December 16 was Lefse Day this December of 2011.
Yesterday— with the good help of one daughter in law and two grandkids— we made 5 big batches of the Norwegian immigrant peasant food so dearly loved by those of Norse/Swedish extraction (and others who are so lucky as to eat it and love it!)
It is definitely “peasant food” made primarily from potatoes and flour. One of our good friends born in Norway, whose family went through the WW 2 Nazi occupation of Norway said they “lived on” a form of lefse they called “potato cake”. That particular lefse was made from potatos and flour alone and dipped in water to soften it up instead of it being like a stiff cracker. Inge was the best “potato cake” maker I have ever known..her “lefse” was incomparable..made from only potatoes and flour and then “washed” in a shallow pan. It had been eaten as a wartime food when food was hard to come by–except for potatoes and flour.
Ours is made from a winning recipe at the Barnesville Potato Days in 2000. It is also tender and tasty and especially good when eaten with melted butter hot off the griddle!
Except for the butter and sugar , my recipe is pretty “healthy” using canola oil instead of butter in the dough. It also rolls like a dream and we rarely have a ruined lefse when rolling it out.
I got to sit in a rocking chair and watch the others roll and fry the lefse yesterday. I had made the dough and cooled it but when the family members arrived they brouht an extra griddle and rolling pin and really took over for me….it was fun to sit in the sun beaming through the big windows and watching them do the work as I sat and rocked and took in the fragrant scent of frying potato lefse and the distinctive aroma of flour browned on the lefse griddle.
The house still smelled good last night when we came home from the youngest grandson’s 8th grade basketball game.
I am baking or making a lot of gifts this Christmas. Plum jelly from our own plum trees is one of the gifts. Homemade bread and fudge are two other gifts. Making such things really beats shopping in crowded malls and big box stores and people enjoy the effort of making something for them.
I am not missing snow in the least. I am content to view the pictures I get of snowy scenes on emails or from other sources. My memories of snowy Decembers is good enough!
I assume you use a grooved rolling pin. Do you put a “sock” on it? We made some with 7up in it. Left an aftertaste. You probably wouldn’t notice if you committed the sacrilege of putting sugar on it. My daiughter’s range has a ceramic cooktop. I wonder if one could fry lefse on that instead of spending $100+ on a Bethany grill.
Lefsa making is an art..one that will be lost unless the olders teach the youngers:)