Icelandic master chef Fridrik V. Karlsson said the choice of the restaurant Noma on Islands Brygge in Copenhagen as the best restaurant in the world shows growing popularity of the use of local food and predicts that Nordic cuisine will be the next big “explosion” in cooking.
Nordic cuisine a-la Karlsson at his restaurant Fridrik V in Akureyri, which has now closed. Photo by Páll Stefánsson.
“Rene Redzepi [Noma’s master chef] is very keen on using Nordic products only,” Karlsson told Morgunbladid. Karlsson was in the group of chefs and restaurant critics who participated in choosing the world’s best restaurants.
“It is very strict. For example, we cannot evaluate any restaurants where we haven’t dined in the past 18 months,” Karlsson said. He knows Redzepi well, who he described as a friend of Iceland. A few Icelandic chefs have worked for him in the past and Redzepi has been to Iceland on several occasions.
Karlsson is an advocate of the local food movement in Iceland. “I experience this year’s list [of the world’s best restaurants] as a recognition of that mindset, […] a framework based on using ingredients from our closest environment.”
Click here to read an interview with Karlsson about local food in Iceland.
