An Icelandic brewery has teamed up with a whaling company to create a beer infused with dead whale, to the horror of environmental groups.
The Steðji brewery created the 5.2 percent alcohol beer with whaling firm Hvalur for a midwinter festival in Iceland, according to the Independent. The beer reportedly contains whale meal, a byproduct of reducing whale flesh to oil, said to be high in protein and vitamin B. The brewery claims drinkers will become “true Vikings.”
Environmental group Whale and Dolphin Conservation heavily criticized Steðji for brewing beer using endangered animals. “Reducing a beautiful, sentient whale to an ingredient on the side of a beer bottle is about as immoral and outrageous as it is possible to get,” activist Vanessa Williams-Grey told The Independent.
Dagbjartur Ariliusson, the brewery’s owner, said the whale beer would only be on sale for six weeks and would not be exported. He defended the cetacean ale as an accompaniment to the traditional Icelandic meal of cured whalemeat. “Now we have the beer to drink with this food,” he said.