Gastronomic Adventures in Bali

It was a pretty amazing time, our week in Bali. I had been talking up Bali for the past year because I had grand plans of buying lots of furniture to bring back home. Well that did not happen instead we spent our days exploring, relaxing, and eating. In March this year, I read an article on Bali’s food scene in the Gourmet Traveller magazine that piqued by interest. Okay I was already planning a visit this summer but after reading the opening paragraph that quoted someone as eating better than she ever did in Paris I was intrigued and anxious to see what the fuss was. Now post Bali I have to agree that the food is amazing, not sure about Paris as I don’t think I ever did have a great meal there. This was years ago and I remember searching for vegetarian grub felt near impossible.

A Scandinavian Summer

I’m no Photographer but I could not resist my hand at trying to capture those majestic buildings, I call them Parisian buildings. No offence intended Stockholm! Motiv Stockholm does a better job in their fabulous black and white photos of this beautiful city. Something that struck me on this fourth visit to the capital is the faint underlying spell of Frenchness to the city from the ubiquitous hot dog stands touting “French style hotdogs” to the cafes with their checkered rattan chairs out on the pavement discreetly placed in prime people watching position. And I was enlightened by my husband (a Swede no less and of Wallonian heritage) that King Gustaf the IV Adolf was deposed by the Swedish Aristocracy for whatever reasons and in 1818 they appointed the French General Jean Baptiste Bernadotte to the throne, he was renamed Karl Johan. As further evidence, the residence of the Royal Family, Drottingholm Castle, constructed during the same time as the Versailles and in the same French Baroque style.

Summer is definitely not wasted on the Swedes, and those 18 hours or so of daylight is fully occupied! And so it is the same in the garden, I loved how commonplace it was to have fruit trees in the front or backyard. I captured some of nature’s bounty in Kungsör, the town where my husband grew up. The cherries and apples are sometime away from being eatable but (sigh) wouldn’t that be nice to only have to walk out your back or front door for fresh fruit.

As I sit here writing about our holiday and fruit I’m remembering the Swedish strawberries, the best I have tasted, all the goodness of summer rolled into this single berry. Sweden is blessed with an abundance of berries; strawberries, blueberries, cloudberries, smultron, lingon, raspberries, blackberries, you name it whatever the species you’re sure to find it somewhere in the landscape. I was introduced to smultron this summer and it’s a very small strawberry like berry that tastes incredibly sweet. This wild berry is difficult to come across and the Swedes have fondly adopted this into an expression “smultronställe” to mean someplace special.