Summer means peak season for vegetables – but this is not noticeable in Iceland.
There, the cucumber shelves gape empty, and the answer to why is simple: Icelanders have gone cucumber crazy.
And the culprit in the drama, it’s Tiktok.
Anyone who hung out on social media during the summer can ascertain one thing: The cucumber has never been more popular.
The trend is said to have started with Canadian Tiktoker Logan Moffitt, also known as the “cucumber guy”, who shared a cucumber recipe with his 5.5 million followers almost every day since July. And he is not alone.
Not just Tiktok’s turmeric mania
Tiktok is now overflowing with recipes for cucumber salads. The vegetable is soaked in sesame oil, garlic, rice vinegar and chili oil. The most popular trend seems to be in Iceland, where many grocery stores have completely sold out of their cucumbers.
Now the Icelandic growers are finding it difficult to keep up with the rising demand, the Icelandic Agricultural Organization SFG tells BBC.
But not everyone agrees that the shortage is solely due to Tiktok’s cucumber hysteria. According to the grocery store chain Hagkaup, it is common to have a shortage of cucumbers at this time of year. At the same time, it has been seen that the number of purchases of the vegetable has more than doubled.
Some stores have also seen a doubling of sales of sesame oil and certain spices.
“Everything happens at the same time”
Growers in Iceland produce around six million cucumbers per year, for a population of 393,600 people.
According to Kristín Linda Sveinsdóttir, marketing manager at SFG, there are several growers who plant new cucumber plants this year, which can cause a gap during the growth period. At the same time, schools open after the summer holidays, which increases demand.
– Everything happens at the same time, says Kristín Linda Sveinsdóttir, but still adds that the cucumber recipes on social media are the most important contributing factor.