Hej Hej Stockholm
We were originally flying to Sweden for the weekend to take part in the Vikingarannet, a Swedish skating race across frozen sea ice. The main event is 80km long, starting in Uppsala and ending in Stockholm. Sounds like total madness right? Well we’d opted to take part in the somewhat more manageable 15km race, starting, obviously, much closer to Stockholm. Only Alex’s sister Amber was crazy enough to take on the full 80km, although I think we’re all being dragged into it next year! Anyway as fate would have it, there was a spate of mild weather in the weeks leading up to the race, making the ice unsafe to skate on and resulting in the race being cancelled. Now I’m sure many people found this highly annoying, I however, took it as an excuse to have a bloody good weekend!
We flew in on friday evening and quickly jumped in a cab to our apartment in beautiful Ostermalm where our friends Bec and Nathan were waiting for us, having caught an earlier flight.
We quickly busied ourselves opening a bottle of champagne – it was Valentines day after all; before spending a few hours settling in and getting ready for dinner.
We had a late (10pm) reservation for dinner at a restaurant called Sturehof which happily (given that I was in heels) turned out to be only a 10 minute walk from our apartment.
As it had a bar attached there were doorman who seemed, rather bizarrely to operate on an honour system, asking how old we were and then letting us through without question or asking to see id. Not a perfect system you would imagine. We were quickly whisked through the hustle and bustle of the restaurant to our table by a man dressed in what can only be described as a rather gimmicky looking captains outfit. Luckily however, that is as far as the cheesiness went, the food was divine and the service lovely and attentive.
First to arrive was a basket of crispbreads and the most heavenly whipped butter with herbs and roe. There’s a chance we may have gone through more than one of these – we were starving and it was soooo yummy.
Next up came the starters
Brisket and caper salad for me which is truly one of the best salads I’ve eve had, I’m so sad it’s a flight away.
A traditional Swedish platter of herrings and cheese for Alex, with some accompanying schnapps naturally:
Whilst Bec and Nathan shared the duck liver terrine and the beef carpaccio:
All of these were wolfed down with gusto and greatly enjoyed, all we could do now was excitedly look forward to the mains.
Alex and I both went for the steamed char with oxtail red wine sauce, roasted salsify and mash potato (because really, how good does that sounds?)And Bec and Nathan shared a Sirloin steak and a truffle stuffed chicken, I’m afraid these photos are so bad I won’t subject you to them (ahem, Alex).
We followed up with a crĆØme brĆ»lĆ©e (very good crack on the top) some profiteroles (you can never go wrong) and a rather potent lemon sorbet with vodka. Sadly we were all a few too many glasses of red down to even think about photos at this point and all that was left to do was to wander home and take ourselves to bed.
The next morning, bright-eyed and full of excitement we took ourselves off to Stockholm’s famous food hall for a wander around as well as the odd croque monsieur and cinnamon roll – for which Sweden is famous
After this we spent some time wandering around the Moderna Museet
Before strolling through Gamla Stan (the old town) and up to Sodermalm for hot chocolates at Louie Louie
All that was left to do now was jump in the worlds most expensive taxi (the equivalent of Ā£42 for a 15 minute ride) back to the apartment and start getting ready for the evening ahead.
This is where I’m going to leave you for today but get ready for part two tomorrow xx
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Tales of a London Girl 
looks so nice there , have to visit for sure š lucky you!
you really must go if you get the chance, it’s beautiful š