This week’s small pleasures 493

Thistles and Kiwis

It is very hard to believe we are heading in to our last week in Stockholm. Not only has time flown past, we have fallen into daily routines in our new location. There is a bit more travel to come before we head back to the other side of the world. Anyway, this week we had dinner with friends one night, and with family another night (fish with egg sauce – so delicious and something I need to make – as well as the potatoes with a sort of tapanade), so a lot of eating, drinking and talking has gone on. Add to that good weather (25C on Saturday), another cardamom bun and more asparagus, and the week has been full of small pleasures.

There are signs of the season everywhere, from the tulips in our local park to the magnolia in the garden behind the building the flat we are staying to lots of beautiful lilac. The featured image was lilac spotted outside Moderna Museet.

Another museum

On Wednesday I took the bus out to Stockholm University and the Swedish Museum of Natural History which lies in its grounds. The museum was founded in 1819 and is now housed in a building completed in 1916. The museum is now also home to an IMAX cinema (Cosmonova) as well as its collections of fossils, biodiversity, the polar regions and of course cases of birds and animals from Sweden. As you can imagine, there were lots of school parties running around, but I did manage to get a peaceful moment in the Swedish wildlife section and even try out some of the quizzes.

It certainly is an impressive building, with this not very well photographed dome bringing in light to the building. The museums themes are not really of huge interest to me, but I was there for another reason as you will see below. I did, however, spot a lively pied wagtail on the way to the bus stop back, which you will have to imagine.

Saturday

On Saturday, after a short bus ride, we found ourselves in Östermalm. Supposedly one of the most expensive parts of the city, it is also home to numerous embassies such as Latvia, France (with Greece in the background), Poland.

It is also home to Saluhall at Östermalmstorg. Opened in 1888 it is home to a number of (now) gourmet food stalls. The building was renovated and reopened in 2020, and is also home to restaurants and cafes as well.

Below you can see a couple of stalls, selling meat and deli products. There are naturally several selling fish as you can imagine.

This stall had kroppkakor, a sort of potato based dumpling filled with meat, which you can read about me eating when we went to Öland in 2023. While in the building, look up, and you will see a number of proverbs and saying such as this one Den litet sår Han litet får.

From there we took a long walk back to Moderna Museet for lunch at their really nice cafe. Rather than take the bus back, we took the ferry over to Slussen. Below you can see the view while waiting: the Vasa Museum (which is a wonderful place to visit and comes highly recommended) and Gröna Lund, the Tivoli or fun fair (not for me…!), before catching a bus back to the flat. The third picture is Slussen, taken while waiting for a bus on Sunday afternoon.

Lunches

The reason for my visit to the museum meant I could have lunch with Karl, who is based out at the university during our time here. As with most of the big museums here, they have a restaurant offering a lunch menu. On that day, I had the hake with an avocado cream and chilli sauce. I added a little couscous, two salads and bread, and enjoyed a miniature brownie with a coffee afterwards. On Friday, I tried out the new cafe that has opened up at Sven-Harrys Konstmuseum, Frost Bageri. Their pizzas are supposed to be good, and certainly looked it, but I had a salami and brie sandwich which was very good. The dressing for the salad worked well too.

As I mentioned above, we had lunch on Saturday at Moderna Museet, where Karl enjoyed a ham and cheese toasted sandwich and I had the hot smoked salmon and potato salad with some excellent pickles and lots of veggies. On Sunday we popped into a little cafe we passed on our walk and had….yes cheese and ham toasties.

Simple things

  • Enjoying bright days and light evenings.
  • Walking and seeing so many things to remember.
  • Feeling the warmth of the sun.
  • Being in Stockholm.
  • Having time to read again.
  • Finding this dangerous lovely shop selling all sorts of kitchen things.

What were your small pleasures this week? Here are some other blog posts from a few fellow bloggers looking at the good things in life.

  • Carol Ann shares some more special delights, noticing the small moments that make us smile.
  • Meanwhile Travels Through My Lens shares some images from recent travels.
  • And Natalie smells the roses.
  • The Travel Sketcher goes to Prague and gets to Kator.
  • Mr Tootlepedal goes to the races.
  • While Melissa of Under the Elderberry Tree makes us some tea and sits down for a chat.
  • And Maria is delighted that her oregano survived the Swedish winter.
  • Neal shares his Five Friday Happy Bringers
  • While Jo goes for a walk in Leeds.
  • And Laurie got a lot done in the garden.
  • Ju-Lyn rounds up the changing seasons.
  • And Jo of Story Crumbs updates us on her writing.
  • The Eternal Traveller continues their Adriatic trip.
  • And The Glasgow Gallivanter shows us some doors seen recently in Malta.
  • Finally….Mr Platypus spots a frog.
  • ..…and all the other lovely bloggers out there. Sorry if I have missed anyone…..

Thistles and Kiwis is a Wellington, New Zealand based blog written by Barbara, who likes cats, summer and good food. Thistles and Kiwis can be found on Facebook and Instagram @thistlesandkiwis

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Published by Thistles and Kiwis

Loves summer, sunshine and cats. Beginner gardener, likes eating, cooking and reading about food

33 Comments

  1. Well, I’ll be sorry when your stay in Stockholm is over, selfish me 🙂 ! Have enjoyed walking the streets with you! This week the Saluhall with food exhibits I so would have wanted to see first of all, and photos of all your food AND the lilacs which bring my youth and childhood back so vividly. The Swedish Tivoli – well, it’s rather important for me . . . my Estonian paternal grandfather and my Swedish paternal grandmother met there and were smitten . . . and look what happened . . . 🙂 !

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  3. Those tulips are beautiful, Barbara, and I need to know about the egg sauce with fish? If I ever get to Stockholm I’ll come and read these again. Many thanks for the link, hon xx

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    1. I was really intrigued by the egg sauce, which was a white sauce with small pieces of hardboiled egg and was so delicious. My brother-in-law had put a little lime in it too, so it was so good with the fish. Anyway, I found a recipe in English on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dh3PNtXVCvw

      Seems it was a thing in England back in the day. I need to find a Swedish recipe as well.

      Hope you get to Stockholm as it is a really lovely city.

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    1. It was a great week.

      As I mentioned to Jo above, I did some digging into egg sauce. I am meeting one of my sister-in-laws tonight so will ask her more about it. It was so good!

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  8. I have never been to Sweden, but as someone who was born in a cold, northern climate, I am naturally drawn to Scandinavian countries, and your posts certainly confirm this. Love the blue skies and the flowers. Thanks for the mention!

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  10. Is it already your last week? I can’t believe it.

    I remember the first time my little sister and I visited Cosmonova, and she peed her pants (literally) when the movie started. The movie was about the rain forest and it was very real.

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  12. Pingback: panorama – Touring My Backyard

  14. Nice to see the Latvian flag in Östermalm! 😊

    I haven’t been receiving your blog updates, so I assumed you weren’t blogging anymore. It turns out you’ve been posting all along! Now I have some catching up to do. 🙂

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      1. Take me out of spam, please! 😊

        You know I’m not the type who only shares the good days, so I need your blog in my reader for all those little everyday pleasures and moments. 🙂

        Thank you for sharing your life so openly and for taking the time to acknowledge and support other bloggers as well. It always makes your posts feel even more welcoming.

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