo. maybe we were looking in the wrong places, but it was all we could see -- kebab, chinese, pizza, burgers, mcds and burger king.

so after a long long day of walking in the sun we headed back to the boat to eat another delicious pre-dinner snack (this time being waffles with plum jam and "rømme", which is like a norwegian sour cream), take long naps, and eat a late night buffet dinner before heading back to columbus club to watch stripes shake his groove thing.

waffels with plum jam & rømme

hej hej fra norge!