Iceland: Where’s Father Christmas?

As we motor through suburban gloom of downtown Reykjavik, the only break from the endless shades of grey are the Christmas lights that twinkle on the quirky houses and multi storey offices. 

It's 10.30am and still dark.  The journey begins in the eerie, misty harbour. The tour bus collects travellers from various accommodations, announcing their nationalities to the other passengers as they climb on-board. It's reminiscent of the voting call in the Eurovision Song Contest but very bonding, nonetheless. With all the nations more happily united than the EU, we head out of town.

We have prepared for this long weekend in Iceland by purchasing an array of thermal garments, scarves and bubble jackets. Everyone else looks as if they have done the same. The bus seems to be stuffed with brightly coloured bloated snooker balls with bobble hats.  The snooker ball people bounce off each other until they shed a few layers to reduce body mass and are able to sit down.

It's freak weather - our guide apologies - in fact it’s the warmest December for 178 years. I can't help but think that we might have wasted a couple of hundred quid on our winter apparel, until someone reminds me that that's just the price of dinner for two at an average Icelandic restaurant, then it feels like not such a big deal.

The guide warns us of high costs in Iceland, advising us to avoid the toilets at the next stop as they come with a hefty £4 price tag.  It's hardly spending a penny in Iceland, is it?

I was never keen on Iceland for a weekend break, but goaded my fiancée who bought the trip as a gift and inspired by TV’s Rick Stein who also didn’t fancy Iceland but ended up loving it, I agreed to go. As it turns out, I’m already enthralled by the country within a day of being here.

The reason? I love stories. To me, travel is about stories and people. Yes, sights too - but it is the stories and the people that very often bring these sights to life for me. And if you like stories, you’ll love Iceland…

The Yuletide Lads

The Yuletide Lads are figures from Icelandic folklore There are thirteen of them. Every night, the last thirteen nights before Christmas Eve, one Yuletide lad visits each child, leaving gifts or potatoes, depending on the child’s recent behaviour.

My relationship with the Yuletide Lads began at Reykjavik Airport at one of those photo opportunities places that I can never resist. It’s a foolish weakness, I know, but I can’t pass these things by. I’m always the first to stick my head on the boards with the missing faces and silly bodies at British seaside resorts. If you’ve seen me, I apologise.

At the airport, I had just assumed that it as an Icelandic way of having a laugh at the tourists who gleefully climbed in to have their pictures taken. Icelanders have a keen sense of humour but I suspected there might be more to this story than met the eye and so we began to ask around.

At a Reykjavik pub, later that day, we ask the young barmaid to explain the Yuletide Lads. She tells the story as if she has been trained as a professional tour guide – a common trait amongst the proud Icelanders. We begin to understand why we had seen the ubiquitous caricatures all around the city. They are the personification of Christmas in Iceland.

“What about Father Christmas?” I ask.

“If you’ve come here looking for Father Christmas you will be disappointed” she replies, sounding distinctly like a Russian spy in a Bond film.

It’s a sentence that I didn’t ever expect to hear directed at a man in his 40’s and it just makes me smile every time I think about it.

Women

On October 24, 1975, 90 percent of women in Iceland went on strike to campaign for equal rights. A BBC report describes the day:

Instead of going to the office, doing housework or childcare they took to the streets in their thousands to rally for equal rights with men. It is known in Iceland as the Women's Day Off. Banks, factories and some shops had to close, as did schools and nurseries - leaving many fathers with no choice but to take their children to work.

There were reports of men arming themselves with sweets and colouring pencils to entertain the crowds of overexcited children in their workplaces. Sausages - easy to cook and popular with children - were in such demand the shops sold out.

  

Those are just two of the many interesting stories – some factual, some fictional – that I enjoyed in Iceland.

Yes, Iceland has a much talked about landscape that looks as if it belongs on another planet. Yes, you can bathe in silica-infused waters that come from the centre if the Earth. Yes, you will no doubt enjoy watching geysers spout water 40 feet in the air.

But the real deal for me are the stories and the charming and witty people who tell them. Go to Iceland armed with an open mind and a full wallet and you are virtually guaranteed a brilliant and quirky break.

Back in Brittany

A good market can capture the essence of a nation as quickly as its anthem.

I’ve just arrived in a Brittany. It is market day and I am instantly infused with unmistakable Frenchness. The influx of aromas has triggered a flood of memories. Images of family holidays in Brittany, a student summer in the Loire, and months working on a hot Languedoc campsite, all start to crystallise in my mind.

The market stalls are pitched precariously on a sloping, cobbled town square, overlooked by the town hall and the old post office. The white canvas that frames each stall is flapping in the salty morning breeze, like sails catching a gust of wind.

France being France almost everything is food. There’s pungent cheese, cooked salamis and hams, raw meats – including horse, fruit - oranges, lemons and grapes, vegetables – olives, onions and garlic, and fabulous fish – as we’re near the coast.

Standing on the edge of the market I get caught in a wonderful crosswind that adds a whiff of freshly baked baguette from a nearby bakery to the heady mix of airborne flavours. The buyers are in charge here. French women are discerning purchasers and the market is full of them – smartly dressed and gesticulating forcefully, locked in commercial combat with the stall owners. I buy a French comic, some Emmental cheese and a few slices of salami. Then I generally amble around, a gear or two below my French counterparts.

After an hour on the cobbles, I take my wares and retire to a café – being careful to retreat a few streets to avoid being charged a premium for a ringside seat at the square.

            

The blackboard outside advertises a set price menu for a modest price – but it’s not quite lunchtime so I opt for a hot chocolate. There is only handful of customers in the café. Some older men are playing a dice game and drinking small glasses of beer. And three teenagers are playing ‘Flipper’ (Pinball) and drinking something that looks like bright green washing up liquid. Apparently it is not as harmful as it looks.

           

The café reeks of polished metal, strong coffee and lingering French cigarettes. It is smart, but ordinary, having all the necessary qualifications for a backstreet pit stop – TV, flipper, basic menu, cheap wine and liquorice spirit, beer, coffee, newspapers and conversation.  

            

The waiter leaves me a small square of a bill with my drink. The bill features an indecipherable array of purple numbers and has a serrated edge where it has been hastily torn from the till. Locating the price on these things can be challenging.  I remember a family holiday when my mum mistakenly tried to pay the date instead of the price.

We had all laughed.  The waiter had simply shrugged in a French way, and wondered how we could have ever thought a cheese toastie could cost so much. 

I wanted to tell him it was because we had just come from Paris.

Puzzled by Pasties

I called into a well-known bakery a few months ago on a cold day fancying a warm Cornish Pasty. 

"We don't serve them" I was told. I argued the point and explained that I had definitely had one at a that very shop in the past. The server looked disbelievingly at me as if he might only be convinced of the validity of my claim on production of photographic evidence, which I didn't have. 

The teenager went on to tell to me in hushed tones that I could have what they used to be able to call a Cornish Pasty, as long as neither of us referred to it a Cornish Pasty and as long as I promised to forget all about the incident afterwards. I agreed. He went on to whisper to me that pasties could no longer be called Cornish unless they are made in Cornwall. I asked him where his were made.

"Pontypridd" he replied

"So can we just call it a Pontypridd pasty and get on with it" I said impatiently, though I couldn't help thinking that Pontypridd Pasty just doesn't sound as good.

I checked out his story when I was back in the office and it turns out he was absolutely right. The Cornish Pasty was indeed given Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) status - in 2011.  The PGI status is the same one that protects champagne, Parma ham, Stilton cheese, Arbroath smokies and Cornish clotted cream. You can make Cornish Pasties wherever you like but you can’t call them Cornish unless they are made in Cornwall.

 All of this made me think about how important words are in making food sound more appealing. Studying a menu in a restaurant a few days later I noticed "trio of sausages” on offer. To me, a trio sing or play music. I would have been extremely surprised if these bangers could have done either particularly well. And I am sure that if I’d asked for a “trio of beers” for me and two mates in my local, I’d have been laughed at.

And now everything is "pan fried" rather than just "fried" which just doesn’t sound good anymore. I mean, what else are you going to fry it in? The same of course is true of “oven baked.”  In “Oven Baked Fillet of Sea Bass" the word “oven” is unnecessary but somehow adds a little romance to the dish and probably justifies an extra few quid for it.

And then there are the sauces. Gravy has been driven into virtual extinction only to be replaced by the far more palatable "jus". "Jus" is rarely just left to be sloshed all over the plate as its predecessor might have been. Instead, jus is usually "drizzled delicately" or perhaps even “doused with glee”, again putting another £3.50 on the desirability factor of the dish.

Finally, there is the description of how the dish is presented. Never can the chefs of today be content with leaving to our imagination the relationship between the chicken breast and the rice and how they got together. No, the chicken must “nestle” on the bed of rice, or even worse be served “alongside a timbale of delicately steamed rice” Whatever next? Will the chicken “sit confidently astride the rice”, “nuzzle up next to the mash” or perhaps even be parachuted into a giant Yorkshire Pudding by a team of singing butterflies?  

So I’ve made resolution to seek out plain English establishment that describes its fayre honestly. This is the sort of thing I want to see:

“Small, salty cottage pie made in a commercial kitchen in Birmingham a few weeks ago, blast frozen, quickly microwaved and presented with a salad garnish to make you think it’s homemade. £14.50”.  

I think I’ll have one of those, please.

A Healthy Halloween?

I'm on Halloween duty because my office is near the front door.! Her argument that she thought ahead and bought all the fun size chocs. First child told me he wasn't doing chocolate, as he chomped on an apple. 

The kids of today, eh?I have now redressed the balance of the trick or treat bowl to reflect 2016 suburban values to include healthy options, veggie choices and gluten free desserts. I suppose I should have them all sign a disclaimer about anything that contains nuts, too? 

"OK kids- treats are on their way but first of all there's some obligatory paperwork to do..." . 

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