Thor at the table

Among the Northern peoples, the significant meal is not divided into starter-main-dessert: it is the veisla, the feast held in the long smoky hall (skáli) around the fires. They serve, without strict order, spit-roasted meats, barley porridges (grautr) that fill the belly daily, dried fish and meats for long journeys, all washed down with mead and beer shared from a horn. The householder honors his guests and the gods through abundance; eating together seals alliance and loyalty. For Thor, the Thunder god whose tales were compiled in Iceland in the 13th century (Snorri's Edda), the table is an extension of Valhalla: eat large, eat strong, and drink to the health of the gods.

Lacking sugar, it is honey gathered from the forests that sweetens, preserves, and, fermented into mead, becomes the sacred drink of Nordic feasts. Honey flavors porridges, glazes roasts, and serves as an offering to the gods. No New World products here: everything relies on barley, rye, game, fish, wild berries, butter, skyr, and this golden honey.