Do you often end up with leftovers of root vegetables like carrots, celeriac, potatoes etc.? We often do, and we hate to throw away food. In Norway people throw away one fifth of all the food they purchase. One fifth that would have been completely edible. What a shame. To help prevent this we give you this recipe you can make of common leftover vegetables.

Ingredients
(feeds a family of 4)

400 g SALMA
Leftover celeriac - typically a half
Leftover potatoes - the ugly ones you didn't bother to serve last time
Leftover carrots - it doesn't matter if they look a bit dry, you're gonna fry them in butter!
250 g Røros butter
Salt & pepper
Fresh thyme

Don't throw it - cook it!

Peel the potatoes, celeriac and carrots. Cut the potatoes and celeriac in smaller cubes. Boil until soft. Drain the water. Let it all dry off completely. Give it a go in your blender with 200g of the Røros butter. Taste with salt & pepper in the end.

Fry the carrots in the rest of the butter until golden. Cut four filets of the SALMA. Rub with salt & pepper. Fry them in the same butter, until the crust is crispy and the center is still a bit raw.

Plate with the celeriac cream first, carrots and then SALMA on top. Sprinkle fresh thyme over. Eat with good conscience and money saved.

A blind tasting of Bordeaux red wines at Restaurant Ni&Tyve during an early spring afternoon. We love wine, we love Bordeaux and the restaurant was unexplored by us so far. Blind tasting of wine sounds easy, right? You taste, and you either like it or not, no? Well, it's not quite that simple. We also had to describe the smell and taste, guess the area (if we could) and rate them.

We were together with far more experienced wine tasters, for sure. Wine writers from different specialty magazines and sommeliers from known restaurants and wine bars, amongst them our friend Magnus from Territoriet. Regardless of that, we tried our best to describe the seven different glasses of red wines from Bordeaux. In the end we rated them, and to no surprise, when the identities were revealed, it turned out Andrea's favorites were the three most expensive wines.

We also learned about the bacteria "Brett" or Breattanomyces. A fault in wine that can both add flavor to the wine or ruin the wine completely. Young wines can get more complexity and/or an aged character from Brett. When a wine is spoiled by Brett it smells of horse manure or a musty basement, and it may have a metallic taste. This could of course be confused with cork taint as well, which makes it even more difficult to distinguish.

After tasting we went to the terrace to eat. We were served a three-course meal from restaurant Ni&Tyve and we enjoyed red, rosé and white wine from Chateau Rauzan Despagne. They come in plastic bottles (PET), which is very handy e.g. when you are traveling to your cottage or going to a picnic. The bottles are less heavy and can't be broken. The wine is quite cheap, but still with a good quality to it. We tasted the Chateau Rauzan Despagne Bordeaux rouge too, and in July that will be released in a three liter bag in box for NOK 450.

Super munch! Energy food! We love this new super food we found at Gutta på Haugen. It is called Superknask and is produced by a company called Energimat.  Two weeks ago, Andrea learned that she has celiac disease. Which means she can't eat gluten anymore. At all. That is pretty heavy news for someone who loves pastry, pasta and pizza as much as she does.

However, once the shock and frustration had settled, we decided that it would not break us. In fact, if anyone can handle such a disease it should be us. We make everything we eat from scratch anyway, and can control all ingredients. That being said, it is still nice to be able to purchase some basic products in the store. Enter Superknask, with two types of crispbreads and one type of cereal. This morning we made a simple breakfast with Superknask crispbreads, good ham and cheeses and various toppings. Here are some pictures for inspiration. In the future we will use Superknask products to make more exciting recipes too.

The story of Energimat is quite interesting. It is produced at Finnøy in Ryfylke, west in Norway, close to where Anders's great grand parents are from. The founder, Mette Lund Larsen, and her family were all diagnosed with a variety of food intolerances many years ago. Her idea was to make the life easier for anyone living with food intolerances and allergies, by producing high quality products without allergens. All the products are without gluten, wheat starch, yeast, egg, milk, nuts, soy or other additives. The sweetness comes from honey or agave syrup. The taste is unmatched!

In case you're wondering: No we won't make this into an allergy food blog. We have done paleo recipes before, and we will do that and probably some gluten free recipes in the future as well. We might give you the gluten free option for some dishes. Largely, the blog will remain the same, though. Hopefully a source of inspiration on where to eat the best meals, and how to make your home cooking more exciting.

A Michelin starred restaurant is usually not where we dine on a regular Thursday after work. This kind of luxury is reserved for vacations. However, we realized that by following this logic we would never get to test the best restaurants in our own hometown. Thus, when our good friend André Blomberg-Nygård asked if we wanted to join for a small snack at his favorite neighborhood shack, Maaemo, we accepted his invitation.

Maaemo is Oslo and Norway's only two Michelin star restaurant. It is also the only Nordic restaurant to be awarded two stars directly, the very first time they were mentioned in the Michelin guide. In the list "The World's 50 Best Restaurants" Maaemo was ranked no. 79 last year. We're looking forward to see where they rank once the 2015 list is revealed on June 1st.

Danish head chef Esben Holmboe Bang leads the kitchen, while co-founder and sommelier Pontus Dahlström from Finland leads the restaurant. We were lucky enough to have Pontus almost entirely to ourselves this evening, at the test kitchen table on the second floor. From this table you overlook the kitchen with all the chefs hard at work, and you also have a panoramic view of the barcode buildings of Bjørvika.

All of the ingredients at Maaemo are organic, and most of the produce are sourced within a 100 km radius of Oslo. Esben explains that the menu is a reflection of the Norwegian nature, and they even go into the forest themselves to forage wild plants and flowers. The wine is organic as well, and some of it is biodynamic, but Pontus doesn't choose strictly "nature wines" like we experienced at restaurants like Noma and Relæ in Copenhagen.

Pontus welcome us in the door as we enter. We are late, and André has already waited for us 15 minutes upstairs. Not the worst place to wait, though, watching the chefs of Maaemo plating dishes with microscopic accuracy.

Esben stands on the right side of the kitchen, looking almost like a conductor of an orchestra. He has complete control. Pontus, on the other hand, is busy being the perfect host for the guests at his table. Esben is equally welcoming, of course, whenever he comes out to put the finishing touches on a dish, but Pontus feels almost like he is part of our table this evening.

This feeling of having your waiter and sommelier so up close and personal is something we've only ever experienced once before, and that was at Noma in Copenhagen. We're beginning to see a pattern at these two star restaurants!

If Germans would be able to settle on one national dish, it could easily be argued to be currywurst. Unfortunately they can't agree due to regional differences in that vast country. However, we were not in doubt of what to make when we invited over the guys from #KulTour for a German evening. New readers might want to check this post and this about the summer adventure Andrea is having with the TV2 film production team along the Tour de France route.

Currywurst is a German fast food, which you will often find served from a food truck or another kind of food booth. The original is made with some sort of bratwurst, sliced in pieces, and served with a ketchup or tomato paste seasoned with curry. We got our sausages from Anni's Pølsemakeri, and made the curry sauces ourselves of course.

Finn-Erik and John Kaare from #KulTour came visiting and brought Finn-Erik's girlfriend Cisilie and his daughter Filipa. We knew that homemade currywurst would be quite new to them, so we made two types of sauces to go with the sausages. One very traditional ketchup based sauce and another gourmet version based on the recipe of famous German chef Frank Rosin. In addition we made Heston Blumenthal's triple cooked fries.

Classic Currywurst Sauce

2 tbsp sunflower oil
100 g tomato ketchup
250 g tomato puree
4 tbsp white wine vinegar
4 tblsp sugar
Salt
Curry powder

It couldn't be easier!

Mix all ingredients and boil the sauce in a pot while stirring. Taste with salt and curry powder until delicious.

Grill the sausages, slice them in pieces, pour the sauce over and dust with more curry powder. Serve with the best ever triple cooked french fries.

Done!

Gourmet Currywurst Sauce by Frank Rosin

4 red peppers
​​1 shallot, finely sliced
1 clove of garlic, finely sliced
2 tbsp tomato paste
500 ml chicken broth
1 half chili
100 g sugar
1 tbsp mild paprika powder
2 tbsp curry powder
1 pinch of salt
1 tsp sunflower oil

This one is a bit more work, but also pretty easy!

Fry the shallots and garlic in a pan on low heat with some oil and the sugar, until they caramelize. This could take a while, about 30 minutes, so start early.

Chop the peppers and chilis and place them in a tray in the oven with some oil to caramelize as well. 180 degrees for 25 minutes should do the trick. Once everything is soft and yummy, mix the peppers, chilis, onions and garlic together and add all the other ingredients.

Cook for 15 minutes. Taste with salt and curry powder until it makes you so happy that you dance the currywurst jiggle.

Use a stab mixer to make it into a fine sauce. Serving is similar to the classic sauce.

Andrea is leaving for France and Spain to film with the #KulTour guys again on Wednesday the 27th of May. If you want to know what they are up to, make sure to follow #KulTour and Two Foodies Eating in these channels:

#KULtour
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Stammershalle Badehotel was our home on Bornholm for three days when we were there with Visit Denmark. We say home because that's what it felt like. Stammershalle is nothing like a hotel in the traditional sense. The owners, Henriette Lassen & Henrik Petersen, make you feel welcome like a dear friend from the past. All of the decoration inside is done by Henriette, as she is an upholstery professional, and it feels like she has made the entire hotel her house.

More than anything Henrik & Henriette wanted to make their hotel restaurant a destination for the locals on the island. If a local Bornholmer would be asked by a tourist where to go, then Stammershalle should be in the top five list of advices. We find this to be a great philosophy, and even believe they have succeed with this goal to a great extent. This also makes them less dependent on tourism, which is concentrated around the spring and summer months on Bornholm.

Built by a German in 1911 who had his own zoo in the backyard with lions and bears. One hundred years later, in 2011, it was bought by Henrik & Henriette. Located along the northern coastline of Bornholm, not far from the city of Gudhjem (God's home), in a beautiful rocky scenery. Waking up to the view of the Baltic Sea every morning is the best start of a day we could imagine, and it makes us want to go back to Bornholm as soon as possible.

The hotel restaurant "Lassens" is also one of the main destination for foodies visiting Bornholm, in addition to Melsted  Badehotel and of course restaurant Kadeau. Head chef, Daniel Kruse, is part of the Danish culinary team and was named chef of the year in 2012. He has previously worked as a pastry chef at Michelin star restaurants Formel B and Søllerød Kro, and won many prizes for his sweet creations.

In Lassens restaurant they strive to satisfy all the senses, and the food looks as great as it tastes. As many of the ingredients as possible are gathered from the local area, very much in line with the Bornholm mentality. However, Henrik points out, sometimes they simply feel like oysters and foie gras. Hard work the last couple of years has even resulted in a place in the White Guide. Without further ado, we present to you the evening's meal.

The breakfast at Stammershalle is one of the best hotel breakfast we have experienced. Everything was freshly made from the same kitchen we dined in the previous evening. We could choose between a variety of ham & cheese, bacon, sausages, scrambled eggs, tomato salad, five types of homemade bread, overnight oats, five types of homemade jams, four different beverages, and more variety of yoghurt and cereal toppings than we knew existed.

Asparagus season is upon us, and we have let ourselves inspire by our visit to Rôtisserie this time. We haven't really copied the dish, there are several differences, but the truffle vinaigrette and the asparagus shavings are some of the similarities. Our best advice when it comes to asparagus is to buy good quality. Go to your local specialty store and pay that premium price. It's worth it. We went to Gutta på Haugen to get ours.

Ingredients
(Serves about 4 people as a starter)

4 green asparagus
4 white asparagus
a handful of ramson
1 chicory or endive salad
4 fresh figs
high quality almonds, try to get hold of Marcona or at least Valencia
extra virgin olive oil
truffle oil
balsamic vinegar
salt & pepper

Shock the vegetables!

The first thing you have to do is break off the hard lower tip on each asparagus. Then you peel them, and for this dish you want to save a few of the slices you peel off for decoration. Make a vinaigrette by mixing 4 parts extra virgin olive oil with 2 parts balsamic vinegar, a small teaspoon of truffle oil and salt & pepper.

We blanched almost all of the vegetables for this salad. The white asparagus was cooked for 4 minutes, the green asparagus 2 minutes, the chicory salad 1 minute and the ramson and asparagus peel 30 seconds. After cooking we transferred the vegetables directly into ice water, to shock them, and stop the boiling process. This preserves flavor and color.

The figs were cut in half and fried in a pan. As for the asparagus, they were fried in a pan too just before serving, about 1 minute per side. Cooking time depends on the size, and you want an asparagus that just barely bends if you hold it by one end.

Plate with the asparagus first, then the other vegetables. Top with asparagus peel and sprinkle roughly chopped almonds over. Spray it with vinaigrette! Yum

Pop-up restaurant! The word is so hot it hurts. Still a fairly new concept in Oslo, although the trend is slowly and steadily growing thanks to influence from cities like Copenhagen and Stockholm. Svinepels is a new pop-up restaurant that caught our interest earlier this year. When they announced a dinner at Seeds in Oslo a month ago, with a 10-course tasting menu and drinks to match, we just had to go check it out. Seeds is a backyard bar and club, and is part of Mesh - the coworking space in Tordenskiolds gate. They have a lot of events, concerts and DJs playing. The musical element of this evening was Jay Nemor.

Svinepels consist of Magnus Støre and Even Rømo. Neither of them are educated chefs, they're simply two friends interested in food and fascinated by the modern restaurant experience. Eating out has become almost theatrical in execution. The experiments in the Svinepels kitchen are based on the latest trends that Magnus and Even pick up from the top restaurants around the world. Both in terms of ingredients and presentation.

This specific evening had the coming of spring as topic, and was a reflection of Mother Earth facing the Northern hemispehere toward the sun and all the life that wakes from hibernation. Martin Kloster from Moestue Grape Selection attended the event and served drinks to match each course.

Svinepels pop-up was a nice experience. The food, the drinks and the music put together made it a great evening. We wish the team good luck with future events, and encourage them to work even more with the flavors and contrast, but also the presentation of each dish. In terms of price they match restaurants in Oslo like Kontrast, Pjoltergeist and Bon Lio. That means expectations from guests are pretty high as well.

Inspired by our class at Kulinarisk Akademi, and the fact that it is asparagus season (!), we decided to make Asparagus with Hollandaise sauce. Since we don't have a sous-vide cooker, even though we would like one, we had to do it the traditional way. However, we will explain both methods.

Ingredients
(serves 4 people)

4 white asparagus
4 green asparagus
250 g Røros butter
2 egg yolks
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
A squeeze of lemon juice
A pinch of Maldon salt
1 tbsp pumpkin seeds

Here's how you break it (the asparagus) down

Start by peeling the asparagus, at least the lower part. Snap off the lower part of each asparagus. If you hold it with both hands and start bending, it will snap where it naturally should.

Bring water to boil in a pot. Cook the green asparagus for 2 minutes, and the white asparagus for 4 minutes. Transfer them directly to ice water after the minute marks, to stop the cooking process.

Hollandaise sauce the traditional way:

Melt the butter in one pot*, and bring water to boil in another pot. Set the butter aside, and turn of the heat from the pot with boiling water. Whisk the egg yolks until creamy in a heat proof glass bowl. Place the bowl over the warm water. Slowly start adding melted butter while you whisk heavily. One drop at a time to begin with, and a steady stream once it starts getting the right consistency. Taste with a squeeze of lemon, the balsamic vinegar and Maldon salt. Add a few drops of water if the consistency is too thick still.

* yes, we didn't make clarified butter. From our experience it is not needed, as the milk proteins actually help the emulsion, and we think the sauce gets shiny enough

Hollandaise sauce with sous-vide and espuma:

Place all ingredients in a bag, and vacuum it. Leave for 30 minutes at 75 degrees C in your sous-vide. Fill the espuma bottle with the mix and insert 1 gas filled cylinder. Shake it and leave in the sous-vide bath again until you need it.

Roast the pumpkin seeds in the oven at 150 degrees for 15 minutes. Grill the white and green asparagus in a grill pan for 2 minutes on each side. Plate the dish by pouring the Hollandaise sauce in a perfect circle (like the top picture shows, not the lower one), and place the asparagus on top. Sprinkle roasted pumpkin seeds over.

On the 17th of May you'll be drinking Champagne with this starter of course! We tried Boizel Blanc de Noirs, a champagne made only with Pinot Noir grapes. That means that it is pure white juice from red grapes. It has a silky texture, smells like pears and tastes very fruity and fresh. A good aperitif, but it can easily be paired with fish and other seafood as well.

Kulinarisk Akademi, the culinary academy, offers a variety of cooking classes in Oslo. We attended a course called "basic modern cooking techniques" in Mathallen a few weeks back. Our expectations in advance were greatly exceeded. Not only do you get to learn cooking techniques by highly skilled chefs, but you also get to enjoy a 10-course meal that easily lives up to some of the best restaurants in this city. A great combination for two foodies.

This particular class also taught us a lot about how restaurants are able to serve advanced dishes to a great number of people at very high speed. Mise en place is part of the explanation, of course, but the use of techniques like sous-vide and creative use of equipment like espuma and stab mixers are equally important. As home chefs who sometimes attempt to serve a lot of guests at once, we loved it.

The class was held by chef Marius Martinsen, who has a background from known restaurants in Oslo like Klosteret, Oro and Onda. It turns out Martinsen is not only a good chef, but also a good teacher. He was both entertaining as well as interesting to listen to and skilled in demonstrating the techniques. A younger apprentice was helping out, which further showed how effectively a small team of chefs work together.

The main technique in focus this evening was sous-vide. To sous-vide means to cook under vacuum. You need a vacuum machine and a sous-vide cooker or circulator to get started. You start by vacuum packing the ingredients you want to cook, e.g. a piece of meat, set the temperature of the water bath to desired core temperature of the meat, and leave it to cook for a certain amount of time depending on the meat. The course will teach you how to calculate time and temperatures for different cuts of meat and other ingredients.

At the moment we don't have equipment at home to cook sous-vide ourselves, but that is solely due to the lack of kitchen space. When we get a bigger kitchen one day we will definitely get this cooking wonder. The store Sous Vide Norge in Mathallen sells all the equipment you need and more, and their staff can also teach you a lot about the method as well.

The power of sous-vide + espuma was demonstrated by making a perfect Hollandaise sauce. Marius put all the ingredients you need for the sauce in a bag, vacuumed it and placed it in the sous-vide cooker. Once desired temperature was reached he transferred the now liquid content into the espuma. Loaded it with two gas filled cylinders, shacked it and put it back in the sous-vide until needed. Later on he could apply perfect, airy, rich Hollandaise sauce to the asparagus dish.

We had a great time attending this class, we learned a lot and we ate a superior meal at a very fair price. Kulinarisk Akademi is highly recommended for any foodie or home chef out there, or those who aspire to become one some day!