The (Almost) Unbearable Beauty Of The Icelandic Hot Dog

Sunday, 27 September 2009 19:52

 

So the hot dog (or pylsur) is nothing short of a culinary institution here in Iceland. Locals will do virtually anything to get their hands on one of their beloved sausage-in-a-bun concoctions, especially if it's slathered with ketchup and mustard and embellished with fried onions.

Bearded men in chainmail have bowed before them; platinum-haired women have been wooed with them; spotty teenagers have mugged little old ladies in broad daylight to get cash for them.

Yet in all the years I've been coming to Iceland (eight, it transpires), I have only ever eaten, hmm…three? Usually the artery-clogging creations (see photo above) farmed out at the famed Town's Finest stand near the harbour - a place so bizarrely famous that Bill Clinton and Metallica have chowed down there (though not together, presumably).

So no, I'm not the biggest pylsur fanatic. But yesterday I had one - my fourth, if we’re counting - and it was an utterly amazing experience. I left my hotel in the afternoon and immediately felt an intense, leg-buckling hunger pang: not so much a gentle sobbing in the stomach as a famine-driven wail, the kind where your body is saying “if you don’t feed me snacks soon I’ll start thrashing around embarrassingly in the street and I don’t care who is watching.”

There was no way I could hold off for the twenty or so minutes it would take me to get to a café downtown. Just the thought of the tasty and morally fortifying "co-operative" soup at Café Hjlomalind made my insides scream. It was just as my panicked mind was starting to create a Final Will & Testament that I’d be able to whisper with my last, dying gasp to whichever poor passer-by found me moribund on the pavement, that I spotted the Petrol Station.

As we all know, fuel and casual snacks go hand in hand in the 21st century, so it was a dead cert I’d find something edible lurking within. In no time at all I was standing in front of the glass frontage of the counter, greedily eyeing up the veritable banquet of snacks and beverages: potato chips and fizzy drinks, colourful sweets and vacuum packed sandwiches, all with funny names containing way too many syllables and consonants.

Then my eyes alighted on the trays of long, brown, glistening, heart-attack-inducing meatsticks known commonly as Hot Dogs. God of Gods they looked good.

 "Góðan dag" said the bespectacled man behind the counter. He looked benign and serious and he'd clearly seen me clocking his bangers.

"Hallo. I'd like a hot dog please."

Done. No turning back now.

The guy paused and straightened, like he was taking a moment to absorb the unanticipated fact of a British tourist requesting an important national treasure. If ever there had been an opportunity to impress, his movements suggested, it was now. I am not exaggerating or lying when I say that he rolled up his sleeves.

"Right. Well..."

The man cleared his throat and began to rapidly lift the lids from an array of small aluminium trays arranged just the other side of the glass frontage.

"We have a few different sides here. There’s potato salad..."

"Ooh, potato salad please." I didn’t need to see the other accompaniments. Potato salad just felt right.

"How much would you like?"

"Sorry?"

"Potato salad. How much of it would you like."

He seemed to be expecting a very specific answer – something preferably in grammes rather than the random ballpark figure forming in my mind.

"Um. What do most people have?"

"Well, everyone is different. Some like a lot, some don't really like so much."

This sounded reasonable. While I thought about it, he expertly pulled out and slapped a white, flaky hot dog bun on a heated tray then stood with the spoon hovering above the potato salad, patiently waiting for me to get my shit together.

"A layer?"

"You mean a thick layer or a thin layer?"

This guy was good.

"An, uh, average layer? Do you put it on the bottom of the bun or on top of the hot dog?"

I realized even as I said it that it was a ridiculous question. He didn’t even look up.

"Most people have it below."

"Oh, good."

I was by now really enjoying the whole interactive process and effort going into this. The guy was subtly guiding me through what was obviously a more complex ritual than I’d thought, and was taking great pleasure in doing so. He layered some potato salad expertly into the crease of the bun.

"The potato salad today is pretty good," he said, by way of conversation.

"Is it different day to day then?"

His head bounced slowly from side to side. "Yesterday's wasn't so good for some reason. Today's is really good."

He picked up some tongs and waved them magician-like over the various displays of sausages that were arranged above on slightly larger, heated aluminium trays.

"We have a few different types of sausage here. These ones are normal...these are filled with cheese...these ones have bacon wrapped around them..."

"Bacon please." It all feel so instinctive, so right.

He contemplated the five identical sausages that were wrapped with pieces of bacon. I knew what was coming.

"Which one would you like?"

"Oh, I don't mind. You can choose"

The tongs lunged.

"Would you care for onion?"

I loved the way he said that: would you care for... It was a bit eccentric or old fashioned. Charming.

"No, thanks," I said.

"Well, here you are," he said and finally handed me the hot dog. I thought that was that - that the meticulous process was done. But not quite.

"On the table over there you will find a range of sauces," he chirped as he swiped my debit card.

"Oh," I said. "Great."

"Yes, we have a few there. There are two types of mustard. Mayonnaise. Ketchup. There's some new Chilli Ketchup too."

"What would you recommend?" I asked. His enthusiasm and veracity were infectious. I didn't want to make some kind of condiment-based mistake now I'd gotten this far.

"Well, I like the Chilli Ketchup. But people really put on whatever they like."

"Is it OK to have maybe Chilli Ketchup at one end and mustard at the other…and maybe mingle them in the center?"

He shrugged. "No problem," is what he said.

I walked across to the condiments stand and stared at the colourful plastic towers of sauce. I did just as I had said - a line of mustard then a line of Chilli Ketchup. The way the pumps dispensed the lines very thinly and elegantly instead of just messy splodges or fat, unseemly squiggles was ridiculously satisfying. I contemplated the whole ensemble, admiring the contrast of the colours and the way the rivulets overlapped like geothermal streams.

It really looked good, this hot dog, and I felt a surge of warmth for this man, who had approached this simple task with so much brio and generosity of spirit. The experience really had improved my mood. I looked up as I was about to leave and he was looking more or less in my direction.

"Thanks sir!" I said loudly and threw up a hand in greeting. I tried to say it as sincerely as I could since I wanted him to know I was deeply appreciative of his manner and general existence.

He ignored me completely and began to solemnly wipe down the glass surfaces of his counter.