Skip to main content
Support

Browse by category

All categories
Home

Fermented milk from Iceland

Sýra and blanda (Icelandic fermented whey and whey drink)sýra

Sýra is the whey left from making skyr, kept in casks until it has soured for a long time. Diluted with water it becomes blanda, the everyday farm drink, and undiluted it was the acid in which Icelanders kept meat (súrmatur).

A short entry: the sources we found record only what is said here about Sýra and blanda itself.

Short entryFermented milk12 months

Recipe

Amounts from a sourceFarm practice with no fixed amounts for the sýra itself; the 18th-century account gives only the dilution for blanda.
Whey from skyr making[vontroil]
Water, for blandaAbout 11–12 parts to 1 part sýraVon Troil describes blanda as water with a twelfth part of sýra added[vontroil]
Thyme juice and crowberry juiceOptional, in winter[vontroil]

Total time across the recorded steps: 12 months

Start
Drag the bar or press Play

What changes: The whey drained from skyr is collected

Step 1 of 3
Collect the whey from skyr making
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented

Output: whey from skyr making.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Sýra is the whey left from making skyr, kept in casks until it has soured for a long time. Diluted with water it becomes blanda, the everyday farm drink, and undiluted it was the acid in which Icelanders kept meat (súrmatur). Made in 3 steps over 12 months. The longest step, sour the whey in casks, takes at least 12 months (Von Troil U).

Key numbers
Main stepat least 12 monthsReported[vontroil]Sour the whey in casks

What makes this one different

Sýra is whey kept until it is very sour, not a curd or a drink in itself. Slovak žinčica is also a sheep-whey product, but it is heated and drunk within a day.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Súrmatur (whey-soured meats)Meat kept in sýra; the sour pieces are still eaten at Þorrablót.
  • Blaand (Shetland)A Shetland whey drink of the same tradition, no longer made (Wikipedia).
  • Sýra in breadVon Troil saw flour kneaded with sýra into dough.

Safety

Von Troil wrote in the 18th century that some meat was kept in casks under sour fermented whey, and that sýra was not thought fit for use until it was a year old. That is a historical account, not a safety test.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

The Swedish traveller Uno von Troil, in his 18th-century Letters on Iceland, wrote that sýra was soured whey kept in casks and not used until a year old, and that blanda was water with a twelfth part of sýra. Shetland blaand died out in the mid-20th century (Wikipedia).

  1. [vontroil] Von Troil U., Letters on Iceland, in Pinkerton J. (ed.), A General Collection of the Best and Most Interesting Voyages and Travels, vol. 1, p. 656 (Project Runeberg scan)archive
  2. [wp] Wikipedia, Blaand (outline)wiki
  3. [wp-2] Wikipedia, Skyr (outline)wiki
  4. [wp-3] Wikipedia, Þorramatur (súrmatur; outline)wiki