Foodie Exchange - The Italian Job

I have a secret admirer. An Italian secret admirer. An Italian secret admirer who sends me kisses.

So, perhaps this person is more of a friend than an admirer, more female than I prefer my admirers to be, and not so much secret as openly talking about sending me things, but she is definitely Italian. And she definitely sent me kisses.

Elga from Semi di Papavero is a talented photographer, and her food posting skills are apparently as good as her blog posting skills if my latest Foodie Exchange is anything to go by. It's still as cool to receive a box of treats from far away as it was when I got goodies from Montreal and Arizona, New York and Toronto, and I was barely inside my front door before the parcel was greedily torn open.

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Delving even further back...

Oh yeah, I also used to live in Sweden. I was on exchange there for a semester during my undergraduate degree, and lived in a 'Flogsta corridor' with 11 other students. I'll spare you the tales of cleaning rosters, people waking me consistently in the wee hours by rocking out to Tina Turner and Rod Stewart, and making the most of our rooftop sauna. Mine was not a typical Flogsta corridor, that usually only has a couple of foreign students, as we had three Italians (one who lived in the next corridor over but would visit a lot), one German, one Greek Cypriot, myself and 7 Swedes. We often ate together, and started this off by having a typical kräftskiva or Crayfish Party.

Svenska kräftor and some little prawns too

Tomas' super impressive balloon kräftor

A recurring event was the corridor pizza night, where we would all chip in a few kroner, someone would head down to the nearby ICA for supplies, and we would get covered in flour and dine on delicious homemade pizzas for dinner.

One of many, many corridor pizzas

One night we all felt like doing something, and many phonecalls were made to see what was going on in town and whether it was worth walking in to go to one of the student bars for some booze and dancing. Half of us were psyched up to go out, and half weren't, and in the end we all just decided to stay home and make waffles instead. As you do. There were a few of us, so we thought we'd better triple the usual waffle mix quantities. We uhh, might've overdone it a little.

Mixing up way too much waffle batter

The remnants, after many a waffle was consumed with cream, ice cream and jam. And possibly champagne.

The leftover mix after everyone was completely stuffed. We were eating waffles for days.

One of our Corridor Dinners had a theme - Homeland Food. Oh it was a delicious theme. I was torn about what to make, and although I toyed with making meat pies, vanilla sliceeventually decided on making sushi as I figured I was representing the entire Asian/Oceanic region.

Organising the deliciousness

Everyone getting stuck into Round One of the Homeland Dinner

Someone's first round of homeland chow

What a sight! This is a smörgåstårta which is essentially a Swedish sandwich cake, made with bread and various fillings and layers.

We also held a Corridor Christmas dinner so that we could all celebrate together before we all headed off to spend Christmas elsewhere (the UK for me). This dinner involved the imbibing of much glögg, which I miss in Australia. There's a lot to be said for mulled wine in cold weather, especially when it is served with raisins and almonds. In glasses with little red hearts on them.

Serving delicious warming glögg to all and sundry

Christmas dinner, corridor style, complete with red wine and Julmust

Christmas dessert - my choc berry meringue, lussebulle and tiramisu

More lussebulle....mmmmmmmm I can smell the saffron from here (please ignore the dirty sink)

Christmas markets in Sweden are worth braving any dreary weather to check out. Chances are you might have some angels, sockervadd or hot hot nuts to see you through the cold. Hot hot nuts.

Making some cash before hitting the club?

Father Christmas keeping himself busy before the big day, selling sockervadd (fairy floss/cotton candy)

Hot nuts! Hot nuts! Get your hot nuts here!

During my semester in Sweden I was lucky enough to be invited to a soiree at the Australian Ambassador's residence in Stockholm. We felt right at home, with a selection of (Swedish) beers, Vegemite sandwiches, sausage rolls, party pies, ANZAC biccies and lamingtons. I was surprised to learn that one of his daughters is a barmaid at one of the Australiana bars in the city, which I never got around to visiting. No great loss, I'm sure.

Classy Aussie fare at the Australian Ambassador's residence in Stockholm

While living in Sweden I had the opportunity to head over to St Petersburg for a few days on an organised tour with other students. I didn't take many food photos there, probably because I didn't really want to remember the food. I did however take a photo of the boot of the car of a man who pulled up when our bus stopped for petrol, kindly offering to sell us any manner of drinks to sustain us for the remainder of the bus trip to our hotel.

A typical Russian boot?

One of our nights there was spent on a river cruise down the Neva River, including singing and dancing and drinking and... not much eating. Sadly the only food we were given to line our stomachs against the vast amounts of champanski and vodka was a little plate of white bread and caviar, and a little bowl of fruit.

Dinner on a river cruise down the Neva River, St Petersburg

I also spent a few weeks in Italy with my newfound Italian friends on my way home to Australia, and was absolutely spoilt by their mothers' cooking. Every meal was a feast, but of course you'll just have to take my word for it. I did however manage to take a few window shopping photos. Anyone for pasta fresca?

No? Hmmm, well how about a chocolate spanner, or mobile phone?


I can't for the life of me remember where the next two photos were taken - somewhere on the Italian coast during a day of much driving and sightseeing. I do however remember how tasty the farinata was.

Hard at work making farinata

Slicing up the farinata ready to be taken to a table of hungry girls

Now I think I really have exhausted the depths of my foodie photos, and really that's probably for the best as I don't want this to turn into one of those slide show nights where everyone is looking at their watches and thinking of ways to make good their escape.

Hej då, до свидания and arrivederci!