Fermented Shark, Anyone? | Hacker News Reader

Fermented Shark, Anyone?

1843magazine.com

49 pointsThevet59 comments

I spent December 23rd with Icelanders. I tried the shark cubes but main event was Skata. Suuuuper potent rotten skate. Easily the worst thing I've ever put in my mouth. It smells so bad you can't prepare it inside. They boil it outside and bring it in to eat. I thought I would need to throw away my jacket the next day as it smelled so bad I would gag.

http://icelandmag.visir.is/article/fermented-skate-a-delicac...

A common side-dish with the skate is hnoðmör (they are often mixed together). It is composed of sheep fat (mör) which has fermented/rotted until it is even a bit hairy (with green hairs). Then it is kneaded back together and sold. You can see an example of it here:

https://youtu.be/gZGxdSI09Lo?t=20m52s

In principle it is not so different from blue cheese, except the source of the fat is different... and typically people prefer cheese.

I'm Icelandic, and my last memory of eating shark was when I was a kid and was visiting my friend. I puked and never tasted it again.

I don't mind keeping traditions around. These foods, however, only existed because we didn't have any better way to preserve them. We do now, and I neither see any reason nor feel any urge to eat rotten food. This sentiment is shared by most icelandic people I know. Very few people(that I know) consider these things to be a delicacy. It's mostly the older generations.

And the tourists! I had some when I was visiting. I didn't like it, but I'm glad I tried.

Damien Hirst calls it The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living.

Icelanders call it supper.

I've actually had hákarl and whale in Iceland. They are both horrible.

Mind you, I've eaten all types of foods from 3 star Michelin restaurants to kangaroo meat on a stick, but those two really stuck out to me as terrible.

First, I had no intention of eating the fermented shark. My wife wanted to try it and we found a person at a deli attached to this big weird flea market that was SO HAPPY to give tourists a free sample. It was as terrible as described and smells STRONGLY of urine. You can pretend like this writer that it is a "very strong cheese" or whatever, but it really just gross. To give context, the aftertaste was so bad that we went back to our rental car and I chewed and swallowed the paper wrapper from a piece of gum to try and get rid of it. The taste was just straight bad.

The whale, to me, was much worse. The only way I can describe it is to say it tastes like crying. As soon as I took a bite I felt like I had made a terrible mistake. My wife spit hers out (she ate the hákarl no problem).

We had the whale at a fancy restaurant. This writer compared it to tuna which I strongly disagree with. It sort of had the texture of tuna, but it didn't taste like fish at all. They paired it with raw onions and some vinaigrette because it was a strong flavor. I guess it felt mostly like I was eating human? or alien? It was just instantly weird, and I wasn't really too conflicted about eating whale before tasting it but was immediately regretful after trying it.

That being said, this article makes the food culture of Iceland sound insane. There is a ton of delicious shit there, especially the lamb (not hearts, just frigging lamb). Wayyy better than any lamb I've ever had. It was served like a nice steak and had great flavor. And everywhere we went they had the best damn lobster soup. Get the lobster soup, it's awesome.

And you would think they would have no vegetables, but we were there in March and they had great fresh salads everywhere. Why? Because they have a ton of greenhouses warmed from the free geothermal energy.

I highly recommend checking out Iceland, just a 5 hour flight from Seattle or the East Coast.

I had Hakarl at that lodge near the Blue Hole. I was the only American they could recall who asked for seconds. Wait. I had whale at a restaurant near Hella. It was more amazing than any beef steak I had ever had and was more or less sustainably caught. What did we say in the 80s? Diff'rent strokes.

I thought the whale was great, but I skipped the hákarl.

Funny, I thought the whale just tasted like citrus-y beef. Maybe there's a huge variation in how its prepared (and maybe which whale species). I had whale as sashimi, roasted, and steak and they all tasted very similar to the cow equivalent. The Australian in the group said it tasted similar to kangaroo.

Hákarl smells much worse than it tastes. I thought it tasted similar to a strange fishy tofu with the texture similar to cheese plus eraser. Definitely took a while to get the taste out of the mouth, but it wasn't immediately gag inducing.

Definitely echo the sentiment of the lamb being delicious. Every time I had lamb it slid off the bone and had a nice balanced gamey-brine. Winter veggies seemed to be limited to tomatoes, cucumbers, bell peppers, potatoes, carrots, and arugula. The restaurants all said they get fresh shipments every morning from the greenhouses.

Yes, they often put lemon on it before or while cooking, a good whale is similar to beef.

My description was actually: the most juicy beef I ever tasted. Definitely better than most good steaks IMO.

Ditto.

I found the opposite to be true. It tasted like beef, not bad but far and away the worst beef I've ever had. We tried it as a group in Japan and it only was something approaching delicious when it was extremely thin cut and raw. If it were significantly less expensive than actual beef, I could see it being a viable substitute, but I just never see there being any reason for me to pay for it myself again.

There's more than one kind of whale meat. Just like Wagyu will have a different taste, I expect Iceland and Japan to have different whales. My experience was from Iceland. I'd really like to try the Japanese whale meat but at the same time don't like the idea of eating unsustainable stuff.

Previously whale meat often had a taste of cod liver oil because the fat oxidated after the whale was caught. These days the whale is cut immediately after it’s shot and then put on ice to prevent the fat from oxidating.

Apparently, not as many locals eat the shark anymore, now that they have more options. Maybe it has improved since, but when I tried it there, the produce was very bland. We even drove to Hveragerdi to check out the greenhouses. I'll vouch for lamb and skyr, the local yogurt.

It's powered by hydro power mostly, not geothermal. A common misconception.

Electricity is mostly hydro. But most greenhouses over here are heated directly with geothermal hot water, not electricity.

human tastes fine. it just tastes like gamy pork.

Are you speaking of experience, or just repeating what you read/heard? Because I keep running into that meme, but for all we know it might just be utter BS that’s been so much repeated, and is so hard to invalidate, that people take it as common knowledge.

Not the parent but I know for certain that pig flesh is routinely used as a replacement for human flesh when testing out stuff. Not sure how the physical similarities translate into similarities in taste though.

experience

it cost me 2.5 grand usd and was legal in the jurisdiction, and i believe it ethical

besides that, i won't say

Were you worried about prion-based complications?

I was pretty sure that cooking would mostly get rid of prions, but apparently Kuru was transmitted even by cooked meat: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuru_(disease)

On the other hand, most humans aren't cannibals and would only suffer from transmissible prion diseases by chance mutations.

no brain matter, to my knowledge. not a senile death either

Where?

I do know that in eyewitness accounts of the firebombings of Tokyo during WWII, the smell had been described as roasted pork. Plus human meat is called long pork, so draw your own conclusions.

Loved this write-up. :-)

I've had the fermented shark in Iceland, at this really kitchy viking restaurant thing, a real tourist trap I think, but our local guides had pointed us in that direction.

Sounds like I need to try the lamb steak and lobster soup next time I go. And I'm definitely going to the Hamburgeseria (sp?) again. A friend described it as "startlingly good".

> My wife wanted to try it and we found a person at a deli attached to this big weird flea market that was SO HAPPY to give tourists a free sample.

This really takes me back! My wife and I went to exactly this place, for the express purpose of trying the hákarl. The guy was eager to give us both a taste as well. But we both said 'no thanks' once the smell hit us.

Where is this "weird flea market"? I've been to Iceland several times, one time for almost a whole month and have no idea what this is referring to.

Edit: Is this that indoor flea market by the water near the customs building and that overrated hot dog place.

Yes it’s called Kolaportið.

Everything about this writeup resonated with me until the last sentence, which made me think I deeply misunderstood the geometry of the spherical earth.

5 hours from the east coast of the US sounds right, but Seattle to Reykjavic is over 7 and closer to 8.

> 5 hours from the east coast of the US sounds right, but Seattle to Reykjavic is over 7 and closer to 8.

Well, it takes about 5 hours to fly from Seattle to NYC. If it takes 5 hours to fly from NYC to Reykjavic, you shave 2 hours off because you don't have to stop and you're following the great arc. Did you think that tacking on an extra ~3000 miles of naive travel distance would only take 2 hours?

I fully agree with your comment about whale tasting like crying, I have a profound regret over eating it....but...not sure why...as I eat pretty much ever other animal.

The lobster in iceland was amazing though.

We did a summer week long roundtrip around it, it was amazing and would love to go back.

> I've actually had hákarl and whale in Iceland. They are both horrible.

So have I, and I disagree completely. I wasn't a real fan of hákarl, but it wasn't nearly as bad as it's hilariously[0] reputed to be. It was mostly inoffensive, honestly.

As for whale? It's the most delicious, most filling meat I've ever had. It was full of flavour. It's nothing like tuna — more like beef, only ever so much more so. I really wish that I could get it at the supermarket here at home.

[0] http://demislw.com/2014/03/09/its-a-fork-off-the-worlds-foul...

I wonder if the experience is genetic, as with Coriander[0][1]

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coriander#Taste_and_smell

[1]: http://www.nature.com/news/soapy-taste-of-coriander-linked-t...

Durian is another food that tends to have a sharp dichotomy of reactions. Some people (myself included) find the smell fairly pleasant, if a bit atypical. Others seem to find it extremely offensive (to the point where most Southeast Asian hotels ban you from bringing it into your hotel room).

I was going to say exactly the same thing about whale meat. I've had it as sushi a few times in Norway, and I always found it reminiscent of good quality beef.

I haven't been to Iceland, but I've tried imported-from-Iceland whale several times in Japan. Each time was delicious.

It had the taste of extremely pungent tuna with some beefiness mixed in, and a texture like very tender beef. The taste was good, but strong to the point that it needs sauce in order to balance it out. Plain whale is like eating 10x concentrated fishy beef, but with a little soy sauce, it's delicious.

Reading comments here, it seems people have vastly different experiences with it. Some people don't seem to get the fishy taste at all, but for me, it's really stood out each time.

Was the whale you had mink whale? I had mink whale at Grillmarkadurin and I really liked it. At least the meat, the restaurant put way too much thick sauce on. I recall the meat to taste like slightly gamey beef. Do you maybe have generally issues with game meats?

It's over 7 hours from Seattle, unless you mean on supersonic aircraft?

Mind you, all types of foods from 3 star Michelin restaurants to kangaroo meat on a stick

Phrased like that, to me that sounds like you've only eaten quite normal everyday things :] Even for me, being from a standard west-european country, to make it sound like all kinds of food, you'd at least have to add some liver/kidney/eye/ear/cod liver oil/... Not that it would prepare you for the fermented shark etc, only other fermented meat really can.

Wayyy better than any lamb I've ever had

If you like that type of taste (vs standard industrial meat's), try some Galloway beef if you get the chance, preferrably from animals used to keep nature reserves under control (they don't get fed manually nor it's about large scale production there: a couple of them are slaughtered per year mainly for population control since they have no natural enemies). These are like 'actual' cows, they way they have evolved without too much human intervention, and don't get fed manually.

You can get kangaroo meat at most major supermarkets here in Australia. It's not exactly an exotic foodstuff.

Kangaroo meat tastes tough and gamey. Not a fan personally.

Probably has a lot to do with how much you pay for it, and how good you are at preparing it. Vue de monde in Melbourne does it very well, but you'd obviously expect that. Of course, they also do some very strange things (such as deep fried shrimp shells).

Kiviak sounds worse; birds stuffed in a seal carcass to ferment:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiviak

During my brief time working for an Icelandic company they flew me over and we had a party the final day together. I had asked about the shark and they obliged but they told me it's essentially for tourists at this point. Regardless it was pretty awful and I'm quite an adventurous eater.

In case someone got the chance to try both: Is a fermented shark's taste somehow comparable to the Swedish 'Surströmming' (fermented herring)?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surstr%C3%B6mming

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_haw_YDC_zo

Anyone who likes hákarl should try hongeo (홍어) in Korea. Such horrendous foods!

Well, it's an acquired taste and pretty expensive. Goes well with alcohol and will clear your sinuses. Definitely memorable.

The SATW take on this dish:

https://satwcomic.com/icelandic-cookbook

For me worse than shark was ordering lamb and being served an entire sheep's head.

Ah yes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svi%C3%B0

oh FUCK...I mean I literally thought nobody could top Japan when it came to eating live meat...

NSFL - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPp-ZDdNdrQ

frog is for "mens health" apparently...

You can slaughter a lamb painlessly and still serve its head. It's nothing more than making more visible what's been going on behind the scenes every time you eat meat. Yes, you're eating a dead animal. It was raised and murdered just so you could eat it.

But to me that video with the frog being skinned alive is just needless sadism and nothing else.

I'm sure the lamb also died painfully

unless they stabbed it in the throat and left it to bleed /s

But isn't the sheep's head delicious while the shark tastes rancid? At least that's what I heard.

These national "delicacies" tell us how terrible it must have been to be an Icelander in the past.

>Sorry, you need to enable JavaScript to visit this website.

Is this a new programming language? From the title alone, it's hard to tell here on HN sometimes.

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