I'll leave the details of the natural topography (like being on the moon with geysers and steam escaping randomly across the land), the non-stop partying, and the omnipresent summer sun on the side and cut to the chase. There are three culinarily notable facts about iceland.
1) They make a very good hot dog that attracts leaders from around the world (Clinton, Gorbachev, etc). Involving lamb in addition to other animal meat in a natural casing. And, yes, it's served from a hot dog stand. The place is called Bæjarins Beztu Pylsur - just rolls off the tongue. And here it is in all its glory:
2) The puffin is the national bird. It is also the national dish. Grilled bald eagle anyone?
3) You can eat whale there legally.
For points (2) and (3), you can get your fix as we did at Sægreifinn - a seafood shack on the water where you pick your raw skewers of these delicacies (i use that term lightly) and they cook em up.
Upon arrival, the "shack" element went from really "local" feeling to "we just got written up in the NY Times and now the jewish population in Iceland is now outnumbered 3 to 1 by the patrons of this restaurant." Yes, the Times loved their tasty lobster soup.
Of course, we picked the puffin and the whale. As you will note there are no pictures as we were too engrossed in what we were eating. The puffin was game-y. Gamier than any venison, bison, elk or mythical wooly mammoth one could eat. It probably had something to do with the preparation which was pretty simple - kill puffin. Cut up puffin. Throw on fire. When i saw the fearless Juice wretch, i knew this was something special. The whale, prepared with equal grace, was strangely enough exactly what is should have been. If you could create a taste spectrum with "meat" on one end and "fish" on the other, whale would have sat perfectly equidistant. Fortunately, the lobster soup was pretty amazing. Unfortunately, we ate it first and therefore could not use it to cleanse our poor tongues for what we just subjected them to.
I also had the good fortune to tour the Reyka distillery - about an hour's drive into the middle of nowhere. We arrived at the aluminum-sided silo with a warm welcome.
Yes, the only distillery in Iceland and one of the world's most environmentally friendly distilleries. And i was fortunate enough to get a personal tour from the master distiller, Kristmar Olafsson. We became the best of friends...
The extremely impressive Copper Still was certainly the highlight of the tour. This is where the magic happens!
Some of the goods before being shipped around the world.
If you ever find yourself cruising through Bourgarnes, Iceland, make sure to swing by and say hi to Kristmar!
