Kjötsúpudagurinn á fyrsta degi vetrar

Meat Soup Day on the first day of winter

Yesterday was fyrsti vetrardagur in Iceland, the first day of winter.

The day goes back to the old Icelandic calendar, which divides the year into 6 winter months and 6 summer months. The first day of winter is the Saturday after the 26th week of summer, usually the Saturday between October 21st and 27th.

The first Monday of winter, the gormánuður , is also known as the “slaughter month” - after the cattle round-up at the end of September, the slaughter of the animals that were not to be brought over the winter followed. Therefore, the first month of winter is the perfect time for good meat soup made from freshly slaughtered Icelandic lamb.

Íslensk kjötsúpa , or Icelandic meat soup, is a hearty soup made from lamb and vegetables. Potatoes, carrots, beets and cabbage are mostly used, and sometimes onions and leeks are also used. The soup is often thickened slightly with rice or pearl barley. Sometimes kjötsúpa is more reminiscent of oxtail soup, sometimes it is based on vegetable broth or contains a tomato base.

On Skólavörðustígur, the first day of winter since 2003 is celebrated as kjötsúpudagur , or meat soup day .

Skólavörðustígur Street runs from Hallgrímskirkja down to Laugavegur. The street takes its name from the old stone school control room that stood up here on the hill for around 140 years. The control room was demolished in 1931 to make room for the large statue of Leifur Eiríksson by the US sculptor Alexander Stirling Calder (1870 - 1945), which was given to Iceland by the USA in 1930 to mark the 1,000th anniversary of Alþingi. By the way, when the statue was erected here, Hallgrímskirkja was only in the planning stage; construction of the church began in 1945 (completion in 1986).

On the first day of winter, the Skólavörðustígur is closed to traffic and free meat soup is served in several places - usually from 1 or 2 p.m. and until all the soup has been served.

Yesterday the first soup station was from Kaffi Loki at the top of the street.

At Krua Thai there was also a stand in front of the shop with Icelandic meat soup, which was also served in the style of Thai in Icelandic sheep's wool sweaters. The soup had a very slight Asian touch, but it was definitely íslensk kjötsúpa .

At the Sjávargrillið restaurant there was still meat soup, like everywhere else in wide cardboard cups for the soup, but the spoons had already run out. I think that could also have been a reason why the delicious free soup portions were particularly large here!

There was also a stand with meat soup in front of the Galleri at Skólavörðustígur 5 - here again the more reddish version.

The last stop was down at Laugavegur at the stand of Bændasamtök Íslands , the Icelandic farmers' association. Subjectively, the kjötsúpa here was particularly tasty and spicy.

Yesterday it started at 1 p.m. At most stands the meat soup was already completely served around 2:40 p.m. I think we missed one stand. In any case, it was a very nice event - oh yes!

[Translated from here.]