I was going to spend the morning pricing stuff for a local children's resale coming up soon but at the last minute decided that we'd go for a quick drive over to IKEA to look at strange Swedish words and to grab some kind of Swedish treat for the girls' snack time.


Here's Ebabe with the Swedish, American and IKEA flags.


Here's one of the Lingonberry juice boxes I got for the kids for their after school snacks. I didn't find any Swedish fish at IKEA so they just had some rainbow goldfish and peanuts for snack. Boo said that the juice was a bit like cranberry juice but sweeter.

For dinner we made Swedish Meatballs (recipe based on a recipe from the Around the World Cookbook by Abigail Johnson Dodge) and mashed potatoes.

To make Swedish Meatballs, you need:

• 1 cup plain bread crumbs
  
• ¼ cup milk
• 1 large egg yolk
• 1 TBSP Worcestershire sauce
• 1¼ lbs ground beef
• 1 small onion, minced
• ¾ tsp salt
• ¼ tsp pepper
• ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
• 3 TBSP vegetable oil
• 2 TBSP flour
• 1 ¾ cups beef broth
• ¼ cup sour cream
• 1 TBSP chopped dill

In a large bowl, mix the bread crumbs, milk, egg yolk, Worcestershire sauce, meat, onion, salt, pepper, and the nutmeg using your hands. Once well mixed, form meatballs. Bug and I used a cookie scoop to shape 26 meatballs.


Heat oil in the large skillet over medium heat. Add ½ of the meatballs. Cook, frequently turning, until they are brown on all sides. This took about 8 minutes. Carefully remove meatballs from the pan and place on a plate. Cover them with foil. Repeat this cooking process for the remaining meatballs.


To make the sauce, add flour to the skillet. Cook over medium heat, whisking, until deep brown. Add in the beef broth and bring to a boil, whisking frequently. Cook, whisking, for 2 minutes.


Remove from heat. Whisk in sour cream and dill. Add the cooked meatballs and any juice. Stir until all meatballs are covered with sauce.

I was told that there are two ways to serve Swedish Meatballs. You can serve them with macaroni noodles or you can serve them with mashed potatoes. We made some homemade red skin mashed potatoes and served the meatballs on top. We also had a little bit of Lingonberry Jam for dipping. Ebabe called it watermelon ketchup. Yeah, I don't get it either!


The Verdict: The older two girls loved it. Bug particularly liked them since she helped mix the meat and formed most of the meatballs herself. They enjoyed them over the potatoes as well.

For dessert, we had Princess Cake (or Prinsesstårta).


While I'd love to tell you how I made it, I must admit that it came from IKEA!