In Sweden, Midsummer marks the start of summer holidays. Midsummer Eve is always the Friday in the middle of the month. People head to the country to be close to nature, enjoy a delicious smorgasbord with beer and aquavit (no wine!), and be with family and friends.

If you’ve seen Ingmar Bergman’s Smiles of a Summer Night, or Woody Allen’s parody of it, A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy, you get the drift.

Celebrants pick wildflowers to weave into wreaths, set up the maypole and outdoor dance floors. Midsummer is supposed to be a magical time for love. But we’d like to focus on that big table laden with food, the smörgåsbord.

Swedish retailer IKEA has an annual Midsummer Smörgåsbord; you can purchase tickets for the 6/14 event at the store. They sell out, so do it in advance—$12.99, for adults, $4.99 for kids. Details at IKEA-USA.com.

Pickled herring canapés on pumpernickel bread with gherkins. Photo by Marta Sobo | SXC.

MAINS

 
SIDES

While you may not have an inventory of Swedish music, ABBA always works for us!
  

Today’s tip comes from McCormick, and it illustrates how easy it is to make gourmet condiments in your kitchen. Just open the bottle of mayonnaise, mustard or ketchup and add herbs and spices.

Use the recipes below on burgers, grilled chicken, hot dogs and brats, sandwiches/wraps and anything requiring some condiment verve.

Just combine the ingredients and whisk thoroughly to blend. Letting them sit in the fridge for a half hour or longer allows the flavors to meld.

How do you define a condiment? See below.

> National Condiment Month is September.

> National Ketchup Day is June 5th. The history of ketchup.

> National Mayonnaise Day is May 5th. The history of mayonnaise.

> National Mustard Day is the first Saturday in August. The history of mustard.
 
 
GOURMET KETCHUP RECIPES

 
 
GOURMET MAYONNAISE RECIPES

 
 
GOURMET MUSTARD RECIPES

 
 
FOOD 101: CONDIMENTS

A condiment is a food product used add flavor to another food. Hot sauce, ketchup, mayonnaise, mustard, ketchup, salad dressing, relish, syrups and vinegar, among many others, are condiments.

The word is first found in print in late Middle English, in the period of 1400–1450, derived from Middle French. The French took it from the Latin condimentum, meaning spice, seasoning or salt, and the verb condire, to preserve, pickle or season.

There is disagreement as to what constitutes a condiment. Some say that salt and spices are condiments; others say that a condiment must be more complicated and moist—i.e, with some liquid in its make-up.

Formal sauces belong in the sauce category; they are not condiments. Thus, while a mayonnaise dip for asparagus is a condiment, hollandaise sauce on the asparagus is not.

Relish is a condiment; pickles are not (they’re vegetables, which happen to be preserved). If you‘re not sure if something is a condiment or belongs in another category, bring the debate to the dinner table. You’ll have fun working it out.

[1] We mixed ketchup with salsa: What a great idea! (photo © Potato Goodness)!

[2] For sandwiches, burgers, deviled eggs, whatever, it’s great to have a choice of flavored mayonnaise (photo © Chef Eric LeVine).

[3] Fries with three different flavors of mayonnaise dips (photo © Le District | NYC).

[4] We mixed mustard with sauerkraut to create a tangy, textured mustard for pork chop (photo © National Pork Board).

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So we searched for other ways to use the rice, and found five more ways to employ uncooked rice in the kitchen.

1. BAKING

You can buy pie weights to blind bake your crusts, or you can use the rice or beans you have on hand. In this case, reserve the “pie rice” for this exclusive purpose; you don’t want to cook with it after it’s been dried by oven heat.

2. COFFEE GRINDER

Clean your coffee and spice grinders—every month, if you use them daily. Beyond brushing out leftover particles, clean the undersides of the blades and absorb other buildup with a “rice treatment.”

Too much rice? Beyond cooking it, we’ve got five ways to use it in the kitchen. Photo courtesy United Rice Mills.

How do you check if your cooking oil is hot enough? If you don’t have a deep fryer with a temperature dial, you could use a thermometer. Or, just drop a grain of rice into the oil.

If the rice rises to the surface of the oil and begins to cook, the oil is ready for frying.

4. RIPEN FRUIT

Want to ripen fruit faster? If you don’t have an apple*, store the fruit in a container of rice.

Check on the fruit twice a day so it doesn’t over-ripen. The rice is still good for cooking.

*A favorite trick is to place the unripe fruit in a paper bag with an apple. The ethylene released by the apple ripens the fruit overnight.

If you live in a humid climate, your salt make clump. Rice comes to the rescue: Add a few grains of rice to your the salt shaker to prevent clumping.

For open boxes of salt, put the rice in a tea ball or tie it in a piece of gauze or cheesecloth like a bouquet garni.

BONUS

You can also make rice milk from scratch (other than rice, of course!) is water and salt. Here’s the recipe.

Here are more ways to use rice, for non-kitchen tasks in your home.