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expected less from such a barren country. I had heard that the shepherds entertain themselves on long winter nights by retelling the Sagas and feasting on rotten shark, but Olaf says this isn’t true. Icelanders no longer eat rotten shark. Iceland grows its own vegetables, and even bananas in greenhouses heated by its geothermal springs. The sight of a sleek trawler unloading fresh cod and haddock and a flock of pint-size sheep blocking traffic gave me further hope. That night we dined on ptarmigan and reindeer at the Hotel Holt, and the following afternoon shopped for our dinner at a supermarket. Icelandic lamb racks are boned, the loins and tenderloins sold separately. We bought some of each, took them home, and browned them in butter, finishing the loins in the oven to barely medium rare. The tenderloins, about three and a half ounces each, we served from the pan with Icelandic boiled potatoes, caramelized in butter and sugar. We arranged the loins on a platter with local greens.

A few months later, in Sag Harbor at dinner with the Olafssons and friends, we began with Icelandic langoustes, which Olaf had ordered from Iceland the day before along with five pounds of lamb and some fish. We napped the langoustes with garlic-infused butter and followed them with bits of steamed cod and haddock caught in Iceland the day before, and then the lamb, sautéed quickly in butter and a little salt with a dab of rosemary-infused demi-glace, barely thickened with a trace of arrowroot. With the lamb we served some fresh peas and roasted tomatoes. Our neighbor Sheila Lukens, with her sixth sense of what goes with what, supplied three bottles of Bandol Rosé (Domaine Tempier).

To protect Iceland’s delicate soil, the lamb population has been reduced by 15 percent since 1990, but the government still fails to promote its surplus overseas as a delicacy, the Kobe beef of lamb. The loins, together with the smaller tenderloins, are sold boned and fresh from September to early November, when the six-month-old lambs are butchered. Since there’s no way to house the flocks over the winter, they are sold the rest of the year frozen, which does not affect their flavor or texture.

ICELANDIC LAMB

For our dinner for six, we sautéed in butter three pounds of boned loins, about three ounces each, and tenderloins, one to two ounces each, and made a light sauce of shallots, cooked in butter until softened, then dusted with arrowroot to make a light roux. We added half a bottle of Pinot Noir, which we reduced by half, and poured in seven ounces of veal and duck demi-glace (ordered from dartagnan.com), and reduced the mixture again by half, until it had just begun to thicken, then turned off the flame and steeped a branch of rosemary in the sauce. The shelled peas we cooked without water, and we roasted six medium tomatoes from the garden until soft in a 350-degree oven with fresh thyme, chopped garlic softened in a little olive oil, and a sprinkling of sugar.

A few years ago, our friend Frances Cook, who was then United States ambassador to Oman, invited us to stay with her in Muscat, the capital of this enchanting if reclusive sultanate at the opposite side of the world from Iceland. Oman, on the Arabian Sea, tucked between the United Arab Emirates, to the north, and Yemen, two thousand miles to the south, somewhat resembles the state of California. It has occurred to me amid our wars and rumors of war that Iceland in summer and Oman in winter might offer a decent refuge, assuming a few airlines survive the world’s meander toward chaos. Here the language is Arabic and the religion Islam, but English is taught as a second language in a thousand state schools, and the Omani version of Islam—Ibadhism—preaches justice, tolerance, and nonviolence. Omanis may wear what they please. Men wear Western clothes or traditional Arab robes and turbans. Women’s tribal dress can be elaborate: fine gold-shot cotton, or embroidered caftans of a heavy material often accented with gold coins. Under a blazing sun one day in the otherwise empty rose and golden desert, I