Friday, December 11, 2009

More About Smjör Butter and Icelandic Farming Policy

As promised Wednesday, I did a little research and found out more about Icelandic husbandry policy, which affects the nutritional properties of Smjör butter.

The Icelandic Consulate in New York City confirmed that the use of hormones and antibiotics is banned in Iceland, which makes Smjör safer to eat than most American butters, which use milk from cows administered hormones and antibiotics.


In addition, Iceland’s climate and relative lack of pollution lead to healthier grass, on which the cows graze in the summer. During the harsher winter months, the cows are kept indoors and are fed a diet of hay (dried grass), silage (fermented grass and other field crops) and protein supplements. As I have written previously, grass-fed food products are much healthier for us than products from corn-fed animals.


Some information I found online stated that the combination of Iceland’s climate and pristine environment obviated the need for the use of pesticides and other chemical sprays. While this makes sense, I could not verify this with a government source. (An e-mail I sent to Iceland’s Ministry of Fisheries and Agriculture has yet to be answered.)


Finally, the Icelandic Consulate sent me a link to a Web page—in English!—describing MS Iceland Dairies, the producer of Smjör products:

“MS Iceland Dairies (Mjólkursamsalan) is a cooperative organisation that includes over 700 of Iceland’s family-run dairy farms and other milk producers across the country.”
And for those worried about the environmental impact of eating butter shipped from Iceland:
“All our products are made using only 100% carbon-free electricity. This advantage exceeds the environmental counterbalance for the methane output inherent in local ruminant agriculture.”

13 comments:

Chris said...

Great info! I bought some Kerrygold to compare head to head and the Iceland butter is the definite winner!It's the best butter that's widely available IMO.

kenny said...

That's good to know. Is this typically a Whole Foods type brand or typical Supermarket brand?

Chef Rob said...

I've seen Smjör only at Whole Foods, but many similar brands--from grass-fed cows, no hormones and antibiotics, etc.--such as Kerrygold and Lurpak are available in larger supermarkets.

Brian said...

The final quote only suggests that use of carbon-free electricity offsets the methane output of the cows (and possibly production processes), not the carbon cost of shipping/refrigeration.

Mark G. said...

You know, I feel like such a butter snob....But, hey....

That Smjör butter is so outrageously over the top awesome, I can't get over it...

I LOVE KerryGold...and I too did this little taste test just to see....KerryGold is truly an amazing butter -- and I will always buy it....but this Smjör is just in another league.

When you go from Land-O-Lakes to Kate's (a great respectable organic butter) to KerryGold to Smjör -- then you've climbed the Butter Stairway to Heaven....

Just amazing stuff....

Love it! Love it! Love it!

Cheers all --

Mark G.

Chef Rob said...

Mark G.,

Glad to hear you liked the Smjör butter.

And I may have to start using your "Butter Stairway to Heaven" line.

Rob

Anonymous said...

..and Smjor, at $2.99, is almost half the price of Kerrygold, at $5.99 - at least in my local Wholefoods it is. Brilliant butter and brilliant value.

Anonymous said...

I had to write, Smjör is indeed heavenly. I was looking door the best kind of yellow butter for my little baby boy and stumbled upon this. Thanks for clarifying the devil in the details.

Mommypotamus said...

Thanks for this! I had a baby recently and my mom is doing the grocery shopping for me. She called to tell me my fave pastured butter was out of stock and told me about the Smjor. A quick Google search led me here and now I can't wait for her to get home so I can try my new butter. Yay for grassfed products!

Chef Rob said...

Mommypotamus - Glad you found the info about Smjor and the blog!

Anonymous said...

Thanks Chef Rob! You really got my attention on this one! I can hardly wait to pick up this butter! Over the past year I have been importing and enjoying a very creamy, raw, cultured, grass-fed butter from the "Dairy state" and believed I had some of the very best butter available, however I'm at least very curious about what Iceland has to offer!
Cheers!
Chef Jem
Blogging at Curezone

Anonymous said...

I recently made ghee (clarified butter used in Indian cooking) made from Smjor unsalted butter and I must say how incredible the ghee turned out! It has a warm, rich smell of buttery croissant rolls with a hint of some caramlization. Definitely the best ghee I have ever made! From now on, I am sticking with Smjor butter for making ghee!

Chef Rob said...

Anonymous - Glad to hear it was such a success!