The Reaper
The first half of today was mostly about Swedish food, which automatically makes any day a good one. Querido isn’t really a fan of fish, but he took my needs into account and decided to make rödspätta (solha, in Portuguese).
We bought the fish from the fishmonger by Willys, so it was of good quality. In this recipe, the fish is breaded, fried in butter and then served with boiled potatoes and a cold sauce made with gräddfil and herbs. The rödspätta is a white fish with a delicate taste, something in need of a little of a kick - and the rest of the ingredients did just that; they complemented it really well and actually made the fish more interesting. I was happy! And no, today’s SOTD won’t be Ocean Man by Ween.
After lunch, Zira came over for a quick coffee with hazelnut syrup. The Saturday of the 30th week of the year had come: it was time for three of the members of Liemannen to meet and jam a little. Z drove us to ICA, where we met with Makko. We bought stupid amounts of vegetarian mince to make tacos at Rackeby before the rehearsal. We also bought some gluten-free tortillas for me, but they decided to humiliate my dietary choices in front of everyone and broke into halves every time I attempted a taco. I am, however, a stubborn soul, so I ate the damn tacos anyway. And the leftovers from lunch. No regrets.
Querido and I opened some beers and took care of dinner while Zira and Makko set things up for the rehearsal in one of the smaller houses in Rackeby. Funnily enough, while the food was being made, Zira’s father told us about his vacation in Madeira, where he tried vinho verde. I must confess that every time a Swede has something nice to say about my country and our wine, it makes me warm and fuzzy inside.
Dinner was fun, tasty and rich in memes. I brought some São Jorge cheese and Zira kindly provided a cheese knife for that and the Västerbotten, my other drug… er… cheese of choice.
After dinner, we went to the cabin. It took some time to set things up, but it was worth it. At least from my perspective, the most important part is that the guys actually managed to meet and play some music, thus keeping the project nourished and alive. There are good things in the horizon for Liemannen. Plus, the new riffs really stuck in my head.
Every once in a while I took breaks from watching the rehearsal to go outside. As I’ve mentioned before, Rackeby really is a special place with an occasional Tolkien vibe, so sitting down and smelling the Summer night was a delight. As sunrise approached, we went back home to catch some sleep.