Lambakjöt með lakkríssósu

Lamb with chocolate licorice sauce

Ingredients

For the meat:

800 g lamb
2 Tbsp butter
salt and pepper

For the sauce:

400 ml lamb stock
100 ml orange juice
1 Tbsp butter
3 licorice snails
100 g orange chocolate
2 Tbsp flour
2 Tbsp cold water

If available, you can use Icelandic licorice chocolate and grated orange peel instead of licorice snails and orange chocolate.


Preparation

For the sauce:

In a pot heat lamb stock with orange juice and butter. Chop the licorice snails and add them into the brew.

Let everything simmer. Thereby again and again stir around, until the licorice has melted.

Cut the chocolate into small pieces and add them to the sauce.

Mix flour and cold water and add it to the sauce.

Let the sauce simmer at low temperature and stir occasionally.

Now prepare the meat:

Melt butter in a large frying pan at medium heat.

Cut the lamb into 1 cm slices. Brown the slices from both sides in the butter and season with salt and pepper.

Serve the fried lamb with licorice sauce, mashed potatoes and salad.

Lax í bláberjasósa

Blueberry marinated salmon

Well, at first glance the combination of fish, blueberries, onions and garlic might seem a bit strange. But modern Icelandic cuisine often tries out unusual things and places traditional Icelandic products in a new context of taste.

Blueberries, "bláberja", are typical for Iceland. There are many large heather areas all over the island. If you keep your eyes open, you can find blueberries at many places. And salmon, in Icelandic "lax", is very common in Iceland, too. Lots of rivers are named "laxá", meaning salmon river.

Ingredients for 2 persons

1 salmon half (with skin)

200 g blueberries

1 garic clove

1 onion

1 cm ginger root

1 Tbsp lime juice

2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar

2 Tbsp chopped basil

salt and pepper


Preparation

Peal and dice the onions. Grate garlic and ginger. (Freshly grated ginger has much more intense taste than ready-to-use ginger powder.)

Heat some butter in a pan. Add blueberries, garlic, ginger, onion, lime juice, balsamic vinegar and basil. Let everything simmer for some minutes. Briefly allow to cool. Then mash the marinade with a blender.

Place the salmon half with skin facing down on a baking tray. Brush it with a part of the marinade (not too thick!).  Let it soak in the fridge for some hours.

Roast the fish (still with skin facing down) in the preheated oven at 250 °C for 10 to 15 minutes.

Serve the salmon decorated with the rest of the marinade and, traditionally, with potatoes and vegatables.

Heimatilbúið páskaegg

Homemade Easter eggs

In Iceland Easter is celebrated by giving big chocolate Easter eggs. You can get these chocolate eggs everywhere in shops and supermarkets. Some weigh more than 1.5 kg. They are filled with candies and slips of paper with good wishes.

Here's a short guide showing how you can make such an Easter present by yourself:


Ingredients

400 g milk chocolate

Depending on taste:

vanilla
instant cappuccino
licorice powder
or similar

and

a big egg mold

Preparation

Melt the chocolate over hot water. Depending on taste, stir in vanilla, instant cappuccino, licorice powder or similar. Allow to cool down, until the chocolate starts to thicken.

Pour some chocolate into a small mold to create a base, on which the Easter egg can be placed later. Let it cool down in the fridge.

Add some chocolate to the egg mold halves and spread it out. Leave to harden a bit. Then add chocolate once more and repeat again and again, until the chocolate layer is thick enough. After cooling down in the fridge, remove the chocolate carefully from the mold. (If something goes wrong, you can melt the chocolate again and start from the beginning.)

When both halves of the egg have turned out well, fill one half with candy and add a piece of paper with a good wish.

Melt a bit of chocolate, coat the edges of the egg halves with it and press them together.

When everything is hardened, add some melted chocolate on top of the base, place the egg on it and let it harden.

If you like, you can decorate the egg with colored sugar izing.

Store the Easter egg in a cool room - and give it to a nice person!

Baunastappa

Pea purée

Ingredients

400 g frozen peas
2 Tbsp butter
6 Tbsp whipped cream
salt
pepper
mint pepper or mint powder


Preparation

Add frozen peas into a pan of boiling water and let them cook for about 5 minutes.

Melt butter in a second pot. Add peas and whipped cream and heat up the mix for a while.

Finally mash the fried peas and season with salt, pepper and mint.

Pea purée is served as side dish to meat or fish.

Rabarbarakaka með rifnu rúgbrauði

Rhubarb cake with crumbled rye bread

In Iceland, rye bread is very common. Even if the bread has become a bit stale, it's no reason to throw it away. You still can process it into something tasty, for example into a rhubarb bread cake.

Ingredients

 500 g rhubarb stalks
 500 g pumpernickel
 150 g sugar
 1 pinch of ground vanilla
 3 tbsp margarine


Preparation

Wash and clean the rhubarb, cut into small pieces, sprinkle with 100 g of sugar, mix and let soak for about 1/2 hour.

Thoroughly crumble the pumpernickel.

Mix in ground vanilla and the remaining 50 g of sugar.

Preheat oven to 180 °C.

Fill the bottom of a springform pan (approx. 22 cm) lined with baking paper with 1/3 of the crumbled bread and press firmly.

Then spread half of the rhubarb on it, followed by another layer of breadcrumbs, the remaining rhubarb, and a third layer of breadcrumbs.

Spread margarine on top.

Bake the cake in the pre-heated oven at 180 °C for about 40 minutes.

Remove the cake from the oven and allow to cool in the tin. Then gently remove from the tin.

It's important to keep the cake in the fridge, since it could lose its shape otherwise.

Serve well chilled and with whipped cream.

Fiskíbollur

Fish balls

Ingredients


500 g haddock fillet
1 chopped onion
1 egg
30 g wheat flour
30 g potato starch
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
1 tsp grated nutmeg
1 tsp curry powder
butter for the pan


Preparation

Cut the fish into small pieces. Mix with chopped onion, egg, flour, potato starch, salt and spices and mash well everything. The resulting pulp should be stiff enough to form little balls by the spoonful. If the pulp is too stiff, you can dilute it with some milk.

Heat butter in a frying pan and brown the fish balls from all sides for about 3 minutes. Place the browned balls in a bowl in the oven at 100 °C to keep warm until served..

Traditionally fish balls are served with potatoes and vegetables. We had it with bean vegetables and french fries.

Fiskíbollur is a very typically Icelandic dish. You can get them pre-fried in every supermarket, so that you only have to toss them in the pan.