Viking invasion: Iceland's finest cuisine, music, culture return to Toronto
See full program of events at Taste of Iceland in Toronto!
One thousand years and counting, Icelandic culture is very much alive. Icelanders enjoy a sophisticated European lifestyle based on age-old traditions. They make their own food from fresh ingredients, design their own clothes, write their own books, make their own music and perform their own plays. Now, Torontonians can once again experience the Icelandic lifestyle during A Taste of Iceland, the country's captivating cultural festival, from Wednesday, March 17 to Saturday, March 20.
Hosted by Iceland Naturally and in collaboration with Toronto's Drake Hotel, this four-day event will offer Canadians a chance to learn more about this beautiful country and its people, with a variety of events including free live performances, film screenings, Icelandic food offerings and art.
FOOD
The Drake Hotel (1150 Queen Street West) will offer an Icelandic menu from March 17 to 20. Chef Thorarinn Eggertsson, also known as Chef Thor, owner and head chef of Orange in downtown Reykjavík, will design the menu to inspire Toronto-area foodies with his unique Icelandic dishes and exquisite cuisine. Chef Thor, who will be on site at Drake, is a culinary artist and innovator both in flavour combinations and futuristic presentation. His reputation for experiential dining and hints of molecular gastronomy has made its way onto Condé Nast Traveler's prestigious Hot Tables List 2009.
MUSIC
Icelandic musician Mugison and his band will play at Drake Underground on Friday, March 19 at 10 p.m. (Drake Hotel, 1150 Queen Street West). FREE ADMISSION. Impulsively nomadic and creatively restless, Icelandic wunderkind Mugison is the kind of post-modern dude that flows with the flux – one of those ants-in-the-pants artists that naturally negates stagnation and actively seeks out new challenges. His music is brimming with emotion and is freighted with a breadth of musical references. Mugiboogie is a mind-trip back to yesteryear when music was free from categorization and diversity reigned supreme.
FILM
Valdís Óskarsdóttir's Country Wedding will have a public screening on Thursday, March 18, at 6:30 p.m. at Cumberland Four Theatre (159 Cumberland Avenue). FREE ADMISSION.
Country Wedding is an Icelandic comedy about a couple with plans to get married in the Icelandic countryside. Wedding guests are loaded onto two buses bound for a remote church an hour outside of Reykjavík. But no one actually knows where the chapel is, and everyone is either too proud or embarrassed to ask for directions.
Óskarsdóttir gave each of her actors a character outline and asked them all to create their own backstories, including at least one secret that they could choose to reveal (or not) during filming. The actual shoot took just seven days, and was unscripted and largely improvised. The results are genuinely funny and uncomfortable in equal measure, with the plans and relationships going off the rails at every opportunity. Country Wedding is the directorial debut of Óskarsdóttir, an award winning editor who worked on films such as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
Óskar Jónasson's Reykjavik Rotterdam will have a public screening on March 18 at 8:10 p.m. at Cumberland Four Theatre. FREE ADMISSION.
Reykjavik Rotterdam is an Icelandic thriller about a security guard who is stuck in a dull everyday routine. Fired from the freight ship he worked on when he was caught smuggling alcohol, he is faced with financial problems. He is tempted to accept the help of his friend, Steingrimur, who manages to pull some strings to get his old job back, and decides to take his chances one last time on a tour to Rotterdam. Mugison wrote all the music for this film. Reykjavik Rotterdam will soon be remade in English, and will star Mark Wahlberg.
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