Eating when I travel is hugely important to me, as I love to try food that is local and traditional to the area. There is no point in eating a McDonalds as you might as well have just stayed at home. Although I'm also hugely opposed to bad quality food. Life's too short for bad food!
Which is why when I was in Iceland I had to try out some local cuisine by a top notch Icelandic chef... who just happened to be at the restaurant in my hotel. That was handy.
Rangá Restaurant is inside Hotel Rangá, which overlooks one of Iceland's most prominent salmon rivers, East-Rangá River.
The restaurant is centered around the concept of a ”Farmers Market“- using local produce that is in season.
They have a regular a la carte menu in the main restaurant, but my dinner was a special taste of Iceland and just looking at the menu made my mouth water.
First on the menu was slow cooked tomato's in tomato juice with a tomato sorbet. The mix of warm and cold in one dish was a unique taste but it surprised me, especially as I never expected tomato sorbet to be something I would like.
Next was pan fried langoustine with celery, onion and apple with dill sauce. Whilst small, it was my favourite dish of the night. The mix of apple and seafood was something I hasn't had before, and yet went so well together.
I have to say, dinner was off to a real winner with me. Another dish I was shocked to love so much was cauliflower in buttermilk sauce. Me loving vegetables? Who knew! The combination of the sweet sauce, the tang of the red onion, and the hint of charcoal was pretty darn delicious.
I think Icelandic food agree's with me.
Now, I have to say this dish raised a few eyebrows. It does look a lot like frog spawn and I'm quite a visual foodie.
The "frog spawn" is actually trout roe, which personally I'm not a fan of roe. Roe is actually internal egg masses from the fish ovaries, which even though I eat meat, just kind of doesn't sit to well with me.
However the salmon was beautifully cooked, and knowing it came from the river just outside was quite exciting really.
Being a Northern girl, I grew up on cod. OK, I mean it was a little more battered cod than fine dinning cod, but the principle is still that I love cod.
However, this was actually my least favourite dish. Salted cod was just way to salty for me, and now I'm a girl who bathes my fish and chips in salt and vinegar, so when I say too much salt, you better believe it.
Finally it was another dish that raised eyebrows. Fantastic piece of lamb, but maybe the presentation needs to be a little less... log like?
Finally a delicious rhubarb sorbet was brought out along with Skyr mousse. Skye is a very traditional Icelandic dairy product. It is a little like greek yogurt but much milder and often people add sugar too it. It actually been a part of Icelandic cuisine for over a thousand years so you really can not come to Iceland and not try it.
After whipping the dish clean, we looked outside to see pitch black, inky sky with nothing for miles around.
Do you remember me telling you about the hotel observatory in one of my other posts? The little building below? Obviously not taken on the same day.
Well it houses 3 astrologer grade telescopes.
Quickly we bundled out into the freezing cold in the hopes of catching sight of some amazing stars.
Sadly though, it was so cloudy there wasn't a star in the sky! Just my look!
Whilst sadly my trip didn't end with seeing the Northern lights or some fantastic constellation, it did end with some amazing Icelandic cuisine.
If you come to Iceland, you must visit Rangá Restaurant, I promise you'll get a true sense of what an amazing country this really is.
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