Lessons from the ancestors + farmer's market romesco risotto

Reflections on my trip to Sweden

Hej hej! I spent a wonderful week in Sweden recently with two of my besties. We hadn’t been together, all three of us, since before the pandemic, and it was wonderful getting to take some real time off work & get to be ourselves somewhere new.

L to R: Jackie, myself, and Elizabeth fika-ing at a French teahouse in Stockholm’s Gämla Stan on our first full day in Sweden

Sweden was pretty grand, even though I sprained my ankle walking home from dinner the first night. My friends and I had gone out for dinner at Punk Royale—a restaurant that served a very fancy blind tasting course meal, but with an atmosphere like a bowling alley throwing a rave.

This was the vibe. The blurriness says more than I can about what that night was like.

Loud music, flashing lights, and a fog machine filled the room while servers pretended to not care about what they were serving us. A server poured wine (intentionally) casually that it all out of the glass and onto the table, all over the (wrinkled) white tablecloth. One course was delivered on a spoon the server stuck in front of my face (of course I obediently opened my mouth and he fed me like a baby bird. You’d have done the same thing).

It was Dionysian. I felt like I was being taken under, taken into the depths, led into a ritual that would change me in some ineffable way. The wine (and beer, and vodka) flowed freely.

I went into that dinner planning not to drink too much, but my resolve faltered when a server picked up my half-drank beer bottle, shook her head at me, and put it back down on the table. We’d already been served at least one wine and a shot of vodka since the beer came out, but her message was clear: Drink. So I did. I wanted to be good. I wanted to do Punk Royale right.

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On the walk home, I tripped over a manhole cover and twisted my ankle. I knew it was a bad fall (especially since I had injured this same ankle a few months ago), but in the moment I picked myself up, walked the rest of the way home, got ice cream, hung out in my friends’ hotel room….

I was well enough to recreate The Incident next day

And then I woke up the next morning unable to stand. My friends were great. They helped me get dressed and made my breakfast plate. They let me put my arms around their shoulders and swung me down the street to wait for Uber to the Närakut (urgent care), helped me get into the building and checked in. They would have stayed if I’d asked, but I sent them off to go on our planned walking tour.

I’d wanted to be good. I wanted to do Punk Royale correctly. That’s always something that follows me around: I want to be good. It’s eldest sibling energy. It’s girl-child energy. It’s Virgo energy.

Even before this experience, I was reflecting on my relationship to alcohol. I drink less than I used to, but my hangovers are worse; after a night of drinking, I’m emotionally wrecked the next day. It doesn’t take much. And this wasn't the first time I’d gotten injured after drinking too much. Wasn’t even the first time I’d sprained my ankle as a direct result of drinking too much. And don’t get me started on how many times I’ve skinned my knees…

Emergency room visit from the last time I sprained my ankle after drinking too much, age 22. At least it was after the snack run?

This was the first time I’d gotten injured on my first night in a foreign country, with a week of travel staring me in the face. Was I going to be able to go on the trip that I’d planned for or if would I be spending my Swedish vacation stuck in hotel rooms?

Fortunately, I was lucky. After a few hours in the Närakut, I learned that nothing was broken, and with crutches, painkillers, and an ankle wrap, I was scooting along on the cobblestones that afternoon. Apart from that walking tour, I didn’t miss out on anything. By the end of the trip, I barely even needed the crutches.

I hiked down to the beach with no crutches. Though you wouldn’t know it from the photo because I’m not in it! Hee hee.

I came to Sweden looking for some kind of connection to my heritage. My mom’s side of the family is all Swedish. Before she died, she gave me a ring from her grandmother, still in its original box with a Stockholm address on it. I brought that ring and one of my mother’s bracelets with me to Sweden.

This whole experience felt like my ancestors giving me a warning like HEY, you gotta stop drinking (but we’re not going to ruin your whole vacation over it) (this time). It’s a message I listened to. For the rest of the trip, I abstained from alcohol, and it led to one of my favorite drinks I’ve ever had: an alcohol-free mojito that I ordered blind at an Ethiopian restaurant in Gothenberg.

Gothenberg was so beautiful (even if driving in it was…. another story)

Once I took a break from alcohol on vacation, it’s been easier to mostly abstain since I’ve gotten home. It turns out I don’t really like the taste of alcohol itself—something I always sort of knew, but definitely has been validated. I just want a fun little drink! I don’t want a fun little drink that lies to me, tells me I want more and more and more until I’m too loud and I can’t keep my mouth shut and everything is spinning and feels horrible.

In the end, I think I did do Punk Royale correctly. Or at least, how I needed to do it. Like all good Dionysian rituals, I went into the cave, got altered, had a time that teetered on the edge of fun and frightening, ended up changed.

One of my favorite moments: dipping my hands into the ocean at one of our campsites along the southern coast, thanking my ancestors for their attention to me.

Travel doesn’t always change you in the ways you expect it to, but in my experience it’s usually changed me in ways I needed to be changed. When I think about my trip to Sweden, this story surfaces as the first story. This is the one that makes me feel like I did Sweden right—I wanted to get in touch with my ancestors. It wasn’t what I expected, but I certainly felt like they spoke to me! I clarified my relationship to myself. I solidified my relationships with my friends. I love you!

We fell in love with the Preem bear. (Peep that green lanyard around my neck—those were the keys to our campervan. I drove in a foreign country, y’all!)

Thanks for reading this—let me know if you’ve had travel experiences that changed you in unexpected ways too. I love hearing about them :)

Now it’s time to send and be done and move on, because the RT post after next will be Dino Nuggie Risotto and I know you’re all frothing at the mouth for that one.

Romesco Sauce Risotto

This romesco sauce is taken from Vegetarian Heartland by Shelly Westerhausen. Apart from a fondness for a name twin, I just adore this cookbook. I bought it when I moved to Indiana, and it helped ease the transition to living there without much in the way of friends or family. It came with me to Alabama and now back to Illinois, and everywhere I’ve gone I’ve sought comfort in her interpretations of cozy comfort food with a healthy, vegetable-y twist. It’s like it was written just for me.

I just didn’t take a picture of it! Surprise!

Romesco Sauce

• 1 15-oz can cannellini beans

• 1 14-oz jar of roasted red peppers in water, drained

• 4 cloves of garlic, peeled

• 1/2 raw almonds

• 1/3 c tomato paste

• 1 bunch parsley, leaves & tender stems only

• 1/4 c red/white wine vinegar, or rice vinegar, or other gentle vinegar

• 1 tsp smoked paprika

• 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes

• 1/2 c good extra virgin olive oil

Risotto

• 1 box vegetable stock or 1 tbsp Better than Bouillon vegetable base

• 1 tbsp olive oil

• 1 onion, diced

• 1 c arborio rice

• 1/2 cup dry white wine

• 1/2 c Parmesan or similar hard cheese

• Juice of 1/2 lemon

Roasted Vegetables

• About 5 cups (total) of whatever vegetables look good at the market, like:

• A bell pepper

• A handful of asparagus, broken into 2-3” sections

• A pint of cherry tomatoes

• A head of broccoli and/or cauliflower

• A bundle of radishes, halved

• A few carrots

• An onion, chopped into big sections

• A potato, large diced

• 2 tbsp olive oil

• 1 tsp chili powder

• salt & pepper

• 1/2 lemon

Make the Romesco Sauce

Add everything except the olive oil to a food processor. Begin to process and stream the olive oil in while it is running. Process until sauce reaches a smooth consistency. Set aside.

Note: You will need about 2 cups of romesco sauce for this recipe. Refrigerate or freeze the rest. It’s excellent over a grain bowl or even as a pasta sauce.

Make the Vegetables

Prep your vegetable array so that the pieces are approximately equal in size. Add to a large bowl and toss with olive oil, chili powder, salt and pepper. Divide between 2 baking trays.

Preheat the oven to 425 when you start the risotto. After about 20 minutes, put the vegetable trays in the oven. Cook for 25 minutes, rotating pans halfway through. They should finish near when the risotto finishes; if the vegetables finish first, turn the oven off but leave the trays inside until the risotto is ready.

Finish vegetables by combining onto one tray and squeezing the 1/2 lemon over.

Make the Risotto.

Set a pot of salted vegetable broth to boil, then bring down to a simmer.

Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a Dutch oven until hot. Add the onion and cook, stirring often, until it’s completely translucent and tender. If it starts to take on color, lower the heat or add 1/2 cup of water to the pan and let the water cook off.

Add the rice and stir for a minute or two, until it’s glassy and chatters when it hits the sides of the pan.

Add the wine and stir until it’s completely absorbed.

Add the broth, about 1/2 cup at a time, until rice is tender and creamy and almost done.

Add the romesco sauce as the broth about 1/2 cup at a time, stirring. Taste. Add more of the reserved romesco sauce if desired, or more of the broth if you don’t want more romesco flavor but the rice isn’t quite done. Ensure the rice consistency is creamy and not chalky at all.

Add parmesan and stir to combine. Add lemon juice and stir. Taste, add more salt or lemon as needed.

Top with the roasted red vegetables and a few fresh leaves of parsley.