Icelandic Cuisine - History

History

The roots of Icelandic cuisine are to be found in the traditions of Scandinavian cuisine, as Icelandic culture, from its settlement in the 9th century onwards, is a distinctly Nordic culture with its traditional economy based on subsistence farming. Several events in the history of Iceland were of special significance for its cuisine. With Christianisation in 1000 came the tradition of fasting and a ban on horse meat consumption, but the event which probably had the greatest impact on farming, and hence, food, was the onset of the Little Ice Age in the 14th century. This severely limited the options of the farmers who were not able to grow barley anymore and had to rely on imports for any kind of cereal. The cooling of the climate also led to important changes in housing and heating where the longhouse of the early settlers, with its spacious hall, was replaced by the Icelandic turf houses with many smaller rooms, including a proper kitchen, which persisted well into the 20th century.

Usually the Reformation in 1550 marks the transition between the medieval period and the early modern period in Icelandic history. Until the agricultural reforms, brought on by the influence of the Enlightenment, farming in Iceland remained very much the same from the 14th century to the late 18th century. A trade monopoly instituted by the Danish king in 1602 had a certain impact on culinary traditions although the influence of the cuisine of Denmark was most felt in the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th. In the early 20th century an economic boom based on fishing caused a slow transition from traditional dairy and meat-based foods to fish and root vegetables, which was at the same time a transition from the dominance of preserved foods towards greater emphasis on fresh ingredients.