Reykjavík Grapevine - 19.06.2015, Page 61

Sushi Samba
Þingholtsstræti 5 • 101 Reykjavík
Tel 568 6600 • sushisamba.is
Our kitchen is open
17.00–23.00 sun.–thu.
17.00–24.00 fri.–sat.
Amazing
7 course menu
A unique Icelandic Feast
Starts with a shot of the Icelandic
national spirit “Brennivín“
Puffin
Smoked puffin with blueberries,
croutons, goat cheese, beetroot
Minke whale
Minke whale with tataki
Arctic charr
“Torched“ arctic charr with parsnip
purée, fennel, dill mayo
Lobster
Lobster cigar with chorizo, dates, chili jam
Reindeer
Reindeer slider with blue cheese, portobello,
steamed bun
Free range icelandic lamb
Lamb with coriander, pickled red cabbage,
fennel, butternut squash purée, chimichurri
And to end on a high note ...
Icelandic Skyr
Skyr panna cotta with raspberry sorbet, white
chocolate crumble, passion foam, dulche de leche
6.990 kr.

FOOD
FOR THE SOUL
without a hot tub to lie in and drink and
watch snowballs melt in the water.
Does he get many tourists visiting dur-
ing the high season? Þorgrímur says they
are surprisingly busy during the summer
months. “We get tourists going up north
or south taking this detour just to drop by
the creamery for half an hour,” he says.
“We only started this in 2009 and already
then someone from Lonely Planet came
and did a write-up and
I see the tourists hold-
ing a copy and asking
for the 'best ice cream
in Iceland.'”
Þorgrímur says
he got into ice cream
because it’s simple
enough to make and
everyone loves it.
“We’re directing this at
children and families
who can come and visit the farm, and dur-
ing the summer,” he says, “we’ll have the
same families coming to visit more than
once.”
I can see why families would be at-
tracted to Erpsstaðir. Aside from the see-
ing the calves get fed and the mischievous
adventures of the shit robot, we were
lucky enough to catch a live birth. The
cow had been in labour for an excessive
amount of time and Þorgrímur had to as-
sist with the birth using obstetrical chains
and a German BDSM dungeon’s worth of
lubricant. The calf arrived soon after, safe
and sound, as the cow went to work clean-
ing up everyone involved. My mother had
an easier time getting me to move from
home and I left claw marks on the door-
frames.
The mouth frenzy ice
cream
Erpsstaðir are best known for their ice
cream but they also produce caraway
cheese, skyr, and a white chocolate and
skyr konfekt. The packaging for the skyr
praline was produced in collaboration
with local designers, and the Reykjavík
Grapevine gave it top honours in our 2012
Product Awards.
The milk and cream for the ice cream
is obviously sourced from Erpsstaðir, the
egg yolks come from Nesbú, and Þor-
grímur says he strives to use local, sea-
sonal flavours whenever possible, such as
rhubarb, dandelion honey, and blueber-
ries from the Westfjords. They are not
distributing the products widely and so
far the best bet is to access the ice cream
directly from the farm.
“I have been selling some portion of
our products to speciality store Frú Lauga
in Reykjavík but it’s not on a steady basis.
During the winter months I am not that
focused on the production line. I try to
make some cheese to have for the summer
but this is a side business for me. I have
been lucky in that all of my dairy experi-
ments have gone really well—everything
sells out,” Þorgrímur explains.
The Erpsstaðir ice cream really is
something else. The Icelandic name he
has given it is “Kjaftæði,” which is a won-
derful play on words. “Kjaftæði,” the most
common Icelandic word for “nonsense,”
literally translates as “mouth frenzy.”
We got to try butterscotch, vanilla,
and coconut during our visit. The vanilla
was a great showcase for the quality of
the basic building
blocks they’re work-
ing with—it has this
freshness to it where
you can literally catch
a faint whiff of ud-
ders and barnyards.
But the coconut one
was an aptly named
mouth frenzy, so
creamy it made coco-
nut cream taste like
skim milk. Thick and delicious with pro-
nounced coconut flavours and flakes of
shredded coconut.
As an added reminder of how the
dairy products of Mjólkursamsalan pale
in comparison, the ice cream is sold in
what look like recycled skyr.is tins.
Incidentally, it was Mjólkursamsalan
who feigned outrage when Danish milk
producer Arla co-opted Icelandic culture
to market their own brand of skyr. Neither
company makes anything that an Icelan-
dic grandmother would recognise as the
skyr from her youth. Both products are a
thin, sugary yogurt-like product.
You have not tried real skyr until you
have had it from a real small-batch pro-
ducer like Erpsstaðir. The bacteria cul-
ture is different, the acidity is both milder
and more pronounced, and the texture is
between yogurt and cottage cheese (be-
traying its designation as a cheese, not a
yogurt). Don’t miss out on the real skyr
experience.
Northern Lights galore
That night at the cabin, we caught the
most vivid and sprawling display of north-
ern lights I have seen in my life, and I have
seen more than a few. So we lay there in
the hot tub after a nice meal of rosemary
lamb and German sourdough bread, nurs-
ing an unholy combination of Hawaiian
pale ale and Icelandic orange soda Ap-
pelsín until we got too pruned up to func-
tion. Just then the TV decided to kick in
and the state TV channel was showing
‘Back to the Future III’. So we sat down
and watched it over an unholy amount of
Kjaftæði ice cream.
This is all anyone should ever need.
-Visit them at: Rjómabúið
Erpsstaðir, 371 Búðardalur
Learn more at: http://www.erpssta-
dir.is/
As an added reminder of
how the dairy products
of Mjólkursamsalan pale
in comparison, the ice
cream is sold in what
look like recycled skyr.is
tins..