How do You Grill Your Cheese?

Every now and then someone asks me what it’s like living in the middle of the forest. These are generally not Swedish people. Swedes know what it’s like. Sweden is a forest.

After we go through the standards (It’s quiet, It’s green, It’s private, It’s beautiful, and We got critters), the prospects of duck acquisition always come up.

Where’s the closest grocery store?
Do you have a movie theatre?
How do you survive the winters?

Which sometimes lead into

Are you depressed?
Do you worship Satan?

But that’s another blog.

Sure, living in the middle of fucking nowhere has its complications. Brief answers to the aforementioned questions are:

Our closest grocery store is 21 km / 13 miles away, in Grythyttan, a hustling and bustling center of economic activity. Here you will also find the gas station and the bank. The bank has been closed for about a year now, but is still a prominent feature of the town square.

We do not have a movie theatre. The last film that I saw was that Narnia thingy, in Stockholm, around Christmas. Right. Christmas. Around Oscar time, I had a conversation with my mother that went something like this: “Haven’t seen it…. Haven’t seen it… Haven’t seen it… Haven’t seen it…) Oh well.

We survive the winters thanks to the fact that our severe depression causes us to huddle together for warmth in the middle of the kitchen floor. “It’s a Wonderful Life” loops continuously in the living room, if only to remind us that this, too, will end. Incidentally, we have given 4,678,312 angels their wings. Which feels good. Every now and then I throw another piece of furniture into the wood-burning stove and do a little satanic dance. We survive the winters just fine.

Another very popular way to survive the Swedish winters is to get the hell out of Dodge. Swedes are the quintessential charter travellers. That Sanna and I are heading down to Barcelona on Monday is no anomaly. For my criminally minded friends out there – come on over, fill up a shipping container. This is the time. Sweden is dead, nobody's here. Prime Minister Göran Persson is actually a hologram during February, March and April of every year. He’s down in Málaga, sipping on the juice while his hologram escorts Foreign Minister Laila Freivalds out the door.

As a rule, getting duck around here is tough. It requires discipline and determination. During the winters, forget about it. Winters in Sweden are rather lovely for about 6-8 weeks. Like through Christmas, pretty much. After that, things get heavy. The worst part is this time of year, especially when it feels like the winter is not gonna let go, not gonna give up. The day before yesterday, coincidentally the first day of spring, it snowed all day long. Every day this week it has been between –15 and –5 (C) in the mornings, and then hovers around the big ZERO for the rest of the day. Hard to leave the house, let alone figure out what the day’s duck is.

THAT BEING SAID, yesterday’s quest for duck came in the form of a grilled cheese sandwich. One of my favorite culinary memories from childhood involves the taste and smell and feel and crunch of a grilled cheese sandwich. Grilled cheese sandwiches are always best when served at a snack bar, café or greasy spoon. There’s something about the ooze of the cheese and the smell of the toasted white bread that still makes me all giddy. The best one that I’ve EVER had came thanks to that rock of a culinary establishment: Denny’s. Not the most nutrient-rich, hell no, not the prettiest (I remember it being squarely square and plastic looking) … but the BEST. It was actually the first time that I ventured away from the basic grilled cheese and opted for a grilled cheese and tomato sandwich. I can’t even begin to try to explain the sensations that occurred throughout my body, from my taste buds to my testicles. It was surreal.

And still is. I regularly try variations of the sandwich, coming close to achieving duck, but never getting there. Yesterday’s was a hit, mind you, a simple version with a nicely melting, slightly “processed” cheese. (I don’t really know what this means, and don’t care to look into it. This is tricky, finding the right cheese. Good, pure cheeses don’t melt very well, they secrete liquid, bubble and hiss and then just sort of go limp. Which is why those damn snack bars had it down – Those classic individually wrapped American cheese slices did the trick… What “American cheese” actually is is still debatable. At the same time, you should be able to slice the cheese you choose, not squirt it out of a tube…that’s nasty.) I buttered the outside of the sandwiches (which I had filled with smoked turkey, sliced tomatoes, and a couple drops of a smoky jalapeno salsa) and then just flipped away, adding butter to the bread, not to the pan, as needed. I think it’s key to flip like it’s going out of style and keep those bitches moving. This way you’re in total control of the desired toastiness and can get them the hell off as soon as they reach the perfect golden color.

I chewed, swallowed and enjoyed, looking out the window at all that white shit everywhere. Ah, to be in the forests of Barcelona instead.

A Quest for Duck?

Life’s little episodes are sometimes unforgettable. And that can be a problem. The fact that it is often quite difficult to forget amazing experiences often creates an inner desire to go back to that place to experience that thing again, only to realize that that thing, whatever it was … is gone. Or different. Or not as amazing.

But we want it so badly that we keep trying and trying to get it. Are we disappointed when we don’t get it again? Sometimes. Do we immediately think of the next attempt? Often. Do we accept the fact that it can’t be obtained? Never. And that’s good.

We are all on … each and every one of us … an eternal quest for good duck.

I’ll explain. Several years ago on a trip to London, I ate the most amazing duck ever. It was juicy, it was crispy, it was gorgeous and sexy. Before that duck experience, I was not a duck man. I had been used to being served mediocre duck, so had completely quit ordering it. On the duckulence scale, mediocre duck is better than bad duck, true. But on the overall scale of taste and palatability, mediocre duck ranks right there next to lutfisk. In other words, about one in seven people likes mediocre duck. I am not that one.

My London duck experience, at Gung Ho in West Hampstead, changed all that. I sat and enjoyed the bird, completely oblivious to the world around me. As I slowly chewed away on these perfect morsels of tangy fowl, I realized that my life was about to change. The room was suddenly aglow with a rich, vivid golden colour.

I had been knighted. I had been chosen. I was the one. I would surrender my mortal existence and scrap everything to start anew.

From that point on, I have been on a magical quest for good duck.

My pilgrimage took me next to San Francisco. (Which was convenient because I lived there at the time and had to get back to work.) The next few months had me ducking in and out of shady little establishments in Chinatown and ordering duck in advance from more “reputable” restaurants. Duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, goose, I just never found it. I ate more duck during the months that followed my return from London than a mad coyote.

Truthfully, I am aware of the fact that I had some pretty damn good duck during that escapade. I am willing to admit that now. But at the time (before the intervention and rehabilitation), no fucking way. I could not bring myself to find the good duck, even if you duck-taped me naked to a chair force fed me with it. (Why naked? Why not?) Though rational about the whole thing now (sort of), I am still on that quest to get the good duck. And always will be.

The funny thing is that I returned to Gung Ho in West Hampstead a couple years ago. And ordered the duck, of course... Drum roll, please: It wasn’t that good. I mean… it was good, but it wasn’t THAT good. I don’t think it ever will be. But who cares. After all, it’s not about whether you get the duck or not, it’s about how you… yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever.

This blog is not about fowl. Nor is it really about food, though many of my duck hunts involve food, so I may throw in the occasional idea or recipe now and then. But essentially, this metaphorical duck that I am now after is the same one that you are chasing. It’s that duck that you experienced as a child when you got your very first pet. It’s the time you got ducked for the first time in the back of your old VW. It’s those ducky, deep, late night talks that you had with that first girl/boyfriend. The duck is all that stuff and more. It’s all of those things that sparked your interest, that made you curious, that set you on your own quest.

This site will be updated weekly with adventures, stories, dreams, exaggerations, yodels and recipes, all of which will help in detailing my quest for good duck. I’ll come very close to it, that much I know. But don’t be surprised if I loosen my grasp just enough to let it slip through my fingers just when you think that the pounce is unavoidable. Because to finally get the good duck sort of means, well, GAME OVER. And I’m not quite there yet - I just put my quarters in.

An Early Duck Attempt

an early attempt to get the good duck