Bakegab: The Bellgab Bakeshop

[Jojo]

Yes, it is a Swedish rye bread about half and half, made with orange juice (and peel) which I thought was only for flavor but from what you have uncovered must be there for an additional reason.

For gluten-free people who miss the flavor of rye bread, caraway seeds can be added to dishes, or crushed onto a tortilla.

[albrecht]

I have not seen it; what a cute show!  Now I want to make some hjertevafler med gjær to have with coffee and some of Shreddie's favorite brown cheese.

My, my.  I see your Vesterheim account is temporarily suspended until you have viewed "I Remember Mama." TCM shows it, usually around Mother's Day. There was a slasher that punned the name: "I Dismember Mama," but I haven't seen it.

ps: that German rye bread is great, there are various varieties Vollkorn etc and good with just a smear of butter or lard or with some herring.  Will be featured at BellGab Herring Fest 2020.

[K_Dubb]

My, my.  I see your Vesterheim account is temporarily suspended until you have viewed "I Remember Mama." TCM shows it, usually around Mother's Day. There was a slasher that punned the name: "I Dismember Mama," but I haven't seen it.

ps: that German rye bread is great, there are various varieties Vollkorn etc and good with just a smear of butter or lard or with some herring.  Will be featured at BellGab Herring Fest 2020.

Haha thanks for reminding me!  They had a couple of cds I don't have.

Have you ever tried that bread toasted?  I am not usually one for toasting bread but, sliced thin, toasting really brings out some sweetness in the whole rye that you would never think was there.

[albrecht]

Haha thanks for reminding me!  They had a couple of cds I don't have.

Have you ever tried that bread toasted?  I am not usually one for toasting bread but, sliced thin, toasting really brings out some sweetness in the whole rye that you would never think was there.

The stuff I buy (not a baker) is sort of thick/wet but still fragile and doesn't seem to work in a toaster (vertical) and breaks apart when I tried, though I suspect I  could use a toaster-oven but haven't yet.

Liv Ullman did a stage production of "I Remember Mama." And there was a tv show spin-off and radio-play from the movie.

[DigitalPigSnuggler]

Not sure that cooking is allowed in the bakeshop, but here goes nothing.

Kimchee Fried Rice

There are a jillion different ways to make this dish.  Some people claim that no recipe is needed; for the Koreans, it's whatever is left over from the previous day fried up together (rice and kimchee always being present).  The following worked for me the first time through, which means it must be fairly idiot-proof.  The best part about it, though, was finding Gochujang in the Korean Market.  It's a spicy BBQ sauce that, I am told, does not have a substitute.  There's no English versions of anything in a Korean market, so I was stuck.  But, as it turns out, I still remember most of the Korean alphabet, though I have forgotten almost all of the Korean that I learned in school.  So I wrote it out on a piece of paper, in Korean, and then scanned around until I found it.  Overcoming adversity and winning!  Combine it with the recipe working out of the gate and I could barely stuff my dick back in my pants.   

Ingredients:

250 g of bacon   I buy the pork belly here and cut my own, thick slices (about 10mm) and then cut it into small pieces
500 g of [meat]   You can use whatever is on sale.  For me, that happened to be pork loin
one yellow onion
a bulb of garlic
2 cups of kimchee   Do yourself a favor and buy the homemade from a Korean store if you possibly can.
1/2 cup kimchee juice
cooked rice   3 cups of raw rice cooked in your rice cooker, or over the stove if you know how to do that
3 TB Gochujang
3 tsp sesame oil
soy sauce (low sodium version)
green onion   I got the giant green onion that is available here and got close to a cup out of it
eggs
sesame seeds

1)  In a large pot over medium heat, crisp the bacon to render out the fat and set aside.  Use the fat to brown the meat, then add the onion and garlic and cook through.  Add the kimchee and most of the kimchee juice (reserving some for taste adjustment) and cook until wilted (not mushy).

2)  Add the cooked rice, gochujang, sesame oil, green onion, and a bit of soy sauce (not too much if it is not low sodium as there are other salty ingredients), and mix together off heat.  Use kimchee juice, gochujang, and soy sauce to adjust to taste.

3)  Fry enough eggs to top each portion served, and garnish with the bacon and sesame seeds.  Tip: If you want a runny yolk, separate white from the yolk, start to fry up the white, and when it's almost done, ease out the yolk on top of the white.  In Korea, the egg is almost always fried over had with no runny yolk at all.

[WOTR]

It's the weekend, and no updates? Tonight I will be making garlic bread for a dozen people. It has quite a reputation. Nothing special with the regular bread or butter- but I grow my own garlic and have a choice of around 40 varieties. It's early in storage- so I have a French rocambole I want to try and I will bring with a clove of Northern Quebec (porcelain) for some fire.

[Dr. MD MD]

It's the weekend, and no updates? Tonight I will be making garlic bread for a dozen people. It has quite a reputation. Nothing special with the regular bread or butter- but I grow my own garlic and have a choice of around 40 varieties. It's early in storage- so I have a French rocambole I want to try and I will bring with a clove of Northern Quebec (porcelain) for some fire.

Given recent events and with all that exotic garlic maybe you should conceal and carry to this event, just to be safe.

[WOTR]

I have to admit that I have been lazy. Even with all of the talk of breads, I did not order a starter culture, did not start to make one, and could not bear the thought of kneeding bread on my counters (full of garlic / bags / tags / soil, roots and dried garlic leaves.)

So, I broke out a bread machine that I got probably a decade ago- and it has sat in the spare room ever since. Unused, and unloved- I decided to plug it in. Four, oil, sugar, salt and yeast. Simple ingredients and there are three settings on the machine.

I added all ingredients before bed and hit "start." (This machine is too old to have a timer as I would expect all modern ones likely have.) When I woke up, I turned it out of the pan. It retained a small amount of heat, and I cut into it. In short, the crumb is not well developed. But the crust was surprisingly even and had a nice "chewiness" to it.

As a review, I can say that I will likely use the machine occasionally. No where near as good as "handcrafted" bread. But it only required 2 minutes of my time. There is no oven, no bowls, no dishes, no flour on the counter and bread pans to wash. Kind of nice. Even if the quality is not at the top of the scale, it is better than most store bought.

Now I just need to get off my ass and get a sour dough starter. 

[pate]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wb1CsfHFR_8

Haha thanks for reminding me!  .
?  , , .

No worries.

Cheers!

[Dr. MD MD]

The Colonel’s secret recipe. 

[WOTR]

If K-Dubb is not going to come save his thread, I'm going to review the Hairo 5 cup vacuum brewer. I have a vintage vacuum pot that I love (no rubber stopper... The seal is made by precision grinding the glass between the two halves.) I have installed a permanent glass "filter rod" in it, and it makes an excellent cup of coffee, when done right.

However, it was meant for daily use in the 50's. It brews far too much coffee for one person to reasonably consume while the brew is at it's peak, even if you cut the capacity in half. It requires that I use it at home where I have a stove, and I find that I don't haul it out all that often.

The solution? A Hairo vacuum pot with a butane heater (to replace the alcohol lamp and provide better control of the heat) and a metal filter to replace the cloth (I like some grounds that continue to extract as well as all of the oils in my coffee.) Brewing with 300ml of water, and 22 grams of fresh roasted, fresh ground single source pacamara made as good a cup as you can hope for.

The advantage of this is that I may take it to work occasionally to brew a cup of coffee to have with lunch. The downside is that I would have to grind the beans in the morning as I'm not hauling a commercial grinder to work with me...

I usually prefer running a new variety through my espresso machine to get a concentrated "hit". However, it has been a decade since I rebuilt it, and have taken it down for another rebuild. Sadly, it is in parts in my kitchen and I don't have access to an alternative.

This coffee had an almost foreign sweetness. I would say it left a lingering reminder of a clear cream soda on the palate. Very unique, and very complex, it was a good choice for vacuum brewing.

Was this a review of a brewing system, or a coffee? I suppose a little of both. K-Dubb had probably better return to reclaim this thread before I get the Wega up and running again.

[pate]

Nautical Shore what coffee brewings have to do with baking, do you have a nice coffee/crumb-cake recipe to go with the Joe?

Since this thread is getting de-railed;  I'm putting the finishing touches on a big pot of Tomato Sauce.  Three medium onions, one bunch celery, four red bell peppers, garlic, five links Eyetalian sausage, two lbs pork sausage, five cans each diced&sauced Tom's, all kinds of spices & herbs.  Not that it has to do with baking.  I am considering prepping some garlic bread and freezing it into "single serve" heat&eat portions...

[DanTSX]

Not my baking but baking related.....went to this bakery this weekend in mystic, CT.  The owner has been featured on food network and Netflix cooking shows a bunch of times.

Impressive skills.  Try it out if you visit the area.

http://www.siftbakeshopmystic.com/ http://www.siftbakeshopmystic.com/

[K_Dubb]

Ok you guys here is my next project, appropriately seasonal:

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/medieval-bake-off

Looking at recipes for soul cakes turns up page after page of pallid unappetizing biscuit-looking things obviously dependent on baking powder or soda, a leavening method that only came into common use halfway through the 19th century.  Fortunately, there is a surviving recipe that dates back to the good old witch-burning era when people actually believed this shit.

The object is to turn the (to modern, scientific bakers) intolerably vague 17th-century recipe into something edible:

“Take flower & sugar & nutmeg & cloves & mace & sweet butter & sack & a little ale barm, beat your spice & put in your butter & your sack, cold, then work it well all together & make it in little cakes & so bake them, if you will you may put in some saffron into them or fruit.”

Modern bakers are clearly misled by the term "cake" which suggests something other than a yeast-leavened dough we'd call "bread".  However, in an era when nearly everything was yeast-leavened (that's the whole point of the ale barm, a still-active yeast left over from brewing) I believe "cake" referred to the sweetness and grade of flour used -- when she first came to this country my grandma famously exclaimed, upon trying the ubiquitous Wonder Bread, "this is not bread, this is cake!"  These days, we'd probably call it a bun.

The first thing to notice about the recipe is that, with the sack (a sweet wine baking reenactors imitate with sherry or tawny port or madeira) and all those spices (including saffron!) these are rich little cakes like hot cross buns or Cornish saffron buns.

The second thing is that there is no liquid other than the sack -- no milk, for example, or water, which suggests to me that the butter is copious, and melted.  This explains the confusing "put in your butter & your sack, cold" -- that is to say, not hot off the stove top where you've probably combined them or it would kill the yeast.

The third thing is that there are no quantities of anything.  Fortunately I am not a scientific baker, relying on touch rather than careful measurement, like every other baker I saw growing up -- Grandma never followed a recipe for anything.

In this case, in my view there are no quantities because the scope of the project is probably determined by the amount of sack and butter (expensive compared to the usual milk or water) you want to devote to it and, in terms of spices, however much you care to afford.  Having settled upon this, you add enough flour to make a dough that feels right.

From reading old recipes I know that "beat your spice" means to grind it with a mortar and pestle.  In historical baking, the flavor of ale barm is usually recreated by mixing grocery-store yeast with a quantity of ale, so these will have both sherry and beer in them, as well as the suggested saffron which, as I do with lussekatter, will be steeped in the hot liquid.

I will research shaping, too, since there are a lot of contrary ideas.  Mexicans still have a special bread eaten on the day, highly spiced and usually with orange peel, shaped like crossbones that you can probably get at your local panaderia -- infinitely better and probably more historically accurate than some lame biscuit people are trying to pass off.  Something called a soul cake should be dangerous, delicious and sexy.

[DanTSX]

Ok you guys here is my next project, appropriately seasonal:

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/medieval-bake-off

Looking at recipes for soul cakes turns up page after page of pallid unappetizing biscuit-looking things obviously dependent on baking powder or soda, a leavening method that only came into common use halfway through the 19th century.  Fortunately, there is a surviving recipe that dates back to the good old witch-burning era when people actually believed this shit.

The object is to turn the (to modern, scientific bakers) intolerably vague 17th-century recipe into something edible:

Modern bakers are clearly misled by the term "cake" which suggests something other than a yeast-leavened dough we'd call "bread".  However, in an era when nearly everything was yeast-leavened (that's the whole point of the ale barm, a still-active yeast left over from brewing) I believe "cake" referred to the sweetness and grade of flour used -- when she first came to this country my grandma famously exclaimed, upon trying the ubiquitous Wonder Bread, "this is not bread, this is cake!"  These days, we'd probably call it a bun.

The first thing to notice about the recipe is that, with the sack (a sweet wine baking reenactors imitate with sherry or tawny port or madeira) and all those spices (including saffron!) these are rich little cakes like hot cross buns or Cornish saffron buns.

The second thing is that there is no liquid other than the sack -- no milk, for example, or water, which suggests to me that the butter is copious, and melted.  This explains the confusing "put in your butter & your sack, cold" -- that is to say, not hot off the stove top where you've probably combined them or it would kill the yeast.

The third thing is that there are no quantities of anything.  Fortunately I am not a scientific baker, relying on touch rather than careful measurement, like every other baker I saw growing up -- Grandma never followed a recipe for anything.

In this case, in my view there are no quantities because the scope of the project is probably determined by the amount of sack and butter (expensive compared to the usual milk or water) you want to devote to it and, in terms of spices, however much you care to afford.  Having settled upon this, you add enough flour to make a dough that feels right.

From reading old recipes I know that "beat your spice" means to grind it with a mortar and pestle.  In historical baking, the flavor of ale barm is usually recreated by mixing grocery-store yeast with a quantity of ale, so these will have both sherry and beer in them, as well as the suggested saffron which, as I do with lussekatter, will be steeped in the hot liquid.

I will research shaping, too, since there are a lot of contrary ideas.  Mexicans still have a special bread eaten on the day, highly spiced and usually with orange peel, shaped like crossbones that you can probably get at your local panaderia -- infinitely better and probably more historically accurate than some lame biscuit people are trying to pass off.  Something called a soul cake should be dangerous, delicious and sexy.

You’re gonna end up with biscotti

[K_Dubb]

You’re gonna end up with biscotti

Well those are a baking powder dough baked twice so they're crispy.  I think I can avoid that.

Snark aside, they will not be dry for all the butter I plan to use.  The only difference between these and lussekatter, dough-wise, is the sherry instead of milk.  I've never baked with alcohol as the primary liquid, so we'll see!

For reference, here is a typical and completely unappetizing supposedly authentic British soul cake:



What is that, like one raisin?

Compare Mexican pan de muerto



Yum.  The red one looks particularly dangerous.  Maybe if I used ruby port...

[K_Dubb]

More British soul cakes



I guarantee there is not so much as a nutmeg within five miles of those babies.  Saffron?  Forget about it.  You going door-to-door a-begging, you'll be lucky to get a raisin.

At this time, on the Continent, rich people bequeathed inordinate amounts of money to build churches and have masses said for them after death.  That rich 17th-century recipe is the same ritual enacted domestically.  Feeding beggars expensive food in exchange for prayers harkens back to the older medieval ethos embodied in the Feast of Fools where an occasional inversion of the social order was celebrated and proper.



What we have here is clearly a failure of imagination, with roots in the workhouses of Victorian Britain rather than in the deep past.

[WOTR]

Nautical Shore what coffee brewings have to do with baking, do you have a nice coffee/crumb-cake recipe to go with the Joe.

Absolutely nothing. That was the point. The thread needs somebody like K_Dubb to rescue it from somebody like me (who thinks that brewing coffee is equivalent to making French pastry.)

Next was going to be a review of starting a "sponge" for the bread machine. (Actually, it improved the loaf considerably.)

[albrecht]

More British soul cakes



I guarantee there is not so much as a nutmeg within five miles of those babies.  Saffron?  Forget about it.  You going door-to-door a-begging, you'll be lucky to get a raisin.

At this time, on the Continent, rich people bequeathed inordinate amounts of money to build churches and have masses said for them after death.  That rich 17th-century recipe is the same ritual enacted domestically.  Feeding beggars expensive food in exchange for prayers harkens back to the older medieval ethos embodied in the Feast of Fools where an occasional inversion of the social order was celebrated and proper.



What we have here is clearly a failure of imagination, with roots in the workhouses of Victorian Britain rather than in the deep past.

I've heard of "Hot Cross Buns," the thing and the various nursery rhymes but are they the same as "soul cakes?" The latter terms seems, to an American, to be something more related to "urban," to use a euphemism,  cuisine, which can be excellent, or places like "King Cake" and ethnic stuff?

[Dr. MD MD]

I've heard of "Hot Cross Buns," the thing and the various nursery rhymes but are they the same as "soul cakes?" The latter terms seems, to an American, to be something more related to "urban," to use a euphemism,  cuisine, which can be excellent, or places like "King Cake" and ethnic stuff?

And let's not forget these delicious babies:

[pate]

These "soul cakes" have nothing to do with the Keltic "sin eater" tradition, do they?

[albrecht]

And let's not forget these delicious babies:

Not much of a sweet-tooth, though I will, and have here, admitted that I do like almond flavored pastries, cakes, and cookies- of almost any ethnic background. In moderation. Only when offered. But too sweet is a no-go for me.

[Dr. MD MD]

Not much of a sweet-tooth, though I will, and have here, admitted that I do like almond flavored pastries, cakes, and cookies- of almost any ethnic background. In moderation. Only when offered. But too sweet is a no-go for me.

Really?! Not even these?

[K_Dubb]

I've heard of "Hot Cross Buns," the thing and the various nursery rhymes but are they the same as "soul cakes?" The latter terms seems, to an American, to be something more related to "urban," to use a euphemism,  cuisine, which can be excellent, or places like "King Cake" and ethnic stuff?

Looking at the old recipe it appears that by 1604, at least, they were similar to hot cross buns in substance and, at least to whatever extent the modern marking with a cross reflects past practice, in form, but not in purpose:  they were distributed to beggars in exchange for prayers for the souls of the departed and (in several references I've found) in exchange for staging little plays, not unlike julebukking or the star boys in Sweden at Christmas -- basically any holiday was an excuse to shake down the neighbors under various pretexts.

Modern pagans, for whom Halloween serves as a sort of anti-Christmas, sometimes make them with a pentagram, sort of their version of a gingerbread cookie, and argue for their pagan roots.  Believe me, nobody would love to find ancient roots for some of this stuff more than I, but it's just made-up wishful thinking as far as I can tell -- the cakes are inextricably tied up in Christian traditions of sin and purgatory.

The only pagan baking tradition securely attested is the seed cake baked in fall, kept over winter, and "planted" in the spring -- we've covered the few surviving Scandinavian examples of this, and I recently came across another in either Latvia or Lithuania -- I can't remember which -- from the 15th c. (the last region in Europe to be Christianized, as you know).

[K_Dubb]

These "soul cakes" have nothing to do with the Keltic "sin eater" tradition, do they?

There were special cakes made for those, too, but I've never come across a recipe.

[albrecht]

Looking at the old recipe it appears that by 1604, at least, they were similar to hot cross buns in substance and, at least to whatever extent the modern marking with a cross reflects past practice, in form, but not in purpose:  they were distributed to beggars in exchange for prayers for the souls of the departed and (in several references I've found) in exchange for staging little plays, not unlike julebukking or the star boys in Sweden at Christmas -- basically any holiday was an excuse to shake down the neighbors under various pretexts.

Modern pagans, for whom Halloween serves as a sort of anti-Christmas, sometimes make them with a pentagram, sort of their version of a gingerbread cookie, and argue for their pagan roots.  Believe me, nobody would love to find ancient roots for some of this stuff more than I, but it's just made-up wishful thinking as far as I can tell.  The only pagan baking tradition securely attested is the seed cake baked in fall, kept over winter, and "planted" in the spring -- we've covered the few surviving Scandinavian examples of this, and I recently came across another in either Latvia or Lithuania -- I can't remember which -- from the 15th c. (the last region in Europe to be Christianized, as you know).

Oh, I have in my travels and estrangement from easy internet, listened to some recent "shows," one of which had some convoluted, though, interesting, theories on this. The guest in question was hampered by an idiot, in my opinion, in handling, because host had no basic understanding but a LOT of the theorizing was the perplexing (though guest had fundamental theory) of why N Europe, particularly those areas, with regard to individualism, female rights, anti-Christian strength (then Christian-strength- then weakness by both histories/traditions, that lead to this modern phenomena of Scandinavian altruism and, theory, weakness) and etc. And relationship between various invaders to Europe and forms of economic/family/legal systems in ancient days. Whew. It was ok. Too broad. Everything from Roman decline (the obvious, from a certain political perspective) but I had a lot of objections when he went more general, particularly that guest avoid basic environmental concerns (why Viking missions only during sometimes, why farming not as much, no focus on fishing and trading culture, etc) And while I also admit, to this day, differences between Northern and Southern Europe (as does anyone with sense) he was a bit too much on family connections and lifestyle. Various types have said such over the decades, and could be true, but just turned on some Viking Metal, over plane wing (ugg) so no classical could suffice noise, and said to the stewardess, "yes, another drink."

[pate]

Alby,

Perhaps not the FIRST crusade, but surely a pre-cursor was the one against the Cathars of Provencal/Languedoc/Aix-en-Provence region.  Among their many heresies were the equality of the sexes.  I think my point here is that the "Northern Territories" not being fully Christenized was perhaps a factor of logistics more than anything else.  The close to home demon-worshippers were more easily wypipple'd out.  Twas a dork thyme, haha!

I believe the oft quoted "Kill 'em all, let Gawd sortem aught" line had its origins in the massacre of the Cathars, I cannae recall the exact town that was burned/pillaged to the ground.  Shirley the Vatican has some record of the event?  I think the guy that uttered the famous phrase went on to some reknown...

Nautical Shore.

-p

[K_Dubb]

Oh, I have in my travels and estrangement from easy internet, listened to some recent "shows," one of which had some convoluted, though, interesting, theories on this. The guest in question was hampered by an idiot, in my opinion, in handling, because host had no basic understanding but a LOT of the theorizing was the perplexing (though guest had fundamental theory) of why N Europe, particularly those areas, with regard to individualism, female rights, anti-Christian strength (then Christian-strength- then weakness by both histories/traditions, that lead to this modern phenomena of Scandinavian altruism and, theory, weakness) and etc. And relationship between various invaders to Europe and forms of economic/family/legal systems in ancient days. Whew. It was ok. Too broad. Everything from Roman decline (the obvious, from a certain political perspective) but I had a lot of objections when he went more general, particularly that guest avoid basic environmental concerns (why Viking missions only during sometimes, why farming not as much, no focus on fishing and trading culture, etc) And while I also admit, to this day, differences between Northern and Southern Europe (as does anyone with sense) he was a bit too much on family connections and lifestyle. Various types have said such over the decades, and could be true, but just turned on some Viking Metal, over plane wing (ugg) so no classical could suffice noise, and said to the stewardess, "yes, another drink."

I think a convincing case can be made that Christianity of the Roman variety was part of a whole set of ideas including kingship (it's no accident St. Olav is a saint) , social stratification including rigid gender roles, and the medieval version of what we now call globalism that didn't hold as firmly in the north (hence the Reformation) but the extent to which that reflected pagan rather than simply political reality is pretty debatable.

[albrecht]

Alby,

Perhaps not the FIRST crusade, but surely a pre-cursor was the one against the Cathars of Provencal/Languedoc/Aix-en-Provence region.  Among their many heresies were the equality of the sexes.  I think my point here is that the "Northern Territories" not being fully Christenized was perhaps a factor of logistics more than anything else.  The close to home demon-worshippers were more easily wypipple'd out.  Twas a dork thyme, haha!

I believe the oft quoted "Kill 'em all, let Gawd sortem aught" line had its origins in the massacre of the Cathars, I cannae recall the exact town that was burned/pillaged to the ground.  Shirley the Vatican has some record of the event?  I think the guy that uttered the famous phrase went on to some reknown...

Nautical Shore.

-p

Yes, obviously, he was concerned with the Iberian and Balkan situation (which, of course, should be praised and taught!!!, Christians kings saved them! ) but oddly applied it (I think actually to the more Northern regions of the Continent) due to a bad host who considered ANY invasions. It was bad. And not good for a pro-European movement of recognizing history. And the difference of the Latin versus Germanic (cue K_Dubb here) but the guest was seriously against Scandinavian and "Northern German" deal, actually, with regard to various laws, land disputes, etc (and, of course, the whole thing was a mess then, in terms of modern ideas.) His point was that "Germanic"and "Northern" was more individualistic, except for certain things/times. And that carried over even when much of it became it. And such ideas still existed. Or even just history of movements/invasions of peoples. It was strange. "Dumbed down." Not good. Got into Purtians (interesting, he didn't mention, there was a some what deal up North also.) But, bascially, I guess, a Neitsche, somewhat view, that Christianity and too "much" individualism and hero-worship will result in "our downfall" because others forsake it for domination, and personal subjection, values.

[Dr. MD MD]

Yes, obviously, he was concerned with the Iberian and Balkan situation (which, of course, should be praised and taught!!!, Christians kings saved them! ) but oddly applied it (I think actually to the more Northern regions of the Continent) due to a bad host who considered ANY invasions. It was bad. And not good for a pro-European movement of recognizing history. And the difference of the Latin versus Germanic (cue K_Dubb here) but the guest was seriously against Scandinavian and "Northern German" deal, actually, with regard to various laws, land disputes, etc (and, of course, the whole thing was a mess then, in terms of modern ideas.) His point was that "Germanic"and "Northern" was more individualistic, except for certain things/times. And that carried over even when much of it became it. And such ideas still existed. Or even just history of movements/invasions of peoples. It was strange. "Dumbed down." Not good. Got into Purtians (interesting, he didn't mention, there was a some what deal up North also.) But, bascially, I guess, a Neitsche, somewhat view, that Christianity and too "much" individualism and hero-worship will result in "our downfall" because others forsake it for domination, and personal subjection, values.

Nordical squirrel.