Icelandic Cuisine

After a week back in the US, I think Lisa and I are just beginning to settle back to eating "American food" - we've had a great meals in Boston, Vermont, Montreal, and now in Bar Harbor but nothing compares to Iceland.  The food we ate in Iceland was FANTASTIC! 

Start with amazing fish (haddock and cod), grass fed lamb and if you feel like it, order beef, because that's great too. (And from what I gather, all the livestock is organic - enough to make me buy organic meats).  Beyond the great ingredients, the food was amazingly well prepared.  In small, unassuming little places, we had amazing food. In Reykjavik, here is our favorite, if you make it to Akureyri, try this one.  I don't think it is exaggerating too much to say that going to Iceland for the food is NOT a crazy plan.

A few things on most menus that we passed up were whale and puffin.  I love to try a new meat and perhaps gain insight into another culture (water buffalo in Laos) but these two just couldn't excite me.  Sorry if it disappoints , but it wasn't because I was opposed to eating smart whales or cute puffins - I tried to work up moral outrage and failed.  It came back to the descriptions of the flavor - one description of whale meat as "like a steak" and another as "like liver" - what? Steak and liver taste nothing alike and I wasn't going to risk having a huge piece of internationally controversial liver in front of me. Puffin was described as "kinda gamey" and "really gamey" - not enough to convince me to give up "butter fried haddock" which I presume is what they eat in Valhalla (how's that for Norse flavor).

If we had made this trip 100, or even 60, years ago, we'd have eaten far more of the traditional Icelandic cuisine.  For much of its history, Iceland was a poor nation, where nothing edible was wasted. Now, with a healthy economy, some traditional cuisine is still ubiquitous - Skyr and geysir bread (its name comes because it is cooked by steam in under ground ovens), but some less desirable options have been left behind except on a few holidays in the winter.

The photo i've attached is from a billboard advertising a cafeteria that serves traditional Icelandic plates (allegedly).  The sheep head is not a reference to eating lamb, it is a reference to eating svið, preserved sheeps heads. Preserved in a gelatin of their own making, they can be "enjoyed" hot or cold.  I never saw these tasty treats - and I went inside, read the dish of the day and spotted everything else offered - apparently these little treats are so unappetizing they can't put them out on display. 

I also didn't see a whole lot of Hakarl - actually, I didn't see it anywhere - and I looked.  This is the food mentioned in every guide book as a sort of open "double dog dare" to tourists.  If you haven't clicked the link, it is usually described as "putrified shark".  A shark too poisonous to eat fresh is buried in the ground for months until it is edible.  The final product is said to have a strong ammonia smell and makes first timers dry heave.  I survived durian, I think I would have tried it (easy to say now).

Long Delay...

Sorry for the long absence, but who'd have thought that my first week back in the USA would find me further from a computer.... coming soon, at long last is the final Iceland post.

National Security

The President of Iceland juast rode by- no motorcade, no fuss, just a nice Lexus with a presidential flag

Dedication

The Icelanders' philosophy of "work hard, play hard" is most famously manifested in their hard drinking on weekend nights. This comes in spite of some very strict laws regulating the purchase of alcohol. Anything stiffer than 2.25% beer (half strength for those of you who were wondering) has to be purchased from Vin Bud - the government liquor store.

Today is Iceland's national holiday, celebrating indepndence from the Danes in 1944. In preparation to celebrate, Lisa and I felt we should stock up on patriotic items like Viking beer and Brennavin (when in Reykjavik..). Vin Bud keeps sparse hours (11:00- 6:00) so we snuck in at 5:50 and picked up some beer. The store was packed and the line was deep but fast moving. On our way out Lisa saw a store employee bar the turnstile for some poor schmuck who will be celebrating independence with lattol.

The difficulty and expense (nearly $20 for our 6 pack of tall boys), not to mention the significant pre-planning, the Icelanders put up with in order to party like the rock stars they are makes their dedication to their craft an inspiration to partiers everywhere.

'Car Days' in Akureyri

After our sojourn to the small towns of Husavik (population 2500) and Reykjahlið (pop 210), we returned to 'the capital of Iceland's North' - Akureyri on Saturday afternoon.

We got into town and began a trek to the great guesthouse we'd stayed at before. There was a much livelier vibe in the street than Wednesday had held. Soon a pickup outfitted with speakers blaring radio ad babble moved slowly through the streets, moving by us on cross streets. When they passed on our street, we could see that they were promoting N3 - a local DJ act playing as part of the Festival and giving out bottles of a soft drink called "Ri Mix" - punny name. Free is rare in Iceland, so we both took a bottle and the truck moved on in the same direction we were headed.

In the main road adjacent to the river there were the loud noises of revving engines and crowds of young revelers. Through the fencing we saw pairs of cars drag racing. We later found that this was Akureyri´s 'Car Days´. The racers were a variety of 'tricked out' street cars of all makes and models - some were more obvious money pits than others. As we passed the road and stood on the bridge that overlooked the line of pending dragsters, we saw a rag tag collection of amateurs - including a number of the style of mid size
luxury SUVs popular in the US! Alright, I can envision a few of my students borrowing Mom's car and drag racing down the Palma Sola Causeway, but standing outside one of these cars was a middle aged man in too tight jeans and a leather racing jacket, strapping on a helmet.

A quick glance through the line of a dozen pending dragsters, I could see that everyone had a helmet on - glad to know that safety comes first.

A REAL SUV

There are a lot of SUVs here in Iceland - with good reason and real 'utility' (most have caked-on mud). These two fall into the broad category called "Super Jeep" - built for off road trips that may require fording a river

Saturday night in Akureyri

We were excited to see part of the 4 day Akureyri International Music Festival (sorry to say, no Sigur Ros or Björk on the bill) and enjoy a peak at the weekend runtur (Iceland´s world famous pub crawl), even the calmer Saturday version (Friday night brings out the Vikings).

We checked out Australia´s own Hoodangers - told you it was an international festival - a rockabilly jazz group that had a poster up in every town we´ve visited. They were fun and it was an interesting scene - not our usual and it struck us that the band was used to a lively crowd.

On our way home from the show, just before midnight, we passed plenty of high schoolers hanging out, one pair of middle schoolers (hey, its still light out...), about 4 roaring house parties, one group of women headed out (things start late), and 2 people so drunk they may not
have known where they were (Iceland!)

While waiting for the bus at 8:30 the next morning, we saw one walker of shame in only a few minutes - and this was only the Saturday runtur!