Customer Reviews

Anthony Bourdain No Reservations: Iceland - Special Edition

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I originally reviewed this episode without the "Special Edition" trappings a few years ago. This remains my favorite episode of "No Reservations," and the Special Edition adds commentary with Tony Bourdain and producer Chris Collins about the experience of making this episode. It would have been done better as a conventional commentary track, but adds Tony and Chris in a picture-in-picture box with commentary at seemingly random times throughout the DVD. Some of the things Tony brings up are obvious (Don't make your first visit to Iceland in January, and especially not when you're sick, for instance....) but many more are on the treacherous shoot itself (the cave sequence takes on more meaning when you hear them discuss it.) Tony is in fine form, and I should mention that Iceland is my favorite place on earth. Tony does himself no favors by going during winter, but he does get to attend the traditional Icelandic feast, Thorrablot. Thorrablot is a feast of horrors for most people from outside Iceland, but Tony tries everything, much to the amusement of his audience. ("That was unspeakably nasty.")

While "No Reservations" is essentially a travel show about food, there is a lot of travel depicted, and here the natural beauty of Iceland shines through (although I would advise a summer visit next time.) Tony tours Reykjavik, rides an Icelandic horse (in a parking lot), and takes a soak in the Blue Lagoon, among many other activities, but the real star is the food. Anytime you talk about Icelandic cuisine, the subject of the famous shark comes up. The central food around which Thorrablot revolves is called "hákarl" (with variants known as "glerhákarl" and "skyrhákarl," depending on the species of shark.) The shark is prepared by burying it in the ground during summer and letting it rot for six months or so, then processing it, ultimately cubing it into toothpick-ready portions. It is advised that people new to the food hold their nose as the stench and ammonia smell is overpowering; perhaps failing to heed that crucial step is what made Tony not only call hákarl "unspeakably nasty," but go on to elaborate that "this is probably the single worst thing I've ever put in my mouth." (Note that this was before the Vietnam episode, however.) Hákarl is so rank, that the recommended method of consumption is to chase your putrefied shark with "Brennivín," a type of very strong indigenous caraway schnapps, which some people think tastes worse than the shark.

Tony not only tried the hákarl, but helped prepare and ate such delicacies as "hrútspungar" or pressed sheep's testicles which he comments about at disgusting length, and which he terms "breakfast of champions," "Sviš," (sheep's heads,) and other gastronomic atrocities: at the end of the Thorrablot dinner he reflects, "let's call it what it was, worst meal ever." Again, that was before he went to Vietnam, but the commentary seems to bear out how enduringly appalled Tony was with the Icelandic fare at the feast of Thorrablot.

This is a great series, and this is the best of all the episodes that I have seen. Anyone who likes an irreverent approach to travel or food will love this show, especially if they love Iceland like I do. The Special Edition is probably best for people who have seen the original, as there is no way to deselect the commentary, and if you don't watch the episode "straight" first, you will miss much of the humor of the pensive yet irreverent commentary.