The 17th of May was always a favourite day back home in Oslo. It is Norway’s national day, or birthday if you like and it is a day celebrated with great pride, warmth, openness and good spirits.
Our traditions back home followed a similar pattern each year. Being old farts we didn’t go out and get hammered on the night of the 16th (traditional). So the celebrations started for us on the morning of the 17th. Firstly, we would dress in our finest, neither of us owning the traditional Norwegian national costume we would dress in Sunday best suits and pretty summer dresses accordingly. We normally hosted a champagne breakfast for a few close friends to enjoy a slap-up breakfast and bubbles would flow. After that we walked down town, to the kings palace amount the throngs of people also dressed to the nines, waving flags and praying for a nice spring day.
A procession of marching bands would troop past the king and along the main street of Oslo, as the sidewalks were lined with cheering, hot dog eating, flag waving families. After the bands cleared out we would find a nice park to sit in with friends, or if the weather was less enticing a balcony or living room of a friend. Champagne would continue to flow, along with cakes of all shapes, sizes and colours. This continued until the early evening when we would pick our way homeward to get out of our finest and wind down the evening resting feet that don’t normally see dress shoes and need to be up on the sofa.
So, how do we achieve this on Itchy Foot?! It wasn’t easy but between us we had a good stab at it.
The morning started slowly, no champagne breakfast this time, with Jon taking school with Teo and Mia and Tina taking watch and choosing outfits for the day. Just before lunch Jon started making, if you ask him, the most importantly part of the 17th of May; the cakes. First up, separating the egg whites for the Kransekake, not easy when the eggs are 15 days old and the yokes and the whites start to run together – they are still perfectly safe to eat (boy can you tell when they aren’t) but impossible to separate. So, lunch quickly became scrambled eggs on toast (all the eggs that wouldn’t separate) and eight eggs later Jon had separate out two whites.
After lunch the cake making continued. Thanks to a lovely couple we met in Vista Mar Marina (Becca and John from Halcyon) we had some almonds onboard. For Kransekake you combine equal weights ground almonds and icing sugar with a little bit of flour. Then stir in whisked egg whites until it gets to be a dry but workable texture. Now, where did we put the Kransekake rings?! Never fear we’ll make some out of aluminium foil. Roll into cigar sized sticks, put in tinfoil forms and then bake in the oven for 12 minutes at 200C. Then allow to rest for an hour and they are frankly amazing with a cup of coffee.
Next cake!
Oreo No-bake Cheesecake! Thanks for Nahanni land support and to Tina’s mum for getting a few recipes online and emailing them to us. Life savers. This one was easy. Crush the Oreo cookies, spoon some into the bottom of ramekins (or jars in our case). Then mix a packet of cream cheese with a can of condensed milk…. wait…. Jon threw out the can of condensed milk as it looked like it was rusting. Oh, wait. How about just adding less water to powdered milk and then keep adding sugar until it tastes right? Yup, that works. So combine the cream cheese with the ‘condensed milk’ and stir in a bunch of ground Oreo cookies. Pour over the top and then stick the jar in the fridge until you are ready to devour.
After getting dressed in our finest – Jon found a lovely piece of red webbing we had spare which made a perfect tie – we enjoy coffee and Kransekake. Then turn up the Ah-ha music and parade around the deck waving our homemade flags. The sun was starting to set and the sea was calm, beautiful. Tina made a lovely evening meal and we decided that we had reached our cake limit for the day and so the cheese cakes will wait until tomorrow.
We miss many things from Noway. Good friends, the beautiful country, a cosy apartment, going to concerts, music day, the 17th of May to name but a few. It was a bitter sweet treat to have such a warm reminder of a place we call home.
Nothing much else to report from the day, the winds were on the light side, but we still made around 5-6 knots on average. The sea is calmer now and even Teo commented on how much easier life in onboard when the waves calm down. We continue on our rhumb line course to our destination and tomorrow I think we’ll celebrate our half-way mark. The champagne is already in the fridge chilling.