[slis] Norwegian-American dessert recipe

["Bill Musser" <wmusser@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu>]

Greetings, SLISers.

The following recipe was requested by a number of those present at the SLIS
picnic this evening. This favorite Norwegian-American dessert is bad news
for your arteries, but oh, what a way to go...!

Here's the recipe for rømmegrøt (the word typically used by the
Norwegian-American community for this peasant food;  the original
_Norwegian_ version of this was made with sour cream ("rømme" literally
means "sour cream"; the version we like was originally called "fløtegrøt",
or "sweet cream porridge", but hey, we're not cultural fundamentalists or
ethnic purists, so we'll call it rømmegrøt anyway!). This is not the
traditional way of making it, either, but it tastes good, so it deserves to
live on... It is the favorite recipe used for food days at the
Norwegian-American Museum in Decorah, and it comes to me via a good friend
and long-time employee of the Museum, Agnes (Keefe) Forde.

You need:
4 c. (1 qt.) whole milk
1 c. Half-and-half or thick cream
1/2 lb. (2 sticks) butter, salted
3/4 c. all-purpose flour
1/2 c. sugar
sugar/cinnamon mixture for topping
1-2 T. of melted butter for topping

--Pour milk & cream (1/2 & 1/2) in pan and heat on medium/medium high,
stirring to keep from scorching (start this a few minutes before the next
step)
While milk is heating:
--Melt 2 sticks of butter in large, flat stainless steel pan using
medium/medium high heat
--When butter is completely melted, stir in flour with whisk
--Cook flour in butter for 5 min., stirring constantly (watch the temp on
this; it can burn easily)
  [This part is much like making a white sauce, I am told]
Ideally, your milk will be scalding hot at about the same time that your
flour is cooked.
THEN--Pour hot milk slowly into the butter/flour mixture and stir vigorously
with whisk
--Continue stirring for several minutes while mixture thickens
--When mixture starts to bubble, pour in sugar and mix thoroughly
--Pour rømmegrøt into glass serving dish, sprinkle cinnamon/sugar mixture
over whole top, and pour melted butter over it

(You can make a lower cal version of this which actually tastes pretty good.
No cream or 1/2 and 1/2, just 2% milk. Use canola oil margarine, but NOT
water-based, low-fat margarines!! Slightly less sugar. Tastes pretty good
and a little less arteriosclerotic.)

Bill

-------------------------
William M. Musser
School of Library and Information Science
3087 Main Library, University of Iowa
Iowa City, IA 52242
william-musser@uiowa.edu
-------------------------
Home: 304 Kimball Rd.
      Iowa City, IA 52245
Home phone: 319-341-4255
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Website:
http://mingo.info-science.uiowa.edu/~musser/