Pop-up café in Viimsi this Saturday!

Six Estonian foodbloggers - Aire, Britt, Liina, Marju, Silja and yours truly - are setting up a pop-up café at the Viimsi Farmers Market this Saturday. It's not the first time - in September 2011 and September 2012 we opened a pop-up apple cake café (õunakoogikohvik, you can see some photos here) at the same market, and the organisers - Museum of the Coastal Folk - asked us to come and serve our creations at their newest special event, Viimsi Fish Day (Kalapäev).

We were happy to oblige :)

Kalapäev focuses on fish in general, and on the culinary uses of a very invasive species, round goby (ümarmudil) in particular. There are several workshops and events throughout, and our pop-up café (or fish buffet, as we've called it this time) is open between 10-14. The menu is varied and rich - we have various quiches (cottage cheese and smoked sea bass, fresh salmon and broccoli, nettle and smoked fish), tuna-filled profiteroles, salmon muffins, Estonian-style fish and chips, Empanaditas Gallegas, miso-glazed cod, a selection of smörgås aka open sandwiches, jellied pike-perch (zander), smoked mackerel paté toasts, salmon fishcakes with a remoulade, a festive leek pie with cream cheese and smoked salmon topping, sprat pastries - to name just a few. Of course, there will be also some sweet cakes - rhubarb and chocolate and curd cheese and cinnamon and kama will feature in one way or another.

We offer a free cup of espresso to all visitors and home-made lemonade to the smaller ones!

Do come along and say hello if you are in Tallinn or Viimsi or nearby! Look for the lovely chalkboard poster and you'll find us easily. 

A huge thank you to Pepe Kala OÜ who supplied us with fresh and cured fish, and MEIRA who kindly lend us a Segafredo MyEspresso coffee pod machine for the duration of the event.

Here's the poster for the main event:

Best rhubarb muffins recipe ever

I just baked a batch and had to dig out this recipe from the depths of Nami-Nami and share this with you again :)


Photo updated in May 2009

We are still enjoying the rhubarb bounty. Here's a recipe for really moist rhubarb muffins that I made twice last week. Firstly, they were served at a 'girly' housewarming/birthday party last Thursday, attended by all my aunties (that's three maternal and one paternal), my parents (my dad was unable to attend the 'real' birthday party on a previous weekend), as well as some of my first cousins (not all 11 though:). Instead of birthday cake, I made lots of these rhubarb muffins that day, served as a pyramid on a cake stand. Very pretty!! But in the midst of all the buzz and excitement, we forgot to take a picture. Not that it mattered much, as it gave me a good excuse to make these very same muffins again on Sunday.

These muffins, let me tell you, are the moistest muffins you'll make. They're so moist, that even if you eat them on the following day, they taste like they're freshly baked. Delicious!

Rhubarb muffins
(Rabarbrimuffinid)

Serves 12

2 medium eggs
150 ml sugar
250 ml plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
150 grams sour cream (20%)
50 grams butter, melted & cooled
400 grams rhubarb, (peeled and) chopped

Cinnamon and demerara sugar for sprinkling (optional)

Whisk eggs with sugar until pale and frothy.
Mix the dry ingredients. Add to the egg mixture together with sour cream and melted butter. Fold in the rhubarb.
Fill 12 hole muffin tray (they'll be pretty full, as rhubarb gives a lot of bulk initially, but shrink while the batter rises), sprinkle with cinnamon and demerara sugar
Bake at 225 C for 13-15 minutes, until muffins have risen and turned golden brown.
Cool a little before serving, as the rhubarb pieces can be very hot!

Other rhubarb recipes @ Nami-nami:
A creamy rhubarb pie (June 2005)
Rhubarb jam with ginger (May 2007)

Other muffin recipes @ Nami-nami:
Apple muffins (March 2007)
Cocoa and raspberry muffins (August 2005)
Dark chocolate and cherry muffins (April 2006)
Dark chocolate and chilli muffins (July 2005)
Savoury muffins with beetrot and blue cheese (October 2006)
Savoury muffins with feta cheese and sun-dried tomatoes (June 2006)

If you love cheese and you're in Estonia this weekend ...

... then you should head to the Rotermanni Quarter this Friday and Saturday for Estonia's first cheese festival: