Icelandic cuisine: another kind of pickled shark meat

Compared with other countries, Iceland's cuisine seems to have not evolved perfectly, and many eating habits are still in the primitive stage. The pickled shark meat that Icelanders like to eat is basically acceptable to themselves, and the diet has become their own Icelandic characteristics.

Iceland is almost entirely built on volcanic rocks, and most of the land cannot be reclaimed to develop agriculture. For centuries, the life of Icelanders can be simply summarized as hunting, fishing and grazing. It may be that such a crude lifestyle can't completely fill the stomachs of Icelanders. Hungry, they actually pointed the knife at the overlord in the sea-the shark.

Many studies and practices show that shark meat is not suitable for eating. Compared with saltwater fish, sharks have poor kidney function and cannot excrete urine thicker than seawater. In order to adapt to life in seawater with extremely high salinity, it can only excrete urea produced by metabolism in the blood. Therefore, the average shark meat always smells like ammonia. Without special treatment, such shark meat is not good for human beings.

Icelanders not only like to eat shark meat, but also like to eat fermented and rotten shark meat. They buried the hunted sharks in the sand and took them out as food after three to six months of natural decay. This kind of pickled shark meat called Hákarl makes outsiders dare not compliment. It not only stinks, but also has a strong ammonia smell. However, this smelly shark is a popular snack in Iceland.

Sharks in Greenland waters must be able to make shark meat in Iceland. This kind of shark is fierce in nature and fishing at sea is very dangerous, so this kind of shark meat has always been the most expensive fish in Iceland. After the shark is caught ashore, fishermen will only choose glerhákarl with a red belly and skyrhákarl with a white and soft body as materials. These selected shark meat should be air-dried for more than 4 months, and the thoroughly dried shark meat will be officially buried in the sand for deep fermentation until the meat quality is completely tender. Such efforts often take a whole year to bear fruit.

Complex production technology makes heterogeneous shark meat become a noble in food. In Iceland, you can only eat it in restaurants of a certain scale, not the "stinky tofu" that ordinary roadside stalls can buy. A plate of four or five pieces of shark meat, a glass of local high-concentration beer and a slice of toast are the most common dining combinations, but such a simple specification costs 6,000 Icelandic kronor to enjoy an authentic Icelandic pickled shark.

Fortunately, not many people will be interested in this kind of food. Some people say that this smelly shark smells like a walking corpse, and it smells like carrion everywhere. "I threw up as soon as I ate the shark meat in my mouth. It's terrible. " For this reason, many restaurants will store smelly shark meat in the refrigerator in advance in a vacuum sealed package, and then take it out when the guests order, otherwise the smell emitted from time to time is likely to affect the business of the restaurant.

However, in the eyes of Icelanders, salted shark meat is indeed the biggest delicacy. In Iceland, every husband's day, the hostess will treat her husband who has worked hard for a year with cooked shark meat. Many Icelanders left home in Wan Li, and still can't forget the delicious taste of smelly sharks. They will buy a small bag of shark meat and breathe a sigh of relief at the first moment when they return home. Pickled sharks, which smell bad, may not taste good, but they have become an emotional bond to maintain local flavor.