Smörgåstårta: Celebrating Midsommar 🌞💐🌾
Last week I published this beautiful recipe: Strawberry layer cake.
This week I wanted to bring you a cake recipe, but with savoury flavours.
I’ve always ben a fan of off-colours and off-flavours. You know, like when you’re watching a TV series and they change the colours of something that always has the same colour.
I love that. Remember Super Mario? Yoshi has always been a character that makes me want to play videogames. I only played to get Yoshi. The games where Yoshi wasn’t there, were boring for me.
Then, they made this thing where you could do a trick and go to a star shaped world and Yoshi was off-colours in each mini-world. Oh yeah… The day I discovered that place, it felt like heaven. I didn’t want to advance in the game and whenever it was my turn I went to those worlds where you could get a Yellow, Pink, Blue or whatever-the-colour Yoshi.
The same happens with flavours. Whenever I see a dish that’s supposed to be savoury but it’s sweet, or the other way around…I feel like…What’s happening here? In a very good, rascally way. As if I made something for that to happen 😂
I know I’m weird, you don’t have to point it out. But I’m sure there’s more people like me. Would love to hear from you to create the Off-club. For those who like off-things. Any enquiries to be part of it, you can leave a comment or send me an e-mail.
But if there’s something I deeply love is celebrating everything in the world. Midsommar is one of those celebrations that I can’t avoid even if I tried to.
The changes of the season, Solstices and Equinoxes, are my weakness. Or maybe my strongest point.
We have a very important tradition in Galicia about it. La noche de San Juan (the night of the 23rd June) we make bonfires. We witches go gather herbs and water to make the cacho.
Cacho is the traditional name, it’s our own particular blend of plants, and in my case I keep doing that thing about the water from different springs.
The herbs are placed outside to get all that nice dew from the bonfires and the next day we clean our faces with that water. That’s my only beauty ritual. It’s said to make you look pretty all year round.
Like most traditions, I do it because I love the smell and it feels so good on my skin. Also, I’m a herbalist at heart…and I do that professionally too. Herb blends are one of my fortes. Oh, you didn’t know? Well, there’s many sides of a Sílvia 😂.
As flowers, fruit and herbs mean Summer to me, I made this Smörgåstårta (Sandwich layer cake) because I feel like it’s the perfect party pleaser. It’s quick and easy to prepare and it feeds many people.
I made a pescetarian recipe, because I eat fish every now and then, but it can be made vegetarian just by substituting the fish and shrimp for smoked and regular tofu.
In case you are vegan, use vegan mayo and cream cheese and if you are a coeliac or don’t tolerate gluten well…there’s marvellous gluten free sandwich bread.
Life is easier each day for those with intolerances or just people that don’t eat like everyone else in general. I’m thrilled about that.
Of course, you don’t have to decorate with store bought pansies, you can go pick your own flowers…or skip that in case you feel like it’s too much. But I truly recommend adding some flowers to evoke that summery feeling.
You can go pick flowers to make crowns and for the cacho. Then add some of them to the cake to decorate.
Each layer has a different flavour, but if you wish…use just one filling to make your life simpler. I made them different because I loved the variety of colours.
My favourite addition was the beetroot layer. I doubted if I wanted to add it or not, but the texture was very nice and made a huge difference visually.
If you don’t want your layers to be tinted with the juice of the beetroot, place this layer on the base. That way, it won’t get mixed with the shrimp or avocado layer. I don’t mind that, so I put it third. I’m not a perfectionist when it comes to food, I want flavours to be as good as it gets…looks come after taste.
Also, I usually don’t make the same recipe twice, lik…ever! so it has to be “perfect” the first time to take the photos 😂.
Smörgåstårta - Sandwich Layer Cake
Prep Time 45 minutes
Cook Time 15 minutes
Servings 6 people
Ingredients
Filling 1
- 1 avocado
- 100 g smoked salmon
- 1 bunch parsley
- 1 scallion
- 1/2 lemon zest
- garlic sprouts
- salt & pepper
Filling 2
- 1 cup prawns
- 2 tbsp mayonnaise
- 4 tbsp yogurt
- 1 bunch dill
- salt & pepper
Filling 3
- 1 big beetroot
- 1 thumb ginger
- 1/4 red onion
- 1 tbsp red seaweed caviar (or any type of red roe)
- salt & olive oil
Filling 4
- 2 eggs hard boiled
- 1 cup arugula
- 5 tbsp plain yogurt
- 2 tbsp black seaweed caviar
- 1/2 cucumber
- salt and pepper
For the frosting
- 100 g crème fraîche
- 3 tbsp mayonnaise
- 200 g cream cheese
For the "sponge"
- 10 slices whole wheat bread (crustless)
For the decoration
- edible flowers
- radishes
- cucumber (sliced)
- fresh dill
Instructions
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Boil the eggs, beetroot and the prawns separately. I used small prawns, but as you will dice them, you can use bigger ones.
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Once they are cook, grate the beetroot and the ginger.
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Slice the red onion and keep it in cool water
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Let the eggs and praens cool completely before mixing with the rest of the ingredients.
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Chop, dice and mince every ingredient in each layer.
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Mix all of the ingredients in each layer.
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Assemble 2 slices of bread and add the first filling on top.
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Do the same with the rest of the layers.
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Mix the ingredients for the "frosting" and make sure all the bread is covered.
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Add the decorations to your taste.
Recipe Notes
Make it vegetarian:
Change smoked salmon for sliced smoked tofu.
Swap the shrimp for regular firm tofu and chopped nori sheets.
Instead of boiled egg, use some silken tofu and, if you fancy, volcanic salt.
Make it vegan:
Change everything on top and use vegan cream cheese and mayo. Swap the crème fraîche for more cream cheese or vegan crème fraîche.
Make it Gluten-free:
Use gluten-free bread, removing the crusts.
I hope you enjoy the Summer from its first day.
If you need more Summer Recipes, here’s a couple of them you might like.
Empedrat (cold bean salad)
Enjoy the recipe. Share it with your friends and family and with me if you want through my social media at Instagram, Facebook or Twitter. Have fun and keep fooding!
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