Iceland review - 2014, Síða 63

ICELAND REVIEW 61
Sólveig Eiríksdóttir, or Solla as she’s known, head chef at the
popular Gló restaurant and Iceland’s best-known health food
guru—she’s been working in the business for more than 30 years
and was voted Best Raw Chef at the Best of RAW awards 2011
and 2012—is among those to have noticed the trend.
“After the crash, people took a good look at the things that
actually make a difference in life. Some saw that all this money
didn’t really make all that much difference. There are some
things you just can’t buy, like good health,” Solla says, noting
that there’s been an increase in people growing their own veg-
gies again too.
As far as Solla’s concerned, eating local and eating healthy are
intertwined. “As soon as you start thinking about where your
food comes from, you become a lot more aware of what you eat.”
The trend towards a healthier lifestyle in Iceland, Solla says,
is also in large part due to the ease at which information can be
disseminated in a small country. Solla herself has been active in
helping to raise awareness of the importance of healthy eating.
While she acknowledges the critics’ argument that eating well
in Iceland can be expensive, she maintains that for most it’s
a choice. “It’s an investment in your future. Take myself as an
example. I’m 54 years old and I don’t take any sort of medica-
tion. I could choose to eat unhealthy food and put the money I
may save aside but I don’t. I choose to eat healthy.” According to
Solla, it’s also cheaper to buy some organic products in Iceland
than in other countries because they are available in all super-
markets, not just the high-end or health food stores. Solla isn’t
exactly impartial here as she claims part of the credit for the
development, having introduced her own line of cheaper organ-
ic and health food products to supermarkets and having sold
around 50,000 copies—close to 1 in 6 Icelanders own one—of
her healthy eating cookbook Heilsuréttir Hagkaups, published in
collaboration with the Hagkaup supermarket chain.
“I remember back in 2004, there were just a couple of shelves
in Hagkaup and no real health food section in the lower-cost
supermarket chains. Now, health food products are available
at all the stores and at a lower price,” she beams. A string of
other health food restaurants and stores have also opened up in
Reykjavík in recent years.
Despite the positive trends, Solla is vocal about the need for
continued improvement. At 239 grams per day, consumption
of fruit and vegetables is still far below the recommended 400
grams, according to the aforementioned 2012 study by the
Directorate of Health. The situation in schools and hospitals is
particularly worrisome, Solla says. “I held a course at one of the
schools a couple of years ago and one of the staff told me that
they have just 186 krónur [uSD 1.50, EuR 1.20] per child per
day to produce meals. What can you do with 186 krónur?”
Solla is also keen to highlight Iceland’s potential to produce a
great deal more fresh produce. “We’re the biggest producer of
bananas in Europe. Yes, here in Iceland!” she says in reference
to a university greenhouse in Hveragerði, South Iceland (the
bananas are not available on the market). “We really can grow
fruit and vegetables here. It could be a paradise for food produc-
tion, if we want.”*
heAlth
“After the crash,
people took a good
look at the things
that actually make
a difference
in life.”