Tommi Tuominen’s Christmas dishes in restaurant Finnjäveli

Although during Christmas, a restaurateur and chef Tommi Tuominen there is little time, he makes his own Christmas table food with love.

In Tuominen’s Christmas at home, traditional Christmas dishes are included: a box of baked potatoes, a box of lantu boxes, ham and salmon.

Tuominen’s restaurant Finnjävelin Salonki, awarded with a Michelin star, also draws from the Finnish food tradition. The taste world of the dishes and the ingredients are familiar, but the execution differs from the traditional one.

Tuominen now reveals three Finnjävel Salon recipes: butterflies, carrot box and liver box.

Even though the buns look like traditional buns, they also bear the handprint of a top chef.

– We added fat and salt to the recipe, so we got them even juicier. Needless to say, these butterflies are even better than the original ones, Tuominen laughs.

However, the instructions are still very simple. It has floury potatoes (puikula is the best), wheat flour, egg, butter and salt (even more than in the North Karelian recipe).

Butterflies are quick to make. In addition, they go well with both meat and fish. Tuominen himself eats the butterflies preferably with roe, onion and whipped sour cream.

Finnjäveli’s customers are also fond of lepuska, even so much so that at the beginning of the year, the restaurant celebrates lepuska and not blini weeks.

A tip for home kitchens as well: puff pastry dough is easier to make than blini dough, and there is significantly less mess when baking.

Tuominen’s Christmas table always has roe and small diced onions.

– They belong at Christmas with salted fish, Tuominen reminds.

He usually serves the roe and its side dishes separately, not mixed into a roe mousse.

According to Tuominen, frozen roe is a good option, but it must be thawed properly.

Under no circumstances should you thaw the roe in the microwave or in warm water, but instead in the refrigerator, so that the texture of the frozen roe remains the same as that of fresh roe.

Thawing takes at least a day. If you want to do the thawing last, put the roe in a filter bag in a strainer so that the liquid drains into a separate container.

Finnjäveli’s carrot box is in a foam-like form and is squeezed out of a siphon, but Tuominen reminds you that you can also leave out the siphon. In that case, the box is baked in the oven.

The juju of the carrot box is in semolina. Manna has indeed been the traditional way of making a carrot box in a small area.

– Manna’s mouthfeel is different. It is fluffier and more pleasant, and you don’t feel large grains of rice in your mouth, Tuominen states.

At first, Finnjävel’s customers are amazed when they hear that they are eating a carrot box. You might be thinking, Is this what we’re paying for?

But when the dish comes in front of you and you taste it, your opinion changes. According to Tuominen, the carrot box is one of the favorites on the Christmas menu.

– Prejudices are stubborn, Tuominen laughs.

One Christmas food is one that hasn’t even made it to the customer.

– Different versions have been made of it, but for some reason the rosolli has experienced strong opposition. I don’t know what’s in it, because rosol meat is good and its ingredients are good, Tuominen wonders.

Finnjäveli’s Maksalaatiko has all the familiar ingredients such as liver, raisins and rice. But that’s the familiarity. This Liver box is eaten with a wooden spoon and is a mousse.

– This is one of our versions of the liver box, Tuominen says.

Since there is a limited amount of traditional dishes, Finnjäveli’s kitchen prepares many variations of them.

Butterflies

1 kg of boiled and pureed baby potatoes

165 g of soft butter

300 g cream

25 g of salt

1. Make mashed potatoes. Let it cool.

6 eggs

0.5 kg wheat flour

12 g of salt

1. Combine with mashed potatoes and mix until the mass is smooth. Using a ring mold, press the mass into approx. 1 cm thick disks on oiled baking paper. Freeze the discs.

2. Bake the lollipop discs with ice in a 225-degree oven for approx. 10–15 min, until golden brown.

3. While still warm, brush with butter. Serve with roe, onion and sour cream.

Carrot box from semolina

1 kg of carrots boiled and pureed

1.5 dl carrot broth

2 dl whipped cream

1 dl of semolina

16 g of salt

1 tablespoon of syrup

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

30 g of butter

breadcrumbs

1. Mix everything except butter and breadcrumbs into the carrot puree.

2. Pour the mixture into a greased pan, sprinkle breadcrumbs on top and make wave patterns on the surface with a spoon.

3. Put the butter on top and bake in the oven at 160 degrees for 1.5 hours.

Tip! If you want to try the foamed version, add 50% more liquid to the recipe and cook the mixture until cooked in a pot. Puree quickly with a stick blender and put in a cream siphon bottle. Add 1 cartridge of gas and mix well. Pour the foam from the siphon directly into the serving dish and serve immediately.

liver casserole

250 g of chicken liver

1 onion

1 carrot

215 g of melted butter

2 eggs

0.5 dl port wine

10 g of salt

1 sprig of thyme

1 bay leaf

1 sprig of rosemary

400 g of whipped sour cream

On:

100 g raisins

0.5 dl of rum

1. Chop and saute the onion and carrot until soft. Fry the liver in a frying pan until dark brown, add the sauteed vegetables and herbs. Add more port wine and simmer for a while.

2. Pick off the herbs and pour the mixture into a blender. Add salt and mix the mass in a blender until smooth. Stir in the melted butter and then the eggs one at a time.

3. Cook the mass in a tightly wrapped pan in a water bath in the oven at 120 degrees for approx. 45 min. Cool down.

4. Knead the mass in a mixing bowl and add the whipped sour cream, lifting it into the mixture. Serve with rum raisins and rice cereal.

5. Put the raisins and rum in a minigrip bag and squeeze out the excess air. Let the raisins flavor overnight. Drain the excess liquid and cut the raisins a little smaller.

Easy soy mayonnaise

1.5 dl of mayonnaise

3 tablespoons low-salt soy sauce

1 tablespoon of honey

1-2 chopped garlic cloves

1. Stir.