Brännvin is a

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

liquor Liquor (or a spirit) is an alcoholic drink produced by distillation of grains, fruits, vegetables, or sugar, that have already gone through alcoholic fermentation. Other terms for liquor include: spirit drink, distilled beverage or ha ...

distilled from

potato The potato is a starchy food, a tuber of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'' and is a root vegetable native to the Americas. The plant is a perennial in the nightshade family Solanaceae. Wild potato species can be found from the southern Un ...

es,

grain A grain is a small, hard, dry fruit ( caryopsis) – with or without an attached hull layer – harvested for human or animal consumption. A grain crop is a grain-producing plant. The two main types of commercial grain crops are cereals and legu ...

, or (formerly) wood cellulose. It can be plain and colourless, or flavoured with herbs and spices. Beverages labelled ''brännvin'' are usually plain and have an alcohol content between 30% and 38%. The word ''brännvin'' means "burn (distilled) wine". It is

cognate In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words in different languages that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymological ancestor in a common parent language. Because language change can have radical e ...

with English '' brandy ine', Norwegian ''brennevin'', Danish ''brændevin'', Dutch '' brandewijn'', Finnish ''Viina'', German '' Branntwein'', and Icelandic '' brennivín''. A small glass of brännvin is called a '' snaps'' (cf. German schnapps), and may be accompanied by a '' snapsvisa'', a drinking song.

Outside Scandinavia

In the US, a

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

producer makes a bitter brännvin (beskbrännvin), called Jeppson's Malört. "Malört" () is the Swedish word for the plant ''

Artemisia absinthium ''Artemisia absinthium'' (wormwood, grand wormwood, absinthe, absinthium, absinthe wormwood, mugwort, wermout, wermud, wormit, wormod) is a species of '' Artemisia'', native to temperate regions of Eurasia and North Africa, and widely naturaliz ...

'', wormwood, often used as an ingredient in absinthe.

In Scandinavian culture

Brännvin was central to the semi-mythical world in the songs of Sweden's bard,

Carl Michael Bellman Carl Michael Bellman (; 4 February 1740 – 11 February 1795) was a Swedish songwriter, composer, musician, poet and entertainer. He is a central figure in the Swedish song tradition and remains a powerful influence in Swedish music, as well ...

. For example, in Fredman's Epistle no. 1, the first verse begins:

References

External links

* - Short introduction to ''. The Historical Museum of Wines and Spirits (English). {{DEFAULTSORT:Brannvin Swedish distilled drinks Swedish cuisine Finnish cuisine

Outside Scandinavia

In Scandinavian culture

See also

References

External links