An Icelandic brewery has reportedly teamed up with a whaling company to create… you guessed it, a beer containing extracts of whale.
The 5.2% concoction is borne from a collaboration between brewery Steðjar and fin-whaling firm Hvalur and is expected to be on shelves in time for Iceland’s mid-winter festival Þorrablót (Thorrablot) held in honour of the Norse god, Thor.
According to the Press Association, the brewery describes it as healthy because whale meal contains protein and is very low in fat, adding that those who drink it become “true Vikings”.
Dagbjartur Ariliusson, the brewery's owner, confirmed it was making the beer, which will only be sold in Iceland from 24 January to 22 February, and is not being made for export.
He said the beer was being made for a traditional festival in which people gathered and celebrated "as we've done for many centuries and eat cured food, including whale fat, and now we have the beer to drink with this food".
Unsurprisingly, conservationists are criticising the move.
A PETA spokesman told HuffPost UK: "The people behind this vomit-inducing creation appear to be the kind of losers who can only get a spotlight shone on themselves by being cruel to the most defenceless of animals, the beautiful whale."
While Vanessa Williams-Grey of Whale and Dolphin Conservation, said: "Demand for this meat is in decline, with fewer and fewer people eating it.
"Even so, 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.
"The brewery may claim that this is just a novelty product with a short shelf life, but what price the life of an endangered whale which might have lived to be 90 years?"
