Expensive Cheese and the shoehorn - culinary adventures in Sweden

As we start to fit in and get our feet on the ground, we find that we want to start to do a bit better than vegemite sandwiches and basic dinners. What we really want is some nice cheese. The first shop we visited, we picked up some Edam. It was pretty expensive (about $20 a kg) and wasn't too bad, but what we wanted was the finest of the cheesy comestables - Cheddar. There were a few blocks in the fridge isle of our local ICA but they were about 120sek a kg ($20). We were tempted, but then Kristine saw something glowing blackly like the depths of night in the deli counter. It was a black waxed cheddar - Black Bomber by name. The price tag showed 29.99kr per kg (about $5). We made our way to the counter and the lady at the deli sliced off a few slices with a golden (well metal) cheese slicer, handing them over like they had been grown by yak-tending monks in the Himalayas.

It was awesome! We could hardly believe that this awesome tasty cheese was only 29.99sek for a kg, but hey, who understands these crazy Swedes. We asked for half of the block that she had - about a kg. She double checked and that should have raised a flag but we were shopping in Sweden and self sufficient and feeling invincible. When she cut off a big chunk she wrapped it, carefully tagged it and handed it to Kris, who chucked it in the trolley.  We'd gone about five steps when I checked the price on our 900grams of Black Bomber - 299.99sek ($50)!  Arrgh!  I told Kris and she rushed back to check.  The poor deli lady explained that the price tag didn't say kg it said hg which was 100g, so the price was 30sek/100g not per kilo.  She did offer, quite nicely, to take some back, but we smiled politely, emptied our wallets onto the counter and carefully placed the cheese in the trolley like a baby in a stroller.

Black Bomber

Our next culinary experiment came that night as we served traditional Swedish kottbullar or meat balls. While I helped prepare dinner by sitting at the table playing on my iPad (hey someone has to do it), I heard Kristine say "I hope this isn't a shoehorn.." Of course I turned around to see her serving the mashed potato using one of the odd utensils we found in the kitchen drawer.  It worked perfectly, but I still think it was a shoehorn - see the pic below and make up your own mind: