Goths

I'm living in an area named Östergötland (East Gothia). There are also a West Gothia. And then there is Gotland.

Some historians belives that the infamous Goths had their origin here (eat your heart out you kids with black dyed hair and mascara!). What we do know is that Gothia was the birth place of the Viking culture.

Sweden has one of the most advanced conventional class submarines in the world; The Gotland class. Here are a story with an additional video about it (it's so cool). Apparently the Swedish submarine ran circles around the US naval Battle group including the carrier USS Reagan.

Gotland is a very nice island apparently (I've never been there). It's concidered to be the place to stay at during the summer for the high and mighty. It's a place of Sweden that many forigners compares to the Southern Europeian Riviera.

It also is one of the few places in Sweden where you can grow Almond Potatoes. Now Almond Potatoes is concidered to be a delicasy and a "must have " to certain Swedish traditional courses, among those "Sour (really fermented) Herring".

But!

The Almond potato needs sandy dirt (provided in Gotland), but it also have to have a low PH (not on Gotland). It also gets the best taste when growing in a relativly cold climate with many hours of sun (think Midnight Sun/24 h a day). It should be yellow and firm- which is not the case with the more mealy Gotland variant. The place to find the right kind of Almond potatoes are up in Lapland where all those conditions are met.

Boil them with the peel on until they are done. You have to watch over them like an Italian pasta chef though. Or better yet. Just boil them untill they are slightly under cooked, wait for them to cool off and then fry them. Heavenly! You can then eat them as snacks with the right seasoning. If you also have a piece of jerky of reindeer filet that you can carve thin, thin slices off- you are in heaven!

Sadly, neither the right sort of Almond Potatoes or reindeer jerky are to be found where I live now.

That's culture!