I had a lovely evening last night spending it wth 25 of my fellow SWEA girls/women at Mama Baba, Master Chef George Calombaris’ popular Italian restaurant in South Yarra. A special treat for the night was that George actually was working so we got to say hello.

There are so many nice Swedes around  and I love hearing everyone’s different stories about their journey that brought them here, to the city we all love. The dinner was our last activity for the year and now we’ll take a Christmas break and prepare for the big kick-off in February.

I’m soon about to go and pick up Simon from the airport and as a welcome home dinner I’ve prepared some homemade Swedish meatballs. For the first time ever they actually turned out semi-round as well, normally they look more like pattys than balls.

Thank you IKEA for the lingonsylt

I’ve really missed Simon this week so it will be nice to have him back home. It’s funny how we spent 1.5 years being apart initally Monday through Friday and then later “only” Monday through Thursday and that became “normal”. We haven’t spent more than one night apart since we moved here so now all of a sudden being apart for a long time feels weird.

Here comes another tip for Swedes living in Australia or anyone craving some Swedish delicious treats. I’ve found a  site, Swedish Goodies Australia, run by a Swedish mum living on the Gold Coast selling all kind of Swedish food products delivering all over Australia. You can even mix your own Pick & Mix lollie bag, Swedish style. Go have a look!

A couple of things that Simon miss here in Sweden are sausage rolls, meat pies and pasties. I’ve made an attempt to make my own sausage rolls and they turned out alright but I’ve yet not tried making meat pies. On the Swaussie Couples Facebook page (yes, there is such a thing and it’s great). I’ve now received a tip that a place in Stockholm called Taylors & Jones sell really good sausage rolls, pies and pasties. We’ll definitely have to pay them a visit when we’re up in Stockholm in March to try them out.

För alla svenskar som permanent eller tillfälligt bor eller har bott utomlands har IKEA ibland varit räddningen när suget efter Kalles Kaviar, Abbas sill, Marabou mjölkchoklad, Ballerinakex eller andra übersvenska förnödenheter har blivit för stort. Men nu är det slut med det för IKEA har bestämt, vilket kan vara deras absolut sämsta beslut någonsin, att övergå helt till mat med sitt egna varumärke. Motsvarande produkter hävdar IKEA – bullshit säger jag!

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Yesterday morning Mellissa and Nick took us out for a yummy breakfast at Swedish Tarts café in Semaphore, a suburb to Adelaide. With a menu influenced by Sweden it felt a little bit like home.

Mel and Simon

We stick to the edible theme here with the next thing we need to make sure we do when we’re in Australia – eat Tim Tams. Tim Tam is a brand of yummy Australian chocolate biscuits manufactured by Arnott’s. A Tim Tam is composed of two layers of chocolate malted biscuit, separated by a light chocolate cream filling, and coated in a thin layer of textured chocolate. Chocolate with chocolate, it can’t go wrong!

We’re now back on the food theme again with this entry. Of course we have to have some Chicken Parmigiana when we’re Down Under.  Parmigiana is an Italian dish that’s a very popular Australian pub dish and there it’s often referred to as Parma. The dish consists of a sliced chicken (dipped in beaten eggs and dredged in flour or breadcrumbs) pan fried in oil, layered with a slice of ham, tomato sauce and cheese, and baked in an oven. It’s often served with a side of chips and salad.

Something I know Simon is really missing over here in Sweden is Fish’n'Chips so I’m anticipating we’ll be having that both one and two times. (Yes, we’re still on the food and drink theme here.)

It’s strange how a lot of the things on my to do list revolves around food and drinks, it must be because as Simon says “You’re always hungry!. But the next one that I came to think of also follows the theme. Of course we’ll be having lots of Aussie barbies with lamb chops, snags (sausages), prawns and meat. Yummy!!