Juuri Sapas is a not quite Michelin starred newbie on the Helsinki scene. Popular and recommended by some of my husband’s gourmand cousins, we were eager to try it. Sapas is like tapas, albeit slightly smaller, small plates of food.

We’re meeting my husband’s cousins whom he hasn’t seen in about 20 years. They’re Helsinki natives and love fine dining and a good drop of wine so we are eager to take advantage of their knowledge of the city. The menu is contemporary Finnish cuisine with a lot of local ingredients and native foods which makes it rather exciting. All 4 mains are savoury and sweet and have meat combined with a fruit in some way. There are some little issues, a couple of people at the table have to ask for new plates as they were given dirty ones, my husband having to ask for a new plate twice.

The Sapas are €3.50 each and we choose the Lingonberry marinated salmon on maltbread, tarragon garlic oil; raspberry marinated arctic char with radish sauce; smoked small perche from Pielinen with egg sauce; crayfish cottage cheese filled cabbage leaves with melted dill butter; fresh sausages a la Juuri with vodka mustard; terrine of reindeer liver with jelly made of berries; smoked lamb with gooseberry jam.

Array of 3 breads

Carrot butter

We’re given a large basket of 3 different breads with a carrot butter. The carrot butter is interesting, distinctly carroty in taste but with the creaminess of butter.

Lingonberry marinated salmon on maltbread, tarragon garlic oil €3.50

The salmon is gorgeous, lightly sweetened with the lingonberries and perched on top of the maltbread which soaks up the tarragon and garlic oil nicely. It’s much better than regular marinated salmon.

Raspberry marinated arctic char with radish sauce €3.50

The slender slice of arctic char resembles salmon in texture but is a whitefish. I’m not usually a fan of radishes but the sauce is creamy enough but still retains the radish flavour.

Smoked small perche from Pielinen with egg sauce €3.50

The small smoked fish are intensely flavoured whilst the egg sauce is an interesting accompaniment. The fish aren’t too dry and the sauce is delicious.

Crayfish cottage cheese filled cabbage leaves with melted dill butter €3.50

The stuffed cabbage leaves resembles a small spring roll but the taste is distinctly different. The sauce is gloriously delicious, with a honeyed tone to it. It’s one of my favourite dishes as well as my husband’s although anything with crayfish is a winner with me.

Fresh sausages a la Juuri with vodka mustard €3.50

The tiny sausages aren’t particularly distintive and the mustard isn’t particularly vodka-ey. It’s a bit of a disappointment given there are so many other delicious dishes.

Terrine of reindeer liver with jelly made of berries €3.50

The pate like reindeer liver terrine is delicious and unusual. Distinctly different from other liver terrines or pates it is enhanced by the berry jelly. If only we had some little toast points to eat it with.

Smoked lamb with gooseberry jam €3.50

The smoked lamb is very smokey in aroma and I’m not sure about the gooseberry jam with it. Although the lamb is delicious when I dip it in the other sauces.

Grilled salsify with rosehip jam €3.50

Pike quenelle in wild herb bouillion €3.50

Beetroot and nut stew with small mushrooms €3.50

Eggcheese spiced with oregano baked on top of straws €3.50

Willowherb asparagus €3.50

Roasted swede with cauliflower puree €3.50

Mains menu

The mains we choose are the Wild Boar Ribs with apple butter and vegetables cooked in beef stock, Organic Lamb Tenderloin with dark orange bolete sauce and fried organic barley porridge and Artic Char (a fish native to Finland) braised in whitecurrant wine, jeruselum artichoke puree, beetroot sauce and parsnip chips.

Wild Boar Ribs with apple butter and vegetables cooked in beef stock €22.50

My Wild boar ribs with apple puree, dutch carrots and other vegetables are absolutely divine, sticky sweet and soft they completely conquer regular pork ribs or any other ribs I’ve had. I almost sob that I know that I can’t get them in Australia and I begrudgingly give some to my sister and husband, knowing that they will love them too.

Organic Lamb Tenderloin with dark orange bolete sauce and fried organic barley porridge €25.50

The Lamb is soft and tenderly pink inside and the accompaniment of fried porridge is delicious. It’s similar to fried polenta but softer and stickier. Like Chinese radish cake or something similar in texture although not in taste. The dark orange bolete sauce is a midly sweet accompanying sauce.

Artic Char braised in whitecurrant wine, jeruselum artichoke puree, beetroot sauce and parsnip chips €22.50

The fantastic looking Arctic Char with a streak of fuchsia beetroot puree as mentioned before tastes like salmon whilst being a whitefish.The artichoke puree and beetroot sauce not only providing visual contrast  to the fish but also flavour that never overpowers the fish.

Fried perch fillets with Finnish original onion and tomato salad, rhubarb sauce and new potatoes €22.50

Dessert menu

Chocolate cake de capo with seabuckthorne mousse €7

Although we are full we can’t pass up on the desserts-there’s one that has caught my eye-the chocolate cake de capo with seabuckthorn mousse. My husband’s cousins tell us the seabuckthorne is actually used in a medicinal sense-whenever someone is feeling ill or coming down with something, they take some seabuckthorne juice. So not only is it tasty but good for you. The chocolate cake resembles a brownie and the mousse a sweet slightly tangy tamarillo mousse. It’s finished with a streak of thick butterscotch sauce.

Selection of Finnish cheeses and crowberry jelly €7.50

My sister orders the cheese plate and when it arrives, with 4 small cubes of cheese with crowberry jelly €7.50. I don’t have the heart to ask her to share any of her tiny 4 cubes with me and she reports back that 1 was “ok” but the rest were unmemorable. She actually wanted to spit out one of the hard cheeses. Not to mention the tiny portions. The crowberry jelly is more like a syrup than a jelly and honeyed in taste although the consistency doesn’t lend itself to all of the cheeses.

Seasonal sorbet Rhubarb €5

We sample some of the Rhubarb sorbet, intriguingly it’s a forest green shade. it tastes like a fruit and vegetable juice, almost like parsley or another herb has been added to the rhubarb.

Rosehip and white chocolate ice cream with marinated strawberries €7

Later, we head off to Mecca bar, an ultra chic and a bit posey bar populated by Helsinki’s beautiful people. We’re persuaded to try the Sweet Salty licorice drink. It’s a glisteningly black tar shot glass and even the smell at a short distance is heady with aniseed. I take a sip, after all I’m not a big licorice fan and indeed it is just like the salty sweet licorice lollies. My husband adores this and wants to buy a bottle.

We leave whilst the night is still young, after all in the Midnnight Sun season, night never falls.

Juuri Sapas

Korkeavuorenkatu 27
00130 Helsinki
Tel. +358 9 635732
www.juuri.fi
Reservation: ravintola@juuri.fi
Seats: 34+6
Open: Mon-Fri 11–24, Sat 12–24, Sun 14–20

I know that I’m cheating ever so slightly when I used white nectarines instead of peaches. We had just purchased a huge bounty of them and I just knew that the delicate blush of the white nectarines would look fabulous alongside the gorgeous, vividly hued raspberry sauce and the tiny black flecked vanilla bean ice cream.

If you feel like this is a one trick pony and can’t be bothered making it again, the poaching liquid is fabulous with some sparkling on a hot, sweltering day and it certainly looks like Sydney’s weather is coming out to play these few days! Hence the almost melting photos…

Peach Melba

Peaches:

• 3 cups/700ml water
• 3 1/2 cups/700grams sugar
• 1 vanilla pod, split lengthwise
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 8 peaches

Raspberry sauce:

• 3 cups raspberries
• 25g icing sugar
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice

To serve:

• 1 large tub vanilla ice cream

1. Put the water, sugar, lemon juice, and vanilla pod into a wide saucepan and heat gently to dissolve the sugar. Bring the pan to the boil and let it bubble away for about 5 minutes, then turn the heat down to a fast simmer. Cut the peaches in half, and if the stones come out easily then remove them, if not then you can get them out later.

The poached fruit to be peeled and stoned

2. Poach the peach halves in the sugar syrup for about 2 to 3 minutes on each side depending on the ripeness of the fruit. Test the cut side with the sharp point of a knife to see if they are soft, and then remove them to a plate with a slotted spoon. When all the peaches are poached, peel off their skins and let them cool (then you can remove any remaining stones). If you are making them a day in advance then let the poaching syrup cool and then pour into a dish with the peaches. Otherwise just bag up the syrup and freeze it for the next time you poach peaches.

3. To make the raspberry sauce, liquidize the raspberries, confectioners’ sugar, and lemon juice in a blender or a food processor. Sieve to remove the pits and pour the puree into a jug.

4. To assemble the Peach Melba, allow 2 peach halves per person and sit them on each plate alongside a scoop or 2 of ice cream. Spoon the raspberry sauce over each.

From Feast by Nigella Lawson

I’ll put my hand up right now, I’m not a huge fan of trifle. My husband however is something of a jelly monster as well as a custard monster and could eat a whole trifle if given the chance. Indeed, I’ve turned my back one afternoon to find an entire trifle completely demolished. So it is for him that I made this Raspberry and Lemongrass trifle. The recipe doesn’t actually call for the requisite jelly so I made some raspberry jelly and added it in. Trying it completely changed my mind about trifle. The sweet ever so slightly tart raspberries are gorgeous against the thick vanilla custard, cushioney sponge and velvety whipped cream. I couldn’t really taste the lemongrass in this recipe so overpowering were the luscious raspberries. And I couldn’t do a trifle without spreading a thin layer of raspberry jam. Overkill? Perhaps a little but a trifle is an exercise in just that.

Nigella’s Raspberry and Lemongrass Trifle

Trifle is the perfect thing to cook when you’ve got protracted time to busy yourself quietly in the kitchen. No one stage stakes long, but the whole needs to be lingered over. And if it sounds odd to suggest steeping the sponges in a syrup flavoured with lemongrass, I should say that I first had the idea when making a syrup with lemon balm for some jelly. If you’ve got a garden, this is easy to come by, but if you haven’t there is no way you can buy it. I tried, then, substituting lemongrass, weight for weight, and it worked beautifully. By the same token, if you have got verbena in the garden then do use that here. But since there isn’t a supermarket around that doesn’t major in lemongrass- and indeed its far more familiar to us that the indigenous lemon balm-this recipe, which first found shape in an Observer article on cooking traditional British foods with new “fusion” ingredients, is actually a good reminder that you can plunder the past without scorning the present.

• 600ml water
• 400g caster sugar
• 50g lemongrass, 3-4 sticks cut in half lengthwise
• 300g fresh raspberries
• 16 store bought ladyfingers/sponge fingers (I used a vanilla sponge cake)
• 3-4 tablespoons vodka
• 600ml single cream
• 8 egg yolks
• medium glass bowl or individual clear glasses

1. Make a syrup with the water and 325g of the sugar by bringing them to the boil in a saucepan and boiling for 5 minutes. Take the pan off of the heat. Add the lemongrass and let it infuse for about half an hour.

2. Strain the syrup into a measuring cup, keeping the saucepan with the lemongrass to one side. Take out about 150-200ml of the syrup and put it into a pan with the raspberries. Bring this to a boil and let it thicken slightly. Mash the fruit to create a jam like consistency. Let it cool a little and then dunk the ladyfingers in the raspberry mixture and arrange them in the bottom of your bowl. Add the vodka and about 100ml of the lemongrass syrup, depending on how much your ladyfingers absorb, and reserve the remainder.

3. Meanwhile, to make the custard, heat the cream in the syrup pan with the lemongrass until it is nearly boiling. Take it off of the heat and let it infuse for about 15 minutes, or so. Whisk the yolks and the rest of the sugar together and pour the cream into the same bowl. Then whisk again and put the custard back onto the heat in the cleaned-out pan. Stir until the custard thickens and then pour it over the trifle sponges. Let it cool.

4. Whip the heavy cream until thick but not too stiff. Cover the custard layer with this. Use about 1 cup of the remaining sugar syrup to make caramel by heating it in a saucepan until it turns a golden brown color. Drizzle the caramelised syrup over the layer of cream to decorate.

From Nigella Bites by Nigella Lawson

I adapted these from the Womens Weekly Cupcakes book as I didn’t have any dried berries, only frozen mixed berries and I gave it a buttercream icing instead of the cream cheese icing in their recipe as I didn’t have any cream cheese in the fridge. I used the Magnolia Bakery’s Buttercream icing but I halved the sugar as I find the original recipe way too sweet.

The icing was the important bit as I wanted to try out my new Tonkin Thermo Tubes star nozzles and piping bag. Now perhaps you aren’t supposed to use frozen fruit for the sugared fruit because mine turned out to be a runny mess, nothing like the frosted beauties in the Womens Weekly cookbook. If anyone knows how to perfect sugared fruit please drop me a line!

The icing is not perfect, its an ok first attempt at using my new star nozzles which will hopefully improve over time.

Berry buttercake

• 125 butter softened
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2/3 cup (150) caster sugar
• 2 eggs at room temp
• 1 cup fresh or frozen mixed berries
• 1/2 (70g) slivered almonds
• 2/3 cup (100g) plain flour
• 1/3 cup (50g) self raising flour
• 1/4 cup (60ml) milk

Sugared fruit

• 150g fresh blueberries
• 120g fresh raspberries
• 1 egg white beaten lightly
• 2 tablespoons vanilla sugar

1. Prepare sugared fruit
2. Preheat oven to moderately slow (170C/150C fan forced). Line 12 hole standard muffin pan with paper cases
3. Beat butter, extract, sugar and eggs in a small bowl with electric mixer until light and fluffy
4. Stir in fruit and nuts then sifted flours and milk. Divide mixture among cases and smooth surface
5. Bake for about 35 minutes. Turn cakes onto wire rack to cool.
6. Make frosting
7. Spread cooled cakes with frosting. Decorate with sugared fruit.

Sugared fruit
Brush each berry lightly with egg white, roll fruit in sugar. Place fruit on baking paper lined tray. Leave about 1 hour or until sugar is dry.

Magnolia Bakery’s Buttercream frosting

Makes enough for one 2-layer 9-inch cake or 2 dozen cupcakes

• 1 cup (250grams) unsalted butter, softened
• 6 to 8 cups icing sugar (I halved this to 3 cups)
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Place the butter in a large mixing bowl. Add 4 cups of the sugar and then the milk and vanilla. On the medium speed of an electric mixer, beat until smooth and creamy, about 3-5 minutes.

Gradually add the remaining sugar, 1 cup at a time, beating well after each addition (about 2 minutes), until the icing is thick enough to be of good spreading consistency. You may not need to add all of the sugar.

If desired, add a few drops of food coloring and mix thoroughly. (Use and store the icing at room temperature because icing will set if chilled.) Icing can be stored in an airtight container for up to 3 days.