Shalimar

The Shalimar is Rejkyavik's key Indian-Pakistani restaurant. Just off Ingolstorg Square, it is hailed by some critics—Icelandic and Continental—as the best such food prepared outside of Asia. I don't know about that, but Ezra and I knew that Bjork was a regular customer...and Robert Plant, as well, when the Zeppelin or he played Iceland.

It's a tiny storefront that seats eighteen down stairs, the same same number in an upstairs room. The dining area could have been any similar restaurant I've eaten in...anywhere—Seattle, London, Vancouver. Indian mystical images, Arabic script, bronze pitchers on shelves were the décor. Family-owned and operated, the chef, maitre d' and our table help were father and son and granddaughter. We were very “at home”.

The menu was also familiar—the surprises and the delight would come with the dishes.

I ordered Much Shahi Korma, translated on the menu as Chicken Tiki Masala.

I enjoy dishes such as this...like Chop Suey and Gyros, traditional courses re-imagined by colonials and ethnic groups to appeal to the their own countrymen and the foreigner. Tiki Masala was devised (for the British still on their own island) as a gateway meal into the cuisine of the sub-continent when the Empire was still a reality. Today it can be found on any English, Scottish or Welsh pub menu (usually with chips), and at ethnic restaurants everywhere.

The centerpiece here—as it should always be—was the chicken.

The meat available to the Shalimar was, as with Icelandic lamb, free-range...period. Gorgeous, plump, it required only a little effort to bring to the point where it would melt in the mouth. The delight, though, was the sauce: Shaved almonds and cashews in a garlic and coconut cream, a whiff of saffron.

The average American will be more likely to compare this to a “butter chicken” than the Tiki Masala available in local restaurants: Their expectations for Tiki Masala and Butter Chicken will be forever changed.

The best Indian-Pakistani restaurant outside of Asia? I don't know. I'll keep looking...and I'll remember Shalimar, a glorious and unexpected shade of those vast and unpredictable cultures.