Category: kitchen
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Mummo Goes to Kozy Shack
Finnish riisipuuro meets American pudding cup, mediated by British custard powder, in a slow cooker made in the USA. Multiple countries in one dessert.
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Piimä | Cultured Buttermilk
Piimä is a fermented milk drink — tangy, pourable, and thinner than yogurt. If you’ve had buttermilk in the US, you’ve had its distant American cousin. They’re not wrong, exactly. But they’re not entirely right, either.
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Kuohukerma | Whipping Cream (Pasteurized)
Finland’s pasteurized heavy cream — the one that handles heat. Kermojen aatelia, the nobility of creams.
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Chicken + Scissors = Dinner
I cut my chicken with scissors. Into the pan. From frozen. No cutting board, no knife, no thawing overnight. It’s heritage cooking knowledge from my mother’s kitchen and the dim sum ladies she learned from — and it happens to be the fastest way to get dinner on the table when nobody planned ahead.
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Grahamjauho | Graham Flour / Whole Wheat Flour
The whole wheat flour a 19th-century American minister designed to suppress the urge to get frisky. Also the one sämpyläjauho is cosplaying as.
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Fusilli Alfredo
There are three ways to make alfredo. The Italian way uses three ingredients and decades of technique I don’t have. The American chain way uses flour, which is cheating. My way uses cream, butter, and cheese — just dairy being dairy. A Roman nonna would not approve. My son came back for seconds.
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Sämpyläjauho | Bread Roll Flour
Sämpyläjauho is a Finnish bread roll flour that looks like multigrain, sits next to whole grain flour on the shelf, and radiates wholesome energy. Read the ingredients label. It is refined white flour wearing a costume.
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Hiivaleipäjauho | Bread Flour
Hiivaleipäjauho is Finland’s bread flour — a higher-protein wheat flour whose name literally means “yeast bread flour.” Refreshingly honest labeling for a country whose all-purpose flour is called “semi-coarse.”
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Mannapuuro in a Cocktail Dress
Mannapuuro is Finnish semolina porridge — simple, austere, the kind of thing your mummo made. My version uses cooking cream, vanilla sugar, and a tempered egg, which technically makes it a custard. Add strawberry jam and it tastes like strawberry ice cream. I didn’t plan this. The Year of Custards keeps claiming victims.
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Puolikarkea Vehnäjauho | All-purpose Flour
Puolikarkea vehnäjauho is Finland’s default wheat flour — the bag you reach for when a recipe just says “jauho.” The name literally translates to “semi-coarse wheat flour” which sounds rustic but isn’t. It’s your standard all-purpose flour with a complicated linguistic relationship to the word.