Lofty Ideals 0 Grim Reality 1

« The Aaargh! shop sign on Lastenkodinkuja in Töölö »

I heard about a rather unhappy turn of events for a friend of mine yesterday. Chip Salzenberg is one of the nicest people I know, most especially among those of the perl persuasion. It would appear that, in a fit of righteous indignation upon finding the unseemly underside of the company employing him, he sent a letter threatening legal action that elicited an unsurprising response from the company; he was fired, the company is suing him and police seized his personal computers since he worked from home and his computers contained proprietary data.

I have absolutely no doubt that what Chip wrote is an honest assessment, but being a cynic who has only rarely had low expectations of humanity be too pessimistic, I'm very sorry he didn't err on the side of seeking legal counsel before sending that letter and winding up on the defensive rather than the offensive side of the game. In a country where corporate crooks of the highest order walk every day, thinking that an angry letter would make a small-time criminal company go legit is, well, terribly näive. The moral of the story is always seek legal counsel if you think you're working for a bunch of crooks. Crooks aren't honest people and, lofty ideals be damned, they'll put a cap in your ass if you try something stupid like this. Welcome to grim reality.

I like to root for the underdog and for those getting screwed for trying to do the right thing. There's a website, GeeksUnite.net, that has a copy of the letter and a short bio of Chip that doesn't include his talent as a walking movie quote database or his love of MST3K, both of which are commendable character traits. I hope his lawyers are better than the MS Frontpage webpage design might suggest as he's in a serious bind and will need top notch legal counsel to extract his ass and his computers from the pit. Chip is a decent human being whom I'd hate to see get shafted by some sleazy grifters like this so donate if you can to his defense fund since I suspect he'll have an expensive case with a yet uncertain outcome. As always, follow the money and cover your ass.

permalink Ω 30 June 2005, Helsinki

Wonders Never Cease

« Panoramic view of the boat club near Rajasaari back in March when the water was still frozen enough to walk on. Judging by the 10C weather forecast for the next week or so, maybe winter is on its way back. The blue cast must be due to the film being mis-processed as slide film since I don't order prints and scan off the negatives. I suppose I'll just stick to using B&W film with the horizon camera. Click on the photo for a larger version. »

The office is quiet these days, so quiet in fact that the lunchroom is going to close for the month of July since the few of us who will be left here wouldn't be miserable enough without also having the only food available within a 15 minute or more walk go on holiday as well. I suppose we'll just have to take long lunches in search of food. The crappy rainy weather combined with just about all of Otava's puppy pals going on holiday with their owners has made for a petulant wound-up horny teenage puppy who has become quite annoying at times since there are few outlets for his abundance of energy. He has also figured out what girls are and which end is appropriate for his attentions which makes me think he must be brilliant since so few dogs seem to get the right gender or end.

Anyone thinking that Tiger's Dashboard has no purpose other than hoover all available memory might want to have a look at the Asteroids widget. It's brilliant and likely violating copyrights of all sorts so get it before the big foot letter spoils the fun. At 60k, I think it's the smallest program on my powerbook and perfect for killing time while watching much more enormous software packages install.

One of the cutest nerdy things I've seen in a long time is a Periodic Table done out of cupcakes. It might have looked better had they made the icing a bit more distinct in colour to make it easier to distinguish the various families of elements but it's pretty cool nonetheless. If I go on a cupcake jag, maybe I'll make a similar one for the periodic table of dessert. :)

It would seem highly improbable that a book titled Cookie Sutra: An Ancient Treatise: that Love Shall Never Grow Stale. Nor Crumble. would get published but wonders never cease. Yes, a book filled with fucking cookies, literally. It'd be more tempting if the book came with a few cookie cutters for the various positions, um shapes. And, a riveting tale told through pictures, Everything I Ate: A Year in the Life of My Mouth, which will soon be followed by Everything I Ate: The Other End. Yes, I fully expect people who buy books filled with pictures of what a guy ate everyday will buy a book filled with pictures of the resulting turds. Hey, that one has corn!

permalink Ω 29 June 2005, Helsinki

Dry no more

« The view across Katajaharjunniemi of Lauttasaari water tower and the Ruoholahti power plant. »

A long, mostly sober, deadly quiet weekend. I'm almost sad to see all the cars returning to the city. Aside from two lovely barbeques and baking a couple of cakes, the highlight of the weekend was seeing the movie The Love Letter. It was a sappy movie, but I enjoyed seeing Rockport again as I do miss living there at times [Holy shit, the town voted to reverse the Hannah Jumper dry laws this year!]. I remember when the movie was being filmed and the stir it created in the small town where everyone knew everyone elses business. All of the actors were staying in apartments down by granite pier and the drive-by traffic trying to catch a glimpse of Tom Selleck or Kate Capshaw was so bad that they had to build a tall privacy fence to discourage the rubberneckers. It was also amusing when hearing all the old matrons tittering and gossiping at the Wednesday night town picnics out in Pigeon Cove about how hot Tom Selleck was. It's a lovely little town by the sea where time moves at a more comfortably slow pace.

permalink Ω 26 June 2005, Helsinki

Viinikivi

« A vintage custom delivery bike that has been beautifully maintained parked out on a sidewalk in Kamppi. »

The city is quickly emptying out as people rush off to drink loads of beer and eat sausages around a fire somewhere in the Finnish forest. I was stupid and somehow managed to volunteer myself for on-call duty this weekend so I have an excuse to stay reasonably sober. Hyvää Juhannusta. :)

One thought for cheap entertainment over the holiday is to stand near one of the "Erektio on jokamiehenoikeus" signs, dress like a tourist and walk up to guys who look like they won't kill me and ask, "What does that sign say?", just to see how they react and if any of them will say that it's a viagra ad informing us that every man has a right to an erection. Keeping a straight face and making sure to ignore anything said in Finnish might be hard to do. I need to get a non-Finn tourist guy with a camcorder to film it, too. If we survive, it could be a lot of fun.

This evening I realised the one thing I didn't get for my baking projects this weekend was some cream of tartar [viinikivi]. I sorta quipped to Jarkko that it's likely only at the apteekki [pharmacy] given the seeming randomness of various products only carried in specialty shops or the apteekki. One call to Stockmann later...it actually IS in the apteekki and not in the groceries. I mean, ok, it has medicinal uses but why should I have to haul my ass down to the apteekki for something so commonly used in baking?! Shouldn't it be in the groceries too?

permalink Ω 23 June 2005, Helsinki

Torpor

« Enjoying the sunshine at Vanjanlinna where we had a 'Summer Seminar'. I put a few pictures from the event in a Vanajanlinna gallery. »

The summer solstice is today so it's all downhill from here in the sunshine department. It's funny how quickly you can get tired of and annoyed by the nearly constant sunshine when it's all you wished for back in November. The doldrums of summer are here and Finland is about to go quiet for the next four weeks as the entire country goes on holiday. I, however, will be at the office...the downside of being the new guy.

Aside from finding that The Bark Magazine has a new blog, Otava's new bed arriving and finding a particularly challenging Finnish cake to obsess on making this week, it's nothing but largesse, little energy and ennui. Welcome to the torpor zone.

As an aside, if by chance the creepy drunk guy on the sidewalk who asked me if I was Elaine and then proceeded to follow or 'sneak', as only a stumbling drunk could, behind Otava and I reads this; either smile and identify yourself or bring your [sober] homies to kick my ass next time. :)

permalink Ω 21 June 2005, Helsinki

Rings of suburbia

« Pineapple upside-down cake »

Nothing like having the flu off-and-on all week and, when feeling a bit better, enjoying a pint or two after work with a few colleagues from work only to have the flu return. At least Jarkko has it now so we can be achy and miserable together when Otava takes us out for a walk/drag.

The 'let's see if they'll eat it' experiment last week was a pineapple upside-down cake since pineapple is a frequent addition to food here and it seems to be very popular in desserts, perhaps a bit too much so. Pineapple, like banana and other tropical fruits, was an expensive exotic food that didn't make its way into the average home until the advent of canning and refrigerated shipping/storage in the early part of the 20th century. One curious factoid about pineapple is that the original native word is 'anana' which explains the taxonomic name as well as the Finnish 'ananas'. [Which makes you wonder if 'banana' was ok then why did the fools change anana to pineapple.]

BACKGROUND INFORMATION ON PINEAPPLE

Pineapple is one of the world's favorite tropical fruits. First called "anana", a Caribbean word for "excellent fruit", the name "pineapple" came from European explorers who thought the fruit looked like a pinecone with flesh like an apple.

Christopher Columbus was the first person to introduce pineapples to Europe. In 1493 he was exploring the Caribbean islands and found pineapples growing on the island of Guadalupe. He brought some of these pineapples back for Queen Isabella of Spain who loved the sweet tropical fruit. So did other Europeans. In fact, Europeans loved the taste of pineapple so much they tried to grow them in Europe, but the tropical plants did not fare well in Europe's cool climate.

THE HISTORY OF CANNED PINEAPPLE

Canned pineapple was first made in the 1901 but wasn't widely available until engineer Henry Ginaca invented a machine in 1911 that could remove the outer shell, inner core and both ends of 100 pineapples in less than a minute! If you've ever tried to peel a pineapple, you'll know how amazing this is. This machine, known as the "Ginaca machine" is still used in pineapple canneries today.

James Dole began marketing canned pineapple by placing ads with recipes in women's magazines in 1907, possibly the first of its kind, a technique that remains popular even now. In 1925 the company ran ads requesting new recipes using their pineapple. A recipe for upside-down cake was in the book of winners but apparently there were 2,500 or so upside-down cake recipes submitted which would give the impression that the cake was not unknown to homemakers at the time.

The pineapple upside-down cake has its roots in skillet cakes which were, and possibly still are, very popular in the Southern US. The availability of canned pineapple made an exotic fruit into a suburban novelty. The most recognizable form of the upside-down cake has pineapple rings dotted with toxic red maraschino cherries which evoke a 1950s modern suburban dream, but the cake has been around for much longer. Both pineapple and the strange red cherries were popular in the 1920s and, in spite of not being able to find a citation for who put them together on a cake, it's likely safe to assume they collided on the cake around that time. The cake has remained an icon of American cooking kitsch, though somewhat shunned and relegated to a 1970s Betty Crockers' Men's Favorites recipe card.

I looked at quite a few different recipes, including one Dole upside-down cake recipe, and most of them are quite similar. Cook's Illustrated featured a recipe in the September 2004 issue which I tried first, but found the batter too thick to spread evenly in the pan and it didn't have the right texture when it was done. I was rather surprised as I'm so rarely disappointed by CI's recipes but I won't make that recipe again. This didn't keep Jarkko from eating a few too many pieces of it though. :)

I found another recipe that Cook's Illustrated had in one of the first cookbooks they printed a few years ago as a master recipe for a fruit upside-down cake. This cake, given the fluffy egg whites and the cornmeal, has a much nicer crumb and overall texture as well as a fluid enough batter to spread easily over the caramel and fruit. The basic idea is to make the caramel, place the fruit in it, pour the batter on top and bake. The other CI recipe called for using fresh pineapple and reducing it by cooking it in with the caramel and draining it before placing it into the pan. I thought this made the fruit come out a bit rubbery and difficult to slice though it does make for a pretty top after baking. Also, it's good to make the caramel first and allow it to set with the fruit a bit before pouring the cake batter over it to avoid the fruit shifting around too much. Unless, of course, you have the Nordicware pineapple upside-down cake pan. It is very delicious when served with a bit of vanilla ice cream and a glass of milk. :)

Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

Serves: 8-12
Time: 25 min prep + 1hr bake time
Source: CI

Topping

• sliced pineapple, drained (or peaches, plums, nectarines, mangoes, apples)
• maraschino or candied cherries / dried cranberries (optional)
• 1 cup or 2,5 dl light brown sugar, packed
• 3 tablespoons or 42g butter

Cake

• 1.5 cups or 3,5 dl all-purpose flour
• 1.5 teaspoons baking powder
• 3 tablespoons cornmeal
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 8 tablespoons or 113g unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup or 2,5dl plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
• 4 large eggs, separated, room temperature
• 1.5 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2/3 cup or 1,5dl milk

1. For the topping: Butter bottom and sides of round 9x3 (23cm x 8cm) cake pan. Melt 3 tablespoons of butter in a medium sauce pan over medium heat; add brown sugar and cook, stirring occasionally, until mixture is foamy and pale, 3 to 4 minutes. Pour mixture into prepared cake pan; swirl pan to distribute evenly. Arrange fruit slices over topping; set aside.
2. For the cake: Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 350F/176C degrees. Whisk flour, baking powder, cornmeal and salt together in medium bowl; set aside. Cream butter in large bowl with electric mixer at medium speed. Gradually add 1 cup sugar; continue beating until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Beat in yolks and vanilla (scraping sides of bowl with rubber spatula if necessary); reduce speed to low and add dry mixture and milk, alternately in three or four batches, beginning and ending with dry ingredients, until batter is just smooth.
3. Beat egg whites in large bowl at low speed until frothy. Increase speed to medium-high; beat to soft peaks. Gradually add 2 tablespoons sugar; continue to beat to stiff peaks. Fold one-quarter of beaten whites into batter with large rubber spatula to lighten. Fold in remaining whites until no white streaks remain. Gently pour batter into pan and spread evenly on top of fruit, being careful not to disperse fruit. Bake until top is golden and toothpick inserted into cake center (not fruit, which remains gooey) comes out clean, 60 to 65 minutes.
4. Rest cake on rack for 2 minutes. Slide a paring knife around the edge of the cake to loosen it from the pan. Place a serving platter over the pan and hold tightly. Invert the cake onto the platter. Carefully remove the cake pan. If any fruit sticks to pan bottom, remove and position on top of cake.

permalink Ω 19 June 2005, Helsinki

Through Finland in Packets

« Crime scene jesus. »

Ever since the Washington Post started doing their 'Finland Journal' blog I've been thinking about saying something, but wanted to wait until they had finished the series and until I had enough time to think about what I wanted to say without sounding like one of the many wackjobs, both Finnish and American, whose comments ranged from explaining how to pronounce SOW-na to ranting about the Swedish Fascist oppression in Finland to bickering about nothing. Mostly I just found the commentary deeply depressing as monoculture was praised as the reason for all the good things in Finland and the reason for all the bad things in the US a bit more often than I found comfortable. I come from one of the most fucked up nations on the planet, but I'm awfully glad for the variety of people there since it is the greatest asset the US has in terms of creativity and innovation. Being a threat to this vaunted Finnish monoculture is not a fun place to be at times. Some expats just complain, some never do and the rest of us try to get on with life as best as we can and occasionally, cautiously, commiserate over beer and try to focus on the positive things as much as possible. One of the reasons I like my 'cookery' is that it's fun to explore the differences in cuisine, I'm reasonably good at it, it's something positive, and nobody hates the person who brings tasty treats for afternoon coffee. :)

There has been a lot of criticism among the foreigners, and even a Phinn, here about the series since visiting somewhere as a journalist on an official junket likely sponsored by the state vs. living here are two very different experiences and given the inevitable superficiality of the WP coverage, a lot of us were disappointed. One of the reasons that Finland is supposedly the "country that Americans know least about" is that aside from the usual Santa, sauna and sisu stories, very little else gets written in English about this country. I've taken to collecting books on travel to Finland, some more than 100 years old, and I could match the topics nearly 1:1 with the old travelogues to the Finland Journal coverage. In fact, I think I liked the bitchy and less fawning Mrs. Tweedie's Through Finland in Carts from 1898 much better as, in spite of her unsavoury British imperialism, she was a far more snarky and entertaining writer. But, again, same shit, different century. Surely, even the Finns must bore of this though the clichés are what keep the tourists coming. It's like the hackneyed 'pahk ya cah in Havahd Yahd' and Paul Revere legends of Boston. The Boston strangler, townies and Southie don't get a lot of press since they aren't exactly attractive to locals much less to tourists.

For the expats, there's precisely dick to prepare them for what awaits them making a life here. Trying to explain how Finland differs for residents as opposed to tourists to the newly arrived is a chore since you either sound bitter or are constantly doubting your own experience of everything in a miasma of cultural relativism and personal baggage. A lot of us come to live here because we have a spouse/SO, a spouse/SO who very likely does not have an objective view or an understanding of the difference between being Finnish and being not Finnish in Finland. I was in quite a sulk for a few weeks after I met an Aus-Fin couple who had moved here and, after two months, the Australian was escaping in defeat after being told repeatedly in interviews that her education credentials were worthless in Finland, the downside of an educational system regarded, and which regards itself, so highly. Her boyfriend seemed completely surprised by this and felt badly for not being a better judge of his own country. With the dearth of realistic information for those wanting to move here, many have no other choice than to trust their Finnish loved one which may or may not prove to be the best option. This seems to happen more often than not as expats don't often stay for more than a few years before giving up and heading back home, with or without the spouse/SO. I don't know if immigration actually keeps track of those who leave and why, but it would be interesting to see the average length of stay for expats as I expect it is generally very short. How many of the foreigners work for Nokia would also be an interesting statistic.

The question this raises is why do people leave? Finland is, in many ways, a lovely country, but why do expats frequently only stay for a short while? It's an important question, one few seem curious about or willing to discuss. The most frequent rebuttals to any criticism or merely mentioning that life here can be a challenge is that it's "the same everywhere" or that we can always just pack up and go home. Ironically, I would expect this sort of chiding from red state Americans. I think that this might be at the heart of much of our nebulous reasons for struggle here; that Finland is a young country, even by American standards, and with a long history of fighting off invading outsiders, Finland has developed a very, very strong streak of nationalism. What's wrong with nationalism? Well, after 9/11, I saw neighbours wanting to beat the shit out of the grocers down the street who had been there for over 20 years because suddenly they were those dark towel heads, "them", who flew into the WTC instead of the two brothers who had been selling them their groceries for decades. Nationalism separates as much as it binds and mostly it just makes people blind and monumentally stupid.

One of the first memorable experiences was while walking HB down Bulevardi about a week after arriving here and running into a smiling little old lady who wanted to pet him and started chatting me up. As soon as I started to say something the smile fell off her face which was replaced by a scowl full of scorn whereupon she screeched something, waved me off and stalked away in a huff. I was like, what the fuck just happened? This would be repeated quite a few times and, in spite of being able to rationalise the behaviour, first impressions tend to be difficult to change. I remain rather shy about being busted as a foreigner and still have a very difficult time daring to say anything to strangers. In the dog park, I'll stand around understanding everything the other dog owners are saying but don't join the conversation which has, on occasion, marked me as a foreigner just as much as saying something would have. :)

Generally, it's the small things, the day to day things, the very difficult to define things, that make life as an outsider here a daily struggle. Learning the language is the single largest hurdle in bridging the gap and becoming less of an alien, but after two years I'm still cautious, still shy, still neurotic about speaking it to the point of avoiding situations where I might have to say something to someone because I'm scared of being busted as an outsider. We all have little defensive tactics like this, depending on our individual hang-ups and struggles. One of my friends visited home a while back and she remarked in an email that she was in awe of how suddenly aware she was of how the little daily things in Finland make life so much more work than back in the realm of the friendly familiarity of home.

Some things, however, aren't so vague, but these are the things we don't talk about or quietly discuss amongst ourselves because they're either too depressing to dwell upon or tend to be met with vituperative attacks. There are things endemic to being an expat, a foreigner in a strange land, that often make you wonder if it's you, if you're not trying hard enough or if it's the culture that is responsible for the discontent and many things often do have simple explanations, if not simple solutions. I have lived elsewhere and, given the culture and the language barrier, Finland is a very challenging place to find a happy niche whether or not any Finns want to hear or acknowledge that. It's not a destination for the easily discouraged or the impatient.

Recently, I had the pleasure of talking to a couple with two adorable basset hounds who had just returned to Finland after 7 years abroad who remarked at how "international" Helsinki seemed nowadays. There are many words I'd use to describe Helsinki, most of them nice even, but international wouldn't be one of them. Being part of the EU while rejecting or reluctantly accepting some of the things that come with being part of the EU, like foreigners, doesn't make a place international any more than dining out at a Nepalese restaurant makes you a world traveller. This doesn't mean Finland should aspire to the problems of the Netherlands, but acknowledging the problems that exist here for foreigners might be something to consider since people do generally tend to stay in places that they feel welcome in and Finland, either intentionally or not, often gives outsiders the impression that we are either not welcome or just merely tolerated. If Finland doesn't want foreigners, it should really just pull out of the EU and close the borders.

So, I suppose the point of my rambling is that there are at least a few of us around who like it here and are trying with sincerity to learn the language, fit in and get along like everyone else but there are so many conflicting messages between what we read in the paper or hear from our spouses and what we actually experience at times that it makes it difficult to reconcile the disparity and still keep on trying. It's a struggle. It's like bloody musical chairs watching all the expats leave one by one.

permalink Ω 15 June 2005, Helsinki

Isle of Dogs

« The lovely beach on Rajasaari, a.k.a. dog island. »

We skipped the Samba parade today and took Otava up to Rajasaari again instead. I've rarely seen a dog so happy as he is to run around like a crazed puppy and swim around in the water. I'm continually impressed by the dog parks in Helsinki and Rajasaari seems like one of the best kept secrets in town since there are never many dogs around when we visit. It's a rocky knob of an island with lots of trees, water and sand for dogs to play in freely off the leash. It's doggie nirvana. It sits just off the shore from the Prime Minister's home in Meilahti which likely prevents any development.

Otava certainly likes to swim, but we're going to have to work on his floating ball retrieval skills as he wades in like a water buffalo, drinks around it, sniffs and then wanders off while drinking more water in search of something more interesting. Perhaps we need to stuff some sausage into the floating kong ball to pique his curiosity. :)

I left work early on Friday in order to try some mämmijäätelö at the Häme regional fair in Senate Square. Many of the Finnish regions seem to offer these during the summertime and it's fun to try regional oddities. I am still pouting that we arrived too late for the mämmi ice cream and I'm thinking that I'll just have to make some myself. Otava got to try some of the boar pyttipannu since he caught a whiff of it while we were snaking our way around the stalls in search of ice cream and decided that he was going to park it in front of the pyttipannu stand until he was served. Oh, the ladies loved him and gave him a wee taste which sealed our fate of having to buy some and lure him away with it. At least he wasn't behaving like he does at the pet store where he walks along the treat aisle and just shoves his face into the bin of stuff he likes the most. :)

One disappointment was being with a friend who wanted to take some pictures of some cute ceramic pots in the Häme market. I was busy holding Otava, who was interested in heading towards the food section, and couldn't quite believe that the vendor started giving her an incredibly hard time about 'using the pictures against her' or some really wacky justification for being viciously rude instead of saying 'please, no pictures.' It didn't occur to me until we were walking home that it was very likely because the friend isn't white and I thought about going back without Otava to see if I would get the same treatment if I tried to take pictures of her cute, but unoriginal, pottery though I wasn't sure how I'd respond if the vendor were to smile and offer to show me other items while I was taking a few pictures. It's always the little things that get under your skin and fester.

permalink Ω 12 June 2005, Helsinki

We call this work

« Art or tactical baby launching device built atop an old pram? »

I'm still recovering from a 'Summer Seminar', a.k.a. work sponsored party, at Vanajanlinna on Tuesday and Wednesday. I used to be the drunken lush in the US when I'd stagger home on a couple of beers at 1am or so, but in Finland I'm just a rank amateur when everyone else stays up until 7 or so drinking well past the early hour I retreated in defeat. :)

permalink Ω 9 June 2005, Helsinki

Cake for Coffee

« Sour cream coffee cake with raspberry and cinnamon streusel filling. »

When I think of coffee cake, I think of a dense, slightly sweet cake with cinnamon swirls and nuts in it, but when I say coffee cake in Finland, I get this weird look as if to ask why one would put coffee in a cake. Treats with coffee in Finland, if not some kind of pulla, are some sort of seriously heavy and sweet cream confection. I've also noticed that while berries have an exalted, perhaps even near ubiquitous, place in Finnish desserts, I've not found any local cakes that have the fruit baked inside the cake and instead are always part of the topping or unbaked filling. I don't know if this holds in all parts of Finland, but I couldn't find a single recipe in older, and even some recent, cookbooks that had berries baked in the dough or batter. It's interesting and makes me wonder why not.

So, I decided to torture my familiar test subjects, a.k.a. coworkers, to a sour cream coffee cake with blueberries to see if the concept was too alien or if a real coffee cake might not appeal. A couple commented that it was strange, but few crumbs were left on the serving plate so in spite of the unfamiliar concept, it didn't appear to slow down consumption. :) So, if Finns want to try this cake as a change of pace, I don't think there will be any leftovers.

Coffee cake is another one of those comfort foods that make me think of home. I totted up a list of foods from home that make me feel homesick and, strangely, almost all of them are sugary dessert or breakfast kinds of foods, neither of which I ate very often back home. I'm sure there is a doctoral dissertation on the gastronomic nostalgia of expats in there somewhere.

At long last, too, I finally found the dairy product in Finland that most closely resembles American sour cream, Flora Fraîche with a 20% fat content. It's not créme fraîche, not smetana, not kermaviili, just fraîche. I figured that a country with a dizzying array of dairy products, especially sour ones, that I'd eventually try the right one. It performed perfectly where I had previously been somewhat disappointed with kermaviili.

A sturdy, powerful mixer is highly recommended for the mixing of the butter and sour cream with the dry ingredients as it gets quite stiff and difficult to work with. You could probably also do it with a biscuit dough tool/potato masher [the one that cuts the butter into the flour] but that will take more time and effort. Jarkko was playing World of Warcraft on the computer which is plugged into the step-down transformer my mixer requires so I had to do the first cake the hard way which made my hand mixer very, very hot. Adding in the egg mixture should also be done slowly as it will slop over the sides of the bowl if not added slowly.

Adding the streusel and fruit layers is easy, but I was disappointed when I followed the recipe to the letter with the 2 cups of batter between layers as I found that it wasn't enough and that they melded into one band of goo. I had so much batter left over after the adding the layers that the streusel distribution through the cake was suboptimal. So be more generous with the batter between layers and save a wee bit for yourself as the batter is damned tasty.

Lemon-Blueberry Sour Cream Coffee Cake

Makes: 1 cake that serves 12 to 16 people
Special tools: A fixed-bottom, 10-inch tube pan (with 10-cup capacity), good mixer, preferably standing
Time: 20 mins prep and 1 hour baking
Source: CI

Berry filling

• 1 cup or 2,5dl frozen blueberries or raspberries
• 1 teaspoon grated lemon zest

Streusel

• 3/4 cup or 1,75dl unbleached all-purpose flour (3.75oz or 106g)
• 3/4 cup or 1,75dl granulated sugar (5.25oz or 150g)
• 1/2 cup or 1,25dl packed dark brown sugar (3.5oz or 100g)
• 2 tablespoons ground cinnamon
• 2 tablespoons or 30g unsalted butter, cold, cut into 2 pieces
• 1 cup or 2,5dl pecans, chopped

Cake

• 12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) or 170g unsalted butter, softened but still cool, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
• 2 tablespoons or 30g butter, softened for greasing pan
• 4 large eggs
• 1.5 cups or 3,5dl sour cream [Flora Fraîche is the closest to American sour cream in .fi with 20% fat]
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 2.25 cups or 5,25dl unbleached all-purpose flour (11.5oz or 325g)
• 1.25 cups or 3dl granulated sugar (8.75oz or 250g)
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon table salt

1. Toss 1 cup frozen blueberries with 1 teaspoon grated lemon zest in small bowl and set aside.
2. For the streusel: In food processor, process flour, granulated sugar, 1/4 cup (,75 dl) dark brown sugar, and cinnamon until combined, about 15 seconds. Transfer 1 1/4 cups (3 dl) of flour/sugar mixture to small bowl; stir in remaining 1/4 cup (,75 dl) brown sugar and set aside to use for streusel filling. Add butter and pecans to mixture in food processor; pulse until nuts and butter resemble small pebbly pieces, about ten 1-second pulses. Set aside to use as streusel topping.
3. For the cake: Adjust oven rack to lowest position and heat oven to 350F/175C degrees. Grease 10-inch tube pan with 2 tablespoons softened butter. Whisk eggs, 1 cup (2,5 dl) sour cream, and vanilla in medium bowl until combined.
4. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in bowl of standing mixer; mix on low speed for 30 seconds to blend. Add butter and remaining 1/2 cup (1 dl) sour cream; mix on low speed until dry ingredients are moistened and mixture resembles wet sand, with few large butter pieces remaining, about 1 1/2 minutes. Increase to medium speed and beat until batter comes together, about 10 seconds; scrape down sides of bowl with rubber spatula. Lower speed to medium-low and gradually add egg mixture in 3 additions, beating for 20 seconds after each and scraping down sides of bowl. Increase speed to medium-high and beat until batter is light and fluffy, about 1 minute.
5. Using rubber spatula, spread 2 cups (5 dl) batter in bottom of prepared pan, smoothing surface. Sprinkle evenly with 1/2 cup (1 dl) blueberries. Sprinkle evenly with 3/4 cup (1,75 dl) streusel filling (without butter or nuts). Repeat with another 2 cups batter, remaining 1/2 cup (1 dl) blueberries, and remaining 3/4 cup (1,75 dl) streusel filling (without butter or nuts). Spread remaining batter over, then sprinkle with streusel topping (with butter and nuts).
6. Bake until cake feels firm to touch and long toothpick or skewer inserted into center comes out clean (bits of sugar from streusel may cling to tester), 50 to 60 minutes. Cool cake in pan on wire rack 30 minutes. Invert cake onto rimmed baking sheet (cake will be streusel-side down); remove tube pan, place wire rack on top of cake, and reinvert cake streusel-side up. Cool to room temperature, about 2 hours. Cut into wedges and serve. (Cake can be wrapped in foil and stored at room temperature for up to 5 days.)

permalink Ω 9 June 2005, Helsinki

Every nation an island

« The boat quay on Koivusaari in late spring. The round disk just to the left of the point light is illuminated in the darker months with what I think is the phase of the moon since it often corresponds to the moon when it isn't too cloudy to compare them. [In fact, if anyone from the boat club knows about the lunar light and can confirm or deny my supposition, send me an email as I've been wondering what its story is for quite some time.] »

A long quiet weekend of laundry, cleaning, reading, scanning the backlog of photos, baking coffeecake and watching Jarkko play WoW. I was very amused when he wondered if the player with the nick 'Koskenkorva' might be Finnish. Uh...yeah, very probably. :)

I was also pretty amused by a Dubai land development called The World" which features a few hundred island nations for sale to those who have always wanted to, say, own Finland. A thinking person probably wouldn't blow a few dozen million bucks on a sandbar with services in the Arabian Gulf after seeing what is happening to Tuvalu and other similar islands. I suppose there will be at least a symbolic swallowing of 'The World' by the sea when the time comes which will be fun to watch on CNN.

John Cleese explains Backup Trauma in a hilarious satire that almost makes me want to cry at the end. For every twat in the technorati who likes to prattle on about 'innovation' and 'emerging technologies' I'd like to make them be tape monkeys for a week or two. I get pretty irate when recycling old ideas with different software passes as innovation while we're still dealing with the same damn hardware that we've been dealing with for about 20 years. The only difference is that it's smaller and faster and holds a lot more data. It's like saying the cup holder in your car is an innovation for automobiles. Mostly, it's just a frilly distraction from the fact that it's still just a combustion engine that works very much like the one your grandparents drove. I'd pay good money to see Charles Platt scream "Where's the innovation?!" in tech conferences these days.

The news usually provides daily affirmations as to why I left the US, but the article Soldiers of Christ I might tide me over for a few months.

permalink Ω 6 June 2005, Helsinki

Tinfoil Hat

« What the tinfoil doesn't protect you from, the wine will. :) »

The only thing I've seen this week is the inside of the bus, the datacenter bunker and the dog park as, like Murphy's wisdom demands, everything tends to happen all at once and in the most inconvenient manner possible. And that doesn't even include the blasting of bedrock or rising water. At least the lift hasn't decided to trap me this week.

Amidst all the rather usual and dull news these days I read that Deep Throat decloaked at the urging of what sounds like family trying to cash in before he kicks it, which is consistent with the three people who might confirm or deny the verity of his admission refusing to do so. I don't know why, but I feel violated somehow as I remember watching the 10 o'clock news' Watergate reports every night as a kid and imagining Deep Throat as a kind of folk hero, the kind you only see in comic books and movies. A mysterious everyman who did the right thing. A man who spawned more tinfoil hat conspiracy theories than Area 51. A man who gave us a modicum of hope that not everyone in DC was a crook.

Now, in a very undignified, very American manner the hero comes out to sell book and movie rights to his story so his family can profit after he's pushing up daisies. It's a pity that there aren't more people like him in Washington these days given that Watergate seems like a quaint misdemeanor by current standards, but why bother when you can be a dirtbag, make millions and still sell book and movie rights to your sordid tale without shame. Perhaps it was inevitable, but I'm disappointed that the mystery man didn't take it to his grave and leave his family to sully themselves alone. Who knew that journalists would have more scruples 30 years on? Three cheers for Woodward, Bernstein and the Fourth Estate.

permalink Ω 1 June 2005, Helsinki