18 courses, no murder: A floating restaurant right out of ‘The Menu’

If this seems like the setup for the horror movie “The Menu,” you’re not far off.

There’s a catch in getting to this sustainable wonderland: It’s a carbon-intensive haul. First you’ll need to fly to Oslo, then take a quick jet or a long train over the mountains to Bergen. Then it’s either a long ferry from Norway’s charming second city or a winding fjordside drive, plus a short ferry or two.

This just gets you to the starting point: the picturesque village of Rosendal (population 839), for what Iris calls the “expedition”: a six-hour dinner of the highest quality and invention, complete with subterranean videos about global warming and lectures about sustainable aquaculture. All this in a bad guy lair straight out of a James Bond film.

Dinner will set you back roughly $300, before wine but inclusive of tax and tip; in Norway, where a sandwich and a beer can set you back $40, that’s a bargain.

A tingly, almost giddy sense of expectation courses through the eight guests that join our party of three on the Rosendal dock. Ethereal orchestral music — think Philip Glass-lite — plays through a speaker. Washington Post colleague Libby Casey and I are approached by three uniformed deckhands, who later double as waiters and sommeliers, and are ushered into an electric speedboat.

Kaleidoscopic waves crash into each other on monitors attached to the back of each seat. The music follows us aboard as we head into the unknown.

Courses 1 and 2:

‘Cone of plenty’: Crispy cone, citrus emulsion, local herbs.

‘Rocky roe’: Grilled brioche, smoked cod roe, grated scallop roe.

The boat purrs through a bucolic inlet and pulls up for a quick first stop on the island of Snilstveitoy, where we’re greeted by Nico Danielsen, the general manager and the husband of chef Anika Madsen. They’ve recently ditched Copenhagen for the wilds of coastal Norway.

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The boathouse here was built in the 1890s, Danielsen tells us as he ushers us inside for a couple of “snacks.” It’s the epitome of Nordic rustic chic: stone tile floor, bleached wood beams, a sparse pine table set with elegant napkins and stemware, furs thrown over chairs. Along one side of the three-walled boathouse is a prep kitchen, where the ever-smiling Madsen and a couple of silent sous chefs put the finishing touches on the first course.

Courses 3 and 4:

‘Uni-fication’: Crispy kelp and sea urchin.

‘Coat of arms’: Crispy croustade, edible flowers and hand-dived scallops.

We’re met by five uniformed staff, standing guard like adorable henchmen. And in we go, 10 feet underwater into the belly of the beast. At the bottom of the curving staircase, our coats and bags are removed. “You won’t be needing this, sir,” says someone in the dark.

Then, suddenly, we’re trapped … in experimental theater. After being instructed not to touch anything that might resemble food, we’re ushered into a windowless round room. We’re assaulted by the sounds of thunder and crashing waves as a movie starts playing on the curved wall. “Most of the food we eat is produced on land, but most of the world is covered in water — the balance is off,” the chef’s voice intones over slow-motion shots of seaside foraging and drone video of whales.

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On cue, the henchmen reappear with bowls of a sea urchin mousse, molded in the shape of the seafloor-dwelling invasive species. I grab a kelp chip dangling from a string and tuck into what tastes like a faintly aquatic buttermilk ranch.

Upstairs we go, where we’re shown another multimedia projection — a quick topographical tour with musical dots showing the local purveyors of reindeer, seafood and berries. Then, finally, we have our first real glimpse inside the UFO, bathed in purple light. Two curved ramps lead up to the dining room, where just seven tables are set along a giant oblong window.

Beyond the steel-gray fjord, a 1,500-foot waterfall cuts a white gash down forested peaks that disappear into low clouds. Behind us, encased in glass, is the central nervous system of this alien ship: a circular kitchen where a half-dozen or so chefs seem to be doing very little. If they’re planning to kill us, they don’t look all that threatening.

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The next course is almost too pretty to eat: A paper-thin bubbly tuile cradles raw chopped scallops and tiny tomatoes, nestled under a bed of edible purple and white flowers.

But as we look out over the distant town, my eyes turn to the restaurant’s dirty secret: the 1,000-foot-long salmon farm floating just offshore.

Courses 5 through 10:

‘Feeding the future’: Mycelium, chlorella algae, insect protein, young salmon fry.

‘Colorblind’: White salmon, birch sap, gooseberries.

‘Next-level neighbors’: Porridge blini, shrimp, caviar, pickled black currant leaves.

‘From zero to hero’: Lumpsucker, beurre blanc, oyster mushroom, peas.

‘500 meters’: Juniper-smoked blue mussels, beach crab bouillon, ‘peas of the ocean.’

‘Weeds of the sea’: Norwegian cuttlefish, kelp, unripe strawberries, lovage.

For a chef who’s all about sustainability and unusual hyperlocal ingredients, it’s a paradox that her restaurant is owned and funded by Eide Fjordbruk, a Norwegian salmon farming company.

That glistening piece of fish at your Whole Foods starts as a smolt, raised and fed in land-based tanks, then transferred after a year to “open-water nets” in the fjord. There, they get fat swimming in circles for another two years, then are sucked out of the pens, stunned, fileted, frozen and prepared for transit.

That single facility in view of Iris holds about 700,000 salmon, and there are roughly 1,400 such farms in Norway, according to the government, so figure roughly half a billion fish. Compare that with the population of wild salmon in Norway’s waters: roughly 550,000 at any one time.

The fjords may look pristine, but they’re not. Sea lice, which rip apart the scales and flesh of salmon, are rampant — and to control the parasites, companies use vast amounts of pesticides and other toxic treatments. Then there’s the feces: One salmon farm produces as much organic discharge each year as 6,800 cows “shitting directly into the ocean,” says environmentalist Rune Jensen. In this region of Norway, for the last year on record, the mortality rate for farmed salmon was 27 percent, according the country’s fisheries department. For commercial chicken farming, which many consider systemic cruelty, the rate is just over 5 percent. Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch tells consumers to “avoid” almost all Norwegian-farmed salmon.

Even Sondre Eide, the 34-year-old CEO and heir to his family’s three-generation-old company, admits that salmon farming is a “problem.”

That’s not to say Eide, who estimates spending $30 million to build Salmon Eye and Iris, isn’t trying. He’s frank about the challenge of sustainability and passionate about new technology that his firm is working aggressively to pioneer, including Watermoon — a “closed-loop” system in which salmon will be contained in massive underwater structures free from sea lice and other parasites, and where fish poop is pumped out and converted to biomass and methane. But the technology is expensive and years away from being built at scale; meanwhile, Norway’s salmon farming industry rakes in $10 billion a year doing things just as they are.

It’s hard to hate on Iris and Madsen’s commitment to using native ingredients. “I’m a city girl. I was used to calling my suppliers, and they’d be there in a half an hour,” Madsen says. “In Norway, the seasons decide the time.”

The next six courses are delicious lessons in pelagic sustainability. A whole baby salmon is gently fried, crusted in a yeasty batter of fungi, insects and algae — ingredients, she hopes, that could reinvent fish feed. The “plate” is a clear polycarbonate encasing a frozen diorama of an eviscerated seabed, complete with an empty mussel shell and a fish skeleton.

The next course is a glorious ceviche of farmed white salmon, harvested before it’s gorged on feed laced with a synthetic compound that turns the flesh a glossy pink. It rests hidden under a delicate gelatin in a cool broth of birch sap, rose peppercorn and gooseberries.

A blini, made from tangy day-old porridge and topped with fatty cold-water shrimp, caviar, pickled black currant leaves and marigold flowers appears on a mini Stonehenge. It’s followed by the first warm dish, a slice of local wild-caught halibut onto which is poured an unctuous beurre blanc dotted with oyster mushrooms, peas, baby squash and lumpsucker — the lowly delousing fish tossed into the salmon pens in untold numbers.

Then, we’re ushered into the lounge for the next course, where more theatrics are on display. A glass orb, filled with smoked blue mussels, cornflowers, kelp pearls and crab bouillon — all harvested within about 1,600 feet of the restaurant — is remotely activated to glow blue as we start eating.

It’s all a bit ironic. Iris showcases Norway’s natural bounty, but the country is still a food desert compared with its Scandinavian brethren. Upon arriving at our rental house up the fjord, I asked the owner where to find some good local seafood. He directed me to the nearby supermarket, which had 25 different toothpaste tubes of mayonnaise but no fresh-fish counter.

Meanwhile, Madsen keeps showering us with invasive species: a local cuttlefish “tagliatelle,” with celeriac and unripe strawberries in an umami-laden dashi butter foam. Danielsen says his wife has been working on a version of this dish for seven years now. It’s the best “pasta” I’ve ever eaten.

Courses 11 through 13:

‘Change of heart’: Tartar of reindeer, grilled leeks, sourdough crumble.

‘Horn to hoof,’ Part 1: Reindeer tongue, yellow beets, lemon thyme.

‘Horn to hoof,’ Part 2: Reindeer loin, Jerusalem artichoke, fermented red currants, pepper sauce.

We’re tipsy, it’s still light outside at 9:45 p.m., and no one has been murdered yet. But then a heart, dripping with inky blood, appears on a gleaming white plate. We turn to a young Danish couple who have been touring Norway in a rented RV, seated at the table next to us. “At least we know to order the cheeseburger,” he says, grinning.

A Magic Shell-style crust made from hibiscus, tomato and black currants encases a tartar livened with pickled capers and grilled leeks. Reindeer, we’re told, emit only a fraction of the carbon dioxide that cows and other livestock do. The next course brings more Rudolph — braised tongue with tender yellow beets and lemon thyme in a creamy foam, topped with grated smoked reindeer heart resembling a gamy shaved bonito. A loin cut of reindeer follows, paired with a puree of sunchokes, red currants and a jus laden with peppercorns.

As dusk falls, I’m starting to be outpaced by the wine pairing. I’ve got at least three half-full glasses in front of me and all of a sudden the room starts to feel a bit wobbly. It’s just the waves of a passing ship, we’re assured, and Salmon Eye is designed to withstand even big winter swells.

Courses 14 through 18:

‘Spruced up’: Brown butter and hazelnut parfait, Rossini Gold caviar, spruce shoots.

‘Malm and Melder’: Rhubarb, woodruff, salted oat crumble.

‘A tribute to Rosendal’: Rose and quince sorbet.

‘Ut pa tur aldri sur’: Financier, fermented blueberries, chocolate.

Chocolate truffles.

By the time dessert rolls around, we’ve been offshore for 5½ hours. Time plays tricks on you when it’s light until 11 p.m. and you’re stuck at sea. But you never feel as if you’re waiting around for the next course. The service is effervescent: Every dish is a story, and every server has one, too.

The first dessert is a glistening mound of brown butter and hazelnut ice cream surrounded by a caviar lifeboat. Pickled spruce shoots lend a hint of pine forest to the sweet and savory bite. The second course looks familiar; it’s shaped like the mountains we’ve been staring at all evening. A dusting of snow tops an herbaceous woodruff and rhubarb sorbet. A table of locals are charmed: “We grew up hiking these hills,” exclaims a young woman who shows us her Instagram of the edible frieze, each peak labeled by name.

Then, for the first time all night, we feel a hint of urgency. If we intend to catch our ferry home, we’ll need to leave in minutes. We pound a quick espresso and with embarrassing haste scarf down the three remaining bite-size desserts. Danielsen insists that he’ll take us back to shore in a second boat, so that the remaining diners — all of whom either are staying overnight or live in Rosendal — can linger a bit longer.

The orb is glowing as we motor away, lit up in purple and yellow against the night sky. Sitting out front of the speedboat, the cool wind rushing past, I can’t help but smile at the absurdity.

Call it what you like: propaganda for Big Salmon, an Instagrammer’s paradise, a lecture in 18 courses. What a time to stay alive.