When we left Germany in 2013 we once again sold all of our furnishings, this time with the help of, and returned to our estranged homeland in a similar daze where we purchased our 4th LACK coffee table in dark brown. Ditto with our REGOLIT arc lamp and several other pieces I can't recall off the top of my head. After more than 12 hours spent traveling, we were in a bit of a daze but easily decided to purchase a third LACK coffee table in dark brown, because it was familiar and reliable. Just enough time to release our two cats from their carriers, who promptly planted their flags in a makeshift litter box, before we were whooshed off to the IKEA in Sindelfingen to choose all of the furnishings we thought we'd need to outfit our new home. When we landed in Germany, we were briefly introduced to our new apartment for maybe 15 minutes. We promptly replaced it with another identical unit that served us well until we sold off all of our furniture and most of our earthly possessions via craigslist and moved to Germany in early 2009. We bought our first one in ~2004, it lasted a few years until an unfortunate occasion when a beer bottle left overnight after a party took a ring of the dark wood laminate with it, revealing the pith of compressed wood fibers that lay beneath. Just wanted to add a post in appreciation of IKEA's LACK coffee table. View recipe here: IKEA Dryck Lingon experiment | Alternative Sugar Beer Extract Beer Recipe | Brewer's Friend

I'm really curious to find out whether it can be made into something worth drinking, and perhaps enjoy some alongside swedish meatballs.Д¬all it an IKEA hack if you will, or a Swedish berry blasphemy, but my objective here is simply to seek out a happy buzz that I assembled myself and can be proud of. Recently, I discovered a forgotten bottle of lingonberry drink concentrate in the back of the skГҐp (cupboard to the layman) and thought it might be a fun project to ferment it like a wine, distill it, and then backsweeten it with more lingonberry juice to make a marginally palatable sipping liqueur, and finally repackage it back into its humble glass bottle. Sweeter and milder than cranberries, we've come to really enjoy IKEA's lingonberry jam and drinks over the years. We still pop into our local IKEA from time to time even if just to enjoy the familiar meal of meatballs and boiled potatoes with gravy and of course the delightfully foreign and festive lingonberry sauce. To me, visiting an IKEA store is like stepping through a time portal that takes me back to all of the spaces we've called home, and recalls vivid, palpable memories of how it felt settling in to strange new surroundings and finding happiness. Throughout our 20 years of marriage and moving back and forth between two continents and 8 apartments, our IKEA furnishings in their unapologetic Swedishness have always provided a familiar sense of foreign dislocation that actually made us feel at home no matter where we were. I canвЂ™t wait to pick upВ some of IKEAвЂ™s other flavored syrups on my next visit.My wife and I kinda have a love thing going on with IKEA. This drinkВ is totally delicious, one I will make again and again. I named this lingonberry mule cocktailВ after the Dala Horse, a carvedВ andВ painted wooden horse thatвЂ™s aВ popular Swedish handicraft and souvenir.

Mixed together with ginger beer, lime and vodka, this full-bodied cocktail is both smooth and refreshing. The lingonberry syrup adds aВ sweet-tart flavor to the classic mule recipe.

The Dala Horse cocktail putsВ a Swedish spinВ on a Moscow Mule. They are brilliant red in color and a bit tart in taste. The berriesвЂ™В bright flavor is a staple in Scandinavian cuisine. Lingonberries grow wild in many ancient forests throughout the Northern hemisphere. I love lingonberry jam, so I figured IвЂ™d like the syrup too. I never know what IвЂ™ll find! This time I brought home a bottle of lingonberry syrup. They have loadsВ of chocolates and candies, beverages andВ other delicious treasures. Not the restaurant, but the little grocery store. Whenever I visit IKEA, I always hit up the food section.

Ikea dryck lingon styrup