At least I thought they were tip jars. After a couple of slugs of Brennivín, well, I couldn't be sure of anything.

What did I just eat?

If you're a vegan, you might find Iceland a bit tough going; the local diet depends on a lot of meat and dairy products. And no part of the animal goes wasted, it seems. A tour guide I sent the day with told me a story of leading a tour party of vegetarians the week before and being asked to sit elsewhere at lunch, as he was eating meat from a smoked sheep's head, cut straight from the bone.

Without question, though, the greatest epicurean adventure one can have in Iceland is to sample hákarl (typically served on cubes with toothpicks, like an artisinal cheese). It's basking shark that's been cured and hung to dry for half a year, and it has a pungent, ammonia rich smell that I can only describe as somewhere between tuna casserole that's been left out in the August sun and dank New York City alleyway.

Eating hákarl requires a very strong stomach, which explains why its consumption is one of those rituals that Icelanders put poor foreigners through on their way to earning their stripes as honorary Vikings.