Brennivín

It is distilled from fermented grain mash and then combined with Iceland's very soft, high-pH water, and flavored only with caraway.

Icelandic: Brennivín, along its sister languages, Danish: brændevin, Faroese: brennivín, Norwegian: brennevin, Swedish: brännvin (Finnish: Viina), is an old Nordic term for distilled liquor, generally from potatoes, grain, or (formerly) wood cellulose etc.

The word means "burn[t] (distilled) wine", and stems from Middle Low German: bernewin (found in Old Swedish as brænnevin).

[3][4] It also exists in Dutch: brandewijn (Afrikaans: brandewyn) and German: Branntwein, gebrannter Wein, ultimately cognate to brandy(wine), also French: brandevin.

In 1397, the Kalmar Union[6] between the Nordic countries put Iceland (along with Norway, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands) under the Danish crown.

Although beer could not easily survive the ocean journey, malt and honey were freely traded between Scandinavia and Iceland.

The distillation techniques of the day (known as "burning") meant that the resulting spirits (known as "burnt wine" or "brann-vin"[8]) were often less than appealing.

The trade monopoly ended in 1786, and thirty years later modern distillation techniques made their way to Scandinavia.

For decades, Brennivín was the drink of choice for Icelanders and became a pop-culture treasure brought home by travelers.

It is also the traditional accompaniment to the uniquely Icelandic hákarl, a type of fermented shark meat.