Ottolenghi, Blumenthal and I

I love birthdays, especially my own, as it was on Friday. We had a real foodie day, my husband and I for breakfast and lunch and then our little family for dinner. We'd planned lots of things but I had woken up with a cold the day before so it became a more muted affair. But ah, what a treat! First Ottolenghi every foodie's favourite café packed with beautifully composed cakes, biscuits, sandwiches and salads. Then lunch at Dinner by Heston Blumenthal at the  Mandarin Oriental Hotel. Mr Blumenthal has come up with a menu inspired by historic British gastronomy and dates the dishes on the menu so that you know when they used to be popular. I had the Meat Fruit (first picture) from around the 1500's as a starter and my husband Salamugundy (second pic) c.1720 which was chicken oysters (supposedly the most flavourful and tasty part of the chicken).  We had dinner at home with the kids and I had chosen to do gnocchi with gorgonzola (sorry no pic) which is one of our favourite dishes. Utterly decadent! 

The inspiration of the day translated into cooking a couple of traditional Swedish dinners this week. Namely Kåldolmar (stuffed cabbage rolls) and Fiskgratäng med dillsås (fish pie with dill sauce, cooking tomorrow so pics and recipes to follow) but then not to overdo it I had to mix it up with something Asian so today I did minced chicken with lime and ginger (pics and recipe to follow). On Thursday we are having beetroots and parsnips with goat's cheese and steak haché. Every Wednesday I usually start thinking about what to cook the following week. Do you have any inspiring ideas you'd like to share with me for next week's menu? 

My husband said the cabbage rolls were the best thing I had ever cooked. However, you should know that it's a dish his Grandmother used to make him quite often as a small boy so he probably has very fond memories to go with the taste. Try them if you like. The kids liked them too. Original recipe here Savoydolmar pa lamm. 

Savoy cabbage rolls with lamb
Ingredients for 4
1 savoy cabbage
1 onion
2 cloves of garlic
1 apple
1,5 dl of pecan nuts
400 g of minced lamb
1 tbsp of Agave syrup (or honey)
1 tbsp of light soy sauce
3 dl of cream
1,5 tbsp of liquid veal stock
black pepper

Preparation
Preheat the oven to 175ºC.
Remove the first couple of loose leaves from the cabbage then pick off as many as you need. I used about 12. Blanche the leaves you are going to use 1-2 minutes in boiling water, then leave to cool.

Roast the pecan nuts in a dry pan then whiz in a food processor. Grate or chop finely onion and apple and slice the garlic finely. Mix the pecans, onion, apple, garlic, lamb mince, syrup, soy sauce and season with some black pepper.

Remove the thickest part of the leaf vein on each cabbage leaf. Then wrap as much of the lamb mix as you can on each leaf. Place tightly in an oven-proof dish. Heat the cream (no need for it to boil) and stir in the veal stock. Poor the cream sauce over the cabbage rolls. Place in the oven and bake for about 50 minutes. Serve with potatoes and lingon- or cranberry sauce.