A few months ago I was at Greenhouse Studios where enigmatic genius Valgeir Sigurdsson was mixing Rafiq’s new record at his studio just outside the center of Reykjavik. Throughout my stay in Iceland I had been continuously infatuated with the concept behind one the country’s most bizarre culinary innovations, Hakarl, or fermented shark. I first heard of this rancid delicacy on Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations and ever since then was determined to find out if it was really a bad as it was purported to be. 

Luckily, on our final night in Iceland, Hakarl was served with dinner at my request, much to the dismay of the other guests at the studio. The resulting experience is far too hard to put down in words, so I figured I would try to document as many of my friends consuming the rotten meat as possible and let their experiences tell the tale. I smuggled enough meat back into the States to last me a while so I’ve decided to create an ongoing series called A Whiff of This, a collection of the facial expressions and reactions of my unsuspecting friends.

What you’ll find above is Episode I, featuring Meade Bernard. Meade was a good soul to go through with this and I think he did a bang up job. Enjoy!