The books: Swedish Cakes and Cookies (Sju sorters kakor)

More than halfway through the Random Kitchen project, and we're still waiting for a few of the 22 participating cookbooks to come out of the random number generator.

Everyday Novelli remains conspicuous by its absence (to my relief but some readers' frustration!), while two of my three "snipped out of newspapers and printed off the internet" folders remain as yet untapped.

The greatest source of sadness for me, though, is that we haven't yet had an encounter with Swedish Cakes and Cookies.

The original-language version of the book, Sju sorters kakor, is a classic that belongs in every Swedish home. It takes its name from the tradition that every good hostess of a coffee afternoon should serve up at least seven different types of biscuit, cake or cookie to accompany the black stuff.

And if you know anything about Swedes, you'll know they take their fika or coffee culture very seriously indeed.

Malmö, 2013: Even the Eurovision press centre enjoys a good fika

I'm half-Swedish on my mother's side, and there was (still is) a big community of Anglo-Scandinavian families in the north-east of England - so there was no shortage of opportunities to flex those nascent baking skills and get busy in the kitchen when I was a young 'un.

My eager hands (and sweet tooth) were only too happy to get involved in mixing and making everything from saffron buns for the annual Lucia celebrations to what would become known in subsequent editions of Sju sorters kakor as the - shall we say - slightly more politically correct "chocolate balls".

Oops

The English version of Sju sorters kakor, which I picked up a few years ago, is really not bad. As the title suggests, it's geared firmly towards a US audience - the back cover even proudly boasts "Sweden's classic guide comes to America" - although the quantities used in the recipes remain pleasingly Scandinavian (flour and sugar are measured in decilitres - of course!).

In any case, for all I do have a certain understanding of Swedish, it's a lot safer not to have to translate things on the hop while attempting to navigate my way through a recipe, so the English-language versions are a godsend in that respect. Some of the names of the various goodies are translated a little idiosyncratically - I probably wouldn't have thought of my favourite havreflarn as "syrup lace cookies", for instance - but most are accompanied by some kind of illustration so it's easy enough to work out what item from the IKEA café/shop they're meant to be replicating.

And really, everything you'd want is in here, from arrak/punsch rolls (also known as "vacuum cleaners", apparently - why wouldn't they be?) and the delightfully evocative dreams, through to that recent Bake-Off favourite, the mighty princess torte. (My birthday cake several times when I was young. And they say only children are spoilt...)

Plus there are some useful tips for rolling tricky pastry, getting your bun dough to rise properly, decorating with chocolate - basically all the techniques that any self-respecting Swedish chef should know.

The original in situ, price tag and all

Now, to be perfectly honest: if the ultimate purpose of the Random Kitchen is to get more use out of my cookbooks, I can't claim that Swedish Cakes and Cookies is exactly gathering dust.

But it does contain nearly 300 (!) recipes for all kinds of sweet pieces of my heritage, so even now I've barely really made a dent, sticking to my old favourites and not venturing too far from the beaten track. (Plus I'm about to start training for a half-marathon, so I can cope with a few more calories in my diet...)

Here's hoping, then, that there'll be - if not seven - then at least one type of Swedish goodie coming my way before the random year is out.