In Search of the Best Swedish Chokladbollar: A southeast asian falls in love with fika

Handa, Alaine: - Equipped with a BA in World Arts and Cultures from the University of California, Los Angeles, a postgraduate in Hospitality Management from Les Roches International School of Hospitality Management Switzerland, and wine certificates from Wine Spirits Education Trust London, Alaine has a creative global soul. A picky eater with an active imagination, Alaine was offered wonderful food from all over the world by her grandmother, exposing her to spices, flavors, exotic smells, and most importantly, the freshest ingredients. Growing up between worlds, she is used to crossing multiple cultures and countries. Born in Singapore, Alaine had her young childhood years in Jakarta and then grew up in Singapore in the expat world, with summers in Sydney and California to visit her relatives. She later went on to live for more than a decade in the US, graduate school in the Swiss Alps, and worked in Brussels. She now splits her time between Singapore and Europe. A bonafide global citizen (or your average Third Culture Kid), Alaine straddles the gap between worlds. Hybrid cuisines and cultures, multicultural ambiguities, international communities and cross-cultural chameleons are commonplace features of her mixed up life. Through diverse careers as a professional contemporary dancer and choreographer, education, events, hospitality, food and beverage, and tourism, she's had a colorful background. Her hyper-creative brain never stops spinning and she's always either creating new recipes or choreographing new dances in her head. Alaine loves to host dinner parties and fika afternoons with friends. Being busy in the kitchen and creating delicious somethings for others to enjoy never ceases to put a smile on her face. Once she started adopting fika as a way of life and enjoying a weekly chokladbollar, she wanted to share that small slice of joy with others. The journey of the chokladbollar for Alaine was more than a simple treat. It became a way of life, a way of fika, and a way of embracing 'just the right amount' or lagom.