Many, many Icelandic dishes

Do you want to get some appetite? In this video, you can see nearly all the Icelandic dishes we've prepared for this blog so far. Enjoy!

  

 

Gulrótarkaka

Carrot cake

Carrot cake is my daughters favorite Icelandic cake. And she’s right: It is really delicious. I feel like I bake it at least once a month for the family - and not only upon request of my daughter. 


Ingredients

250 g soft butter

250 g brown sugar

5 eggs

peel and juice of 1 orange

170 g flour

1 tsp baking powder

100 g chopped almonds

100 g chopped walnuts

250 g carrots

sea salt

For the coating

150 g mascarpone

200 g cream cheese

100 g icing sugar, sieved

peel and juice of 1 lime

For the decoration

6 walnuts (in halves)

Preparation

Preheat the oven to 350 °F (180 °C).

Peel and grate the carrots.

Beat the butter and brown sugar until frothy. 

Separate the eggs and add the egg yolks one by one. 

Then add the orange peel and orange juice, the flour and baking powder, the chopped almonds and walnuts and the grated carrots and stir everything.

In a separate bowl, beat the 5 egg whites with a pinch of sea salt until stiff. Carefully fold it into the dough.

Then place the dough in a springform pan buttered or lined with baking paper. Bake in the oven for at least 45 minutes until golden brown. Be careful – the cake tends to be unbaked at the bottom middle, so bake a little longer and test with wooden sticks whether everything is really baked ("toothpick test").

Let the cake cool for at least one hour.

For the coating, stir all ingredients together. Then spread the mixture on the top and the sides of the cake. Decorate with walnut halves.

If possible, prepare the carrot cake the day before and let it rest over night.

Note: 

If time is pressing, you can simply cover the cake with a normal icing sugar or lemon glaze instead of the cream cheese coating.

Rúgbrauð - Icelandic Rye Bread

A particular specialty of Icelandic cuisine is the Icelandic rye bread, i.e. rúgbrauð. It is a bit similar to pumpernickel, but it is soft and fluffy and tastes sweet. 

Baking bread with the heat of the earth

Traditionally, this bread is baked in Iceland’s geothermally heated ground, then usually in a tin can, which is buried in the ground for 10 - 24 hours (depending on the temperature on site). This bread is known, for example, from Heimaey after the volcanic eruption in 1973, from the region on Mývatn or from the geothermal bakery at the swimming pool "Fontana" in Laugarvatn.

An oven of the village community

In some places, however, there are also communal "ovens" where the inhabitants can bake their rye bread in special devices with the hot steam of geothermal energy. 

A friend of ours lives here, and she showed me her "oven". In this steaming "tin barrel", there is a grid, on which you place a milk carton filled with your dough. Then you push the lid down again and screw it down. Then the bread bakes in hot steam. On the next day the rúgbrauð is ready. 

But in fact, you need at least two people when you put your dough in here, because the barrel is really hot, and I would have had big problems to screw down the lid on my own. 

Slow baking - baking time 12 to 24 hours

If you don't have geothermal energy available, you can also bake your rúgbrauð in the oven. Here I have  a recipe for you, which  is prepared with ab-mjólk (a special probiotic thick milk) or alternatively with yogurt. The bread is baked classically in empty, washed-out milk cartons (32 fl. oz. resp. 1 l) - here for about 11 hours at 200 °F (90 °C). 

Ingredients for 3 loaves of bread

460 g rye flour

260 g wholemeal wheat flour

3 tsp coarse sea salt

3 tsp baking soda

1 l ab-mjólk (or plain yogurt)

350 g syrup

oil for greasing

Preparation

Preheat the oven (circulating air) to  200 °F (90 °C).

In a very large bowl, mix the rye and wheat flour with the salt and baking soda.

Then add sour milk and syrup.

Mix everything thoroughly to a smooth dough.

Wash the milk cartons thoroughly, cut open the upper end, grease a little bit their insides.

Then fill the dough evenly into the prepared milk cartons, which should then be almost half filled (be careful, the dough really rises properly when baking!).

Cover the milk cartons thoroughly and firmly with two layers of aluminum foil. 

And bake in a preheated oven at 200 °F (90 °C) circulating air for about 11 hours.

Then take the bread out of the oven, carefully remove the aluminum foil and let the bread cool. Finally open the milk carton carefully and tear it off.

Cut the bread into slices and serve with fresh butter as an accompaniment to soup or fish dishes.

I had baked this bread here for a forum meeting of Iceland fans in Germany, where I had arranged an Icelandic lunch: meatless meat soup (we also had vegetarians with us) with rye bread with butter and for dessert cinnamon rolls and ástarpungar ("loveballs"). 

The bread tastes best fresh, but you can also cut it into slices and freeze it in portions if there is anything left. 

Kjötsúpudagurinn

Meat Soup Day at the beginning of winter

In Iceland, winter always starts at the end of October. The first day of winter ("fyrsti vetrardagur") according to the old Icelandic calendar is the first Saturday between October 21st and 27th.

Since 2003, on Skólavörðustígur street, which leads from Hallgrímskirka down to Laugavegur in Reykjavík, the "kjötsúpudagur", i.e. the Meat Soup Day, has been celebrated on the first day of winter. From 2 p.m., various variants of the typical Icelandic meat soup are served at several stations along the street for free. The event starts at 2 p.m. and lasts as long as stocks last (maximum for 2 hours).

This year, unfortunately we could not join the Meat Soup Day. But in 2021 we took the opportunity and tried out five different meat soups. It was definitely a rewarding and delicious experience!

Impressions of 2021

If you missed the Kjötsúpudagur on Skólavörðustígur this year, as we did, you can also cook your own Icelandic meat soup at home, of course. Here on this blog you can find two very delicious, but also very different types of such soup:

• a traditional variant and
• a meatless meat soup

The taste of the vegan variant actually comes very close to the classic meat soup.

Meat or no meat, that doesn't have to be the question.

The taste is great anyhow.

Kjötlaus kjötsúpa

Meatless meat soup

Kjötsúpa, meat soup traditionally prepared with lamb, is one of the most famous dishes of Icelandic cuisine.

Here you find a vegan version of this soup, instead of lamb with lentils.

But the taste - it really fits! 

Ingredients

1 onion

1 leek

2 Tbsp rapeseed oil

1 tsp ground cumin

300 g carrots

1/2 celery bulb

150 g potatoes

1/2 head of white cabbage

150 g red lentils

6 Tbsp oat flakes

1 vegetable stock cube (vegan)

2 l (4 cups) water

2 - 3 bay leaves

1 tsp coarse sea salt

1 bunch parsley

Preparation

Heat oil in a large saucepan.

Peel the onion and leek, chop coarsely.

Fry them in the hot oil.

Sprinkle with the cumin and roast carefully. 

Meanwhile, peel and chop the carrots, the celery bulb and the potatoes.

Add carrots, celery and potatoes to the pot.

Clean the white cabbage, chop it and cut into thin strips. Then add it to the pot as well.

Add also the lentils and vegetable stock cube.

Add the oatflakes. Pour in 2 l (4 cups) of hot water. Season with the salt. Add the bay leaves and cook for about 3/4 hour. 

Then remove the bay leaves.

Wash, pluck and chop the parsley and add to the soup.

Serve the hot soup to taste with rye bread and vegan margarine.

Kleinur

Twisted donuts

Ingredients

1 kg vegetable fat (for deep-frying)

300 g wheat flour

125 g sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp hartshorn salt (ammonium carbonate)

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp cardamom

1 tsp grated orange peel

60 g skyr

1 egg

40 g margarine

Preparation 

Slowly melt the vegetable fat over medium heat in a large saucepan.

Mix the flour with sugar, baking powder, hartshorn salt, salt, cardamom and grated orange peel in a bowl. Make a hollow in the middle and add the skyr, egg and margarine. Then process everything into a smooth dough. 

Roll out the dough in portions on a floured work surface. 

Cut the rolled out dough into strips of about 2 inches (5 cm) width. Then cut at a 45° angle so that diamonds are created from the rolled out dough. Cut a slit in the middle of each diamond with a sharp knife (or a pizza cutter). Pull the ends of the dough piece through so that the whole thing is "twisted".

Then bake the twisted dough pieces in the hot fat for about 2 minutes, not more than 3 or 4 of them at once, turning them over if necessary. Be careful that the Kleinur do not bake too long in the fat - they darken afterwards!

Get the fried Kleinur with a spoon out of the hot fat. Drain on kitchen paper and let cool.

Kleinur, cinnamon rolls and "Happy Marriage" cake

Video (in German)

Vínarbrauð

"Viennesse bread" – Danish pastry

This pastry is very popular in Icelend. You can get it in nearly every supermarket and bakery. However, the recipe has its origin not in Iceland, but in Austria. From there it was brought to Denmark and then to Iceland. In Denmark it is called “Wienerbrød “, which is literally the same as the Icelandic “Vínarbrauð”, meaning “Viennesse bread”. In Vienna it is called “Kopenhagener Plunder“, referring to Denmark’s capital Copenhagen. In the U.S. it is known as "Danish pastry".

Ingredients for the dough

500 g white flour

50 g sugar

50 g soft butter

1 egg

1 pkg dry yeast

250 ml lukewarm milk

200 g cold butter

Ingredients for the vanilla cream

250 ml milk

1 tsp ground vanilla

150 g sugar

5 egg yolk

150 g potato starch

50 g soft butter

250 ml whipping cream

Ingredients for the chocolate glaze

100 g chocolate

50 g butter

Preparation of the dough

Mix flour and sugar. Add the soft butter and the egg and knead together.

Add the dry yeast. Pour in the lukewarm milk. Mix everything and process into a smooth, smooth dough. Let it stand for about 15 minutes.

Then roll out the dough between two pieces of baking paper to a thin square. 

Cut the cold, hard butter into thin slices. Use the first quarter of the butter to cover half of the dough with its  slices, but leave a border of about 1 inch (2 cm) free. Fold the other half of the dough on it and press the edges together.

Carefully roll out the dough thinly again. Fold it up, fold it and fold it again. Place the package in the refrigerator for about 15 minutes.

Now process the 2nd quarter of the butter in the same way:  Roll out the dough to a thin square. Cover one half with the butter slices. Leave the edge free. Then fold, roll out thinly and fold. Then refrigerate again. 

Do the same with the last two quarters of the butter. At the end place the dough again in the refrigerator.

Preparation of the pudding cream

Heat 250 ml milk with vanilla in a saucepan and bring to a boil briefly. 

In a separate bowl, beat 5 egg yolks with 150 g of sugar and 150 g of potato starch until frothy. Add the warm vanilla milk in portions and stir. 

Then put everything back in the pot and cook gently, stirring constantly, until the cream thickens. 

Pour the cream into a cold bowl and add 50 g of butter. 

Beat the whipping cream (250 ml) until stiff and mix with the vanilla cream.

Finally, let the cream cool a little in the refrigerator.


Final preparation of the Viennesse Bread

Preheat the oven to 400 °F  (200 °C) upper/lower heat. 

Remove the prepared dough from the refrigerator, roll it out on a work surface lined with baking paper and cut into two long strips. Place the dough strips on a baking tray lined with baking paper. 

Carefully spread the vanilla cream on the middle of each of the dough strips. Then fold up the dough, but leave a little space in the middle.

(I placed baking cups between the two dough strips on the baking tray so that the "breads" do not run too far apart in width... not perfect, but it worked!) 

Bake in a preheated oven at 350 °F (180 °C) for about 20 minutes until the dough has turned golden brown.

 

Now melt the butter for the glaze. Add the chocolate to the hot, melted butter and gently stir everything until smooth. When the Vínarbrauð comes out of the oven, brush it right in the middle. Then cut into thin strips and let cool well.