Reykjavík Grapevine - 09.09.2011, Blaðsíða 20

20
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 14 — 2011
For those who don’t feel like troll-
ing the local restaurants but are
similarly underwhelmed by the se-
lection at their local pink piggy or
yellow coin supermarket, here’s a
quick list of suggestions for raw in-
gredients.
VEGGIES
The cheapo markets may sell pig fod-
der vegetables but you have some re-
course. Melabúðin (Hagamelur 39), the
favourite from the west side of Reykja-
vík, a neighbourhood store that con-
sistently offers fresh and healthy look-
ing produce. The warehouse Stórkaup
(Faxafen 8) isn’t too bad either when it
comes to vegetables, despite appear-
ances. Otherwise you are best served
at the pricey vegetable section at Hag-
kaup or Nótatún (many locations).
General organic food can be found
at Yggdrasill (Rauðarárstígur 10) and
Maður Lifandi (Borgartún 24 and other
locations). For pulses and grains, the
Grandi location of the chain supermar-
ket Krónan has been fairly consistent as
far as variety and price goes.
FISH
For pre-made stews, marinated cod,
fish balls and the rest you could do
worse than Hafið (Hlíðasmári 8), for
people on a budget the frozen whole-
saler fiska.is is your friend who are also
to be found in the wonderful produce
section at the Kolaportið flea market.
Or you can use the walk back from the
Laugardalslaug pool to drop by Fisk-
búðin at Sundlaugavegur 12, a friendly
neighbourly operation. Fylgifiskar
(Suðurlandsbraut 10) is still a great op-
tion for high-end fish and seafood as
well as some pre-marinated choices.
The cheapest traditional fish store
seems to still be Litla fiskibúðin in the
town of Hafnarfjörður (Miðvangur 41),
although it’s tiny and the selection is
nothing to phone home about.
MEAT
For meat you can try Kjötkompaní
(Dalshraun 13, Hafnarfjörður), which
has a decent selection of meats and
Kjötbúðin (Grensásvegur 48) offers a
wide selection at comparatively good
prices. For the more adventurous I defi-
nitely recommend Háls í Kjós (www.
hals.is) or any of the farms selling prime
organic cuts straight from the farm,
with tenderloin, rib eye, porterhouse,
beef tongue, jerky and more. A full list
of farms that sell directly to consumers
can be found at www.beintfrabyli.is.
PROCESSED MEATS
Raw sausages and quality pickles were
next to impossible to find in Iceland
until immigrants came to the rescue.
For sausages and pickles you have a
number of small Polish neighbourhood
stores to choose from, such as Mini
Market (Drafnafell 14) but the best
place for cured and uncured sausages
remains Pylsumeistarinn (Hrísateigur
47). On the same corner you have the
farmers market Frú Lauga (Laugalæk
6). This is a fixed location for Frú Lauga
but they do branch out to downtown
Reykjavík on occasion. Great ground
beef chuck, lamb, assorted smoked
meats along with beets, blueberry jams
and rhubarb straight from the source
and mostly organic.
HOME AND WILD GROWN FOOD-
STUFFS
Not that you’d need to buy your rhu-
barb—see if you don’t know an Iceland-
er with a surplus in their garden and
take a tip from Icelandic kids and dip
it straight from the ground into a bowl
of sugar. Or use the chance the first
weeks of September and go out pick-
ing blueberries and mushrooms. For
mushrooms, www.nature.is gives tips
on edible varieties and www.berjavinir.
com lists good spots for wild bilberries
(Google Translate is your friend here).
Growing veggies outdoors is also an
option in Iceland—potatoes, kale, car-
rots and rutabagas all do well here and
herbs prosper in our warm colourful
huts when there’s sunlight to be had. If
everything fails, the coastline and rivers
of Iceland are teeming with fish only to
happy too be eaten by you (www.nat.
is/nateng/angling_in_iceland.htm) and
you can always grab a gun and head
out east to bag yourself a reindeer or
goose (www.huntingiceland.com).
That’s it for now but please let
Grapevine know of any hot produce
procuring tips we probably definitely
have missed!
“The coastline and rivers of Iceland are teeming with fish
only to happy too be eaten by you”
Food | Good to know Opinion | Ragnar Egilsson
WHERE TO FIND YOUR MEAT AND VEG
RAGNAR EGILSSON
NATSHA NANDABHIWAT
We thought we'd make an extra 'food page' (in addition to the restaurant reviews in
our listings). We are thinking of making it a steady thing, too. What do y'all think?
You are probably going to be
hearing a lot of griping about
Icelandic food trends in this
mini-column, so I want to start
o f f on a positive note.
I was hanging around my aunt's garden
this weekend (as you do) and was f labber-
gasted to find that, not only is she growing
the largest strawberries I have ever seen
outside of a greenhouse, but she's growing a
bevy of beauticious bright pink raspberries.
Apparently everyone is doing it and I com-
pletely slept on it. And this was in addition
to the usual carrots, kale, redcurrants and
parsley in her growbox.
This led to a big discussion about the
other things people have started to grow out-
side of greenhouses in Iceland. We now have
barley growers like Ólafur Eggertsson with
Eyrarbú in Þorvaldseyri and Júlíus and Jóna-
tan Líndal in the far north of Skagaströnd,
Haraldur Magnússon at Belgsholt in Melas-
veit and others. These must getting close to
supplying all the barley needs in Iceland as,
come to think of it, I don't remember seeing
imported barley in over a year. I even came
across a barley breakfast cereal made from
local grain (www.byggi.is).
Then there are the apple farmers, such
as mad scientists Jón Guðmundsson in
Akranes, experimenting with the outdoor
cultivation of apples, pears, plums and cher-
ries and Sæmundur Guðmundsson at Hella
also with pears and apples as well as black-
berries, huckleberries and other strangers
to the Icelandic berry f lora (no relation be-
tween the two men as far as I know). Both
seem to be aiming for a commercial scale
and the outlook seems good. Finally there's
Á-Vöxtur, an interest group advocating fruit
cultivation in Iceland that's working in col-
laboration with The Fruit Tree Planting
Foundation.
Not to mention our many enterprising
marijuana farmers, although I think they
are still greenhouse bound for obvious rea-
sons.
It's tempting to lay this on global warm-
ing but it's just as likely that these are due
to access to new cultivars better suited to
Icelandic climate and a growing interest in
diversification among Icelandic growers.
Having come back to Iceland after living
abroad, it's a pleasant surprise to see this
rising trend in locally grown fruits, grains
and veggies spilling out of the greenhouses.
From the micro to the macro, whether it's
my aunt one-upping me with monster ber-
ries to the farmers experimenting with new
ideas on a commercial scale, the rewarding
feeling of eating vegetables you have grown
yourself can be extended from the individual
to a national level. Not that this is necessar-
ily rooted in patriotism. The slow food move-
ment and the localvores have a tendency to
nationalism and neo-luddism that can be
a little off-putting. I'm not celebrating this
for some obscure patriotic yeah Iceland rea-
sons, but simply because it raises quality by
not relying on damaging import procedures.
This is a great thing because it results in
better food. And who knows what the future
may hold, I'm no expert but climate-wise I
can't see why we couldn't experiment with
pumpkins, sweet potatoes, courgettes—all
of which I've seen grown with success in
cooler climates.
Strange
Fruit