I am one lucky girl, having just returned from an amazing trip, including Iceland.

While there aren’t a lot of traditional Icelandic foods that particularly appealed to me. Hello, fermented shark. I absolutely fell in love with this bread, rugbraud. It was served along side the traditional fish stew, plokkfiskur. Rugbraud is a dark rye bread, very dense and slightly sweet. I was thrilled when we found it in the grocery store and enjoyed it at our hostel. Then, I saw it at the airport and brought it home to share with my family. When that was gone, I looked up how to make it. I just couldn’t get enough. 😊

But, I’m so glad I looked up rugbraud recipes because I learned about the history and how it is traditionally made. Buried in the ground and slowly steamed next to a geothermal hot spring. How cool is that?! Or hot? 😉

Often, I don’t have a lot of luck with baking so I was somewhat skeptical how it would turn out. Added that I was substituting molasses for the golden syrup could be disastrous.

I followed this super simple recipe.

www.saveur.com – Rugbraud Bread

I initially used 1/3 cup of molasses in place of the full cup of golden syrup, but it wasn’t enough moisture. So I added in another 1/3 cup molasses and a splash of milk. This did the trick and it mixed up well! It baked in 7 1/2 hours; low and slow!

It looked just right and tasted just right!

One of the joys of traveling is experiencing different cuisines and being able to incorporate it back home in my Oregon kitchen. Where to next?

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