Cooking with Brooke: Icelandic Fish Soup

A few years ago when my little peanut was literally the size of a peanut (sans shell) Joe and I traveled to Iceland for our delayed honeymoon where we encountered the worst food we've ever tasted.

Why, then, you ask, am I creating a recipe to duplicate something from the land of fire and ice?

I'm so glad you asked. You see hidden in a tiny gift shop along the shore of the glacial lagoon, Jokulsarlon was the best soup I have ever eaten. This brothy, hearty fish-based soup that I have found myself dreaming about since.

I had done a cursory google search to see if the recipe was available a few months ago and found nothing. But yesterday I took charge and realized I never tried searching for "Icelandic Fish Soup," which was gross oversight.

I found a few recipes, melded them with my own ideas and tada:

Icelandic Fish Soup




Though I had long dreamed of this soup, I have to say I was afraid that I only remembered it being delicious because I was so starving that in comparison to all the other food the island offered it was astounding, but when pared with my kitchen of endless possibilities it would fall flat. It did not. This soup is amazing.

Obviously, you could use any vegetables you like, I am writing it with what I used.

Makes a large pot of soup
Takes approximately 1 hour

5 cloves of garlic
1 large onion
2 large carrots
4 medium yellow potatoes
2 golden beets
1 head of broccoli
Handful of green beans
1 jalapeno
1 chipotle pepper or ancho chilli
3 bayleaves
1T. fennel seed or fresh fennel
1 1/2 T. tumeric
2 tsp. curry powder
1 tsp. chilipowder
2 pinches ground cloves
salt & pepper as desired
12 oz. crushed or strained tomato
32 oz. low-sodium chicken broth
12 oz fish (I used white fish in the form of Mahi Mahi, you could use any fish but white fish will be the least "fishy")
Handful of shrimp
butter



Chop vegetables and onion. Saute onion in olive oil and butter (or butter substitute) on medium heat while you chop the garlic. Add garlic and spices and saute for a few minutes, being careful not to burn the garlic.

Remove bay leaves and use an immersion blender to smooth onion. Feel free to skip this step if you like onions. But if you don't (or are married to someone who doesn't like me) this is a great way to add onion flavor without the textural mishap.

Add veggies and cook for a few minutes, then add tomato* and broth and 1 1/2 cups of water. Boil for 30-40 minutes. While it is boiling, cut the fish into small pieces and prepare the shrimp. Right before you are ready to serve it, throw in the fish and shrimp and continue on a low boil for 3-5 minutes. I used still frozen fish, but it may take less cooking with fresh fish.

Turn the heat down to low and serve when ready.

Joe said a nice crusty piece of bread would have made a good accompaniment, but I think the soup was hearty enough on its own.





*A note about canned tomatoes: Most people have caught on that BPA, which is used when making plastics can act as a hormone disruptor in humans. It's why we don't drink from polycarbonate plastic water bottles anymore, right? Well, unfortunately we actually get most BPA in our system from canned foods and (this is really scary) carbon copy receipts. The more acidic the canned food, the more likely the can is lined with BPA.

The solution? Buy tomatoes from a glass jar. I finally found some made my bionaturae.