ICELANDIC TIMES - Land og saga

New Nordic Kitchen at it´s Best!
Exciting and Delicious
DILL restaurant offers meat, fish,
vegetables and wild herbs from the
Icelandic nature in a completely
new way. While finding the Nordic
culinary roots the result is exciting
and delicious.
Recently the New Nordic Kitchen
has proven to be the biggest thing of
the culinary world, recent award for
NOMA restaurant of Copenhagen
proves that. Two of the pioneers of the
New Nordic Kitchen in Iceland , Chef
Gunnar Karl Gíslason and Sommelier
Ólafur Örn Ólafsson opened DILL
restaurant in 2009 and have since
then had rave reviews. They were
chosen Iceland´s restaurant of the
year and nominated as one of the best
restaurants in the Nordic Countries.
The restaurant offers dishes of meat,
fish, vegetables and wild herbs from
the Icelandic nature. The owners are
nature lovers who want to know the
origins of their ingredients. Being able
to collect herbs and seeweed from
the Icelandic wilderness, mountains
and seaside and select raw material
from the farmed or planted they
will always go for organic if possible.
The Kitchen at DILL restaurant uses
modern technology and creativity to
make the diners’ experience unique
using familiar flavours in new and
surprising ways.
Seasonal menu
“The difference between our
restaurant and other New Nordic
Restaurants is that we get our
ingredients from surrounding
communities here in Iceland. We
believe that food shouldn´t travel so
we don’t want ingredients that have
been transported from a far. We like
to use the nature around us and the
farmers we know are offering the most
beautiful and most fresh ingredients
in the world,” owner Ólafur Örn
Ólafsson says passionately.
“Sometimes we use traditional cooking
methods, e.g. the smoking and try to
make something new and exciting out
of it. We have for example developed
courses using spruce and Icelandic
birch. We love to experiment with the
ingredients you can find in the nature
whether we burn them or use them
fresh,” he says.
The Dill menu is seasonal. Every
week the owners arrange a new
seven-course tasting menu with a
wine menu to match each course.
“We like vegetables, so from spring
to autumn you will find a lot of
lovely fresh vegetables on our menu
accompanied with the fish or meat of
the season,” Ólafur says. “When the
hunting season starts our menu fills
up with lovely Icelandic game such as
Reindeer, geese and ducks .“
Informal and laid back
While DILL restaurant is rated among
the finest in Iceland, even in the
Nordic Countries, the atmosphere is
intimate and laid back. The restaurant
is appropriately located in the Nordic
House, a cultural house that was
designed by the famous Finnish
architect Alvar Aalto. All the design
of the restaurant is Nordic, the lamps
and furniture are original design by
Aalto. The rest, “everything from the
beautiful Royal Copenhagen China,
to the chefs’ jackets is Nordic Design.
We want to go all the way in being
Nordic,” Ólafur explains.
For lunch guests have a chance to
sample the DILL style of cooking in a
more rustic style, traditional Icelandic
dishes, such as “plokkfiskur” get a New
Nordic face lift, served in clay pots on
the tables.
“We believe that food shouldn´t travel so
we don’t want ingredients that have been
transported from afar.“ Photos: Ingo
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REYKJAVÍK:
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Laugavegur 64
The Viking, Hafnarstræti 3
The Viking, Laugavegur 1
Islandia, Kringlan
Icefin, Nóatún 17
Ull og Gjafavörur, Hótel Saga
Ísey, Laugavegur 23
Hitt hornið, Laugavegur 100
Álafoss, Mosfellsbær
OTHER LOCATIONS:
The Viking, Hafnarstræti 104, Akureyri
Sport og útivist, Á stéttinni, Húsavík
Selið, Mývatn
Mývatnsmarkaður, Mývatn
Gullfosskaffi, Gullfoss
Geysir Shop, Haukadal
Byggðasafnið, Skógar
Víkwool, Vík í Mýrdal
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