mmm-yoso!!! is food blog based in San Diego County. Kirk, ed (from Yuma) and Cathy share blogging duty. Really, it's narratives about food we ate, eat and enjoy. Sometimes there's an explanation other than just being hungry. Today, Cathy is chronicling another one of her adventures.
Hi. The other day The Mister and I found ourselves in Mission Valley, at Ikea. Ikea is the Swedish furniture store that has a cafeteria in the midst of furniture displays and a small grocery, called the Swede Shop, at the exit. I've Posted about Ikea on two other occasions. We went to the Swede Shop looking for some snacks and noticed the advertising displays- all about the annual Crayfish Party, a Scandinavian celebration of the end of summer.
We could have purchased all the food and decorations for a party for $20…
The food consists of, naturally, kilo of crayfish (which are indeed crawfish, but in Scandinavia, the miniature lobsters are boiled in a dill based brine, instead of the cajun seasonings used for a crawfish boil)
some roe,
bread and cheese. (Sauce came frozen with the crayfish)
and always, gravad lox is part of any Swedish plate.
We decided to walk through the store first to get some exercise while looking at furniture and decor and buy the snack food on our way out. Then we saw this sign. We could get a whole party for $3.99!
So we stopped at the cafeteria.
I spied a whole plate of gravad lax (raw salmon cured with sugar, salt and dill) and took it from the cafeteria display. ($4.99)
We also saw lentil soup as the soup of the day. I always like it from here. ($1.99) It has a deep, rich flavor and is always thick with lentils. You can see my gravad lox plate had plenty of lox and a lot of spinach which I treated as salad. It came with a hot honey-mustard. Heat, but not from chilis…Scandanavian spice…
The Crayfish Party! six cooked crayfish (served cold), small shrimp, crisp bread and cheese, roe, gravad lox on a bed of spinach. That's a half hard boiled egg topped with a mayonnaise in the center. You can see the spices/flavor enhancers for Scandinavians consist mainly of dill and lemon. Simple food. This was a satisfying and celebratory meal for $3.99. Very fancy and very nice.
The Mister is very good at opening crayfish…
We bought all the ingredients as we exited so we could have our own party at home. Easy and good.
Yes, it is almost the end of summer. Does anyone have any traditions for the change of seasons?
IKEA 2149 Fenton Parkway 92108 (619)834-1520