On December 19, Skyrgámur (Skyr Gobbler) comes down from the mountains to have his fill of fun until New years day. Skyr Gobbler, the eighth, was an awful stupid bloke. He smashed the skyr tub till the lid on it broke. Then he stood there gobbling - his greed was well known - until, about to burst, he would bleat, howl and groan. Skyrgámur......skyr-gobbler arrived today and made a straight line for the dairy, where he found a barrels of skyr* He gobbles down all the skyr and is rewarded with stomach aches and pains. He is heard far and near, as he cries out “I should not have eaten all the skyr”. Skyrgámur is not the brightest Yule Lad in the litter, and after a full year of doing other things (he is into collecting snow in the winter and dew drops in the summer and his collection keeps getting stolen by someone mysterious), he often forgets exactly how to do his job. Eat it, play with it, throw it at someone, decorate it? His Terrible Terror friend is just as forgetful but still 100% of a prankster. Deadly combination. Like many of his fellow countrymen, Skyrgámur has the healthy habit of eating skyr. Skyr (or farköst) is a type of cheese, though it more resembles a very thick yogurt. The Greek yogurt that has become so popular lately resembles it, but not exactly. Skyr tastes tangy, thick and rich, yet it actually is low fat and very high in proteins .Thanks to its components, skyr’s nutritional benefits are quite remarkable. - a glutton to be sure, but one with strong bones and teeth! Like yogurt, you need to use a starter culture from a previous batch of skyr. Milk with all of the cream skimmed out is mixed with buttermilk, rennet and a bit of older skyr culture and brought to a boil. It is allowed to cool down slowly so the rennet can work its magic. A curd and whey has been created. The mixture is strained through something like cheese cloth until all the whey has dripped out. (The whey is saved as a preservative for meats). The remaining curds are skyr. Eating skyrs all Skyrgámur does when it’s his turn to pay the yearly visit during the Christmas period. In his fifteen-day stay he devours quantities of skyr to last him for a whole year; he gulps down barrels of it, literally. In past times, skyr was kept in wooden barrels and that’s why good old Skyrgámur is often depicted messing about with them. They call him stupid, but apart from his lack of temperance Skyrgámur is not that stupid. For those who are wondering, skyr is a low-fat and very high in proteins dairy product, similar to strained yogurt, but much healthier. Thanks to its components, skyr’s nutritional benefits are quite remarkable. Legends say skyr was discovered by farmers by chance: what would have Skyrgámur done if the chance never occurred? Perhaps he would have enjoyed junk food more or we would nowadays see him instead of Santa Claus on Coca Cola ads. So if you dont want to share any of your cultural experiences with Skyrgámur, hide your yogurt, skyr, buttermilk, filmjölk, kefir and sour cream from sight between Dec 19 and Jan 1.
Posted on: Fri, 19 Dec 2014 07:28:13 +0000
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