We come from the land of the ice and snow

Well three months after my brief visit to Iceland, I finally got round to drinking the three beers I brought back with me. All three were from the Borg Brugghús Brewery, but before describing them in detail, I want to write about the Icelandic beer scene in general, especially because the country is a relative newcomer to the world of beer.

It is not widely know that owing to an extended period of prohibition, it has only been legal to drink beer in Iceland since 1^st March 1989. That date is now celebrated as "Beer Day", but how did this strange situation come about?

A total ban on the sale of alcohol came into effect in 1915, following an earlier referendum; (plebiscites are never a good idea, as Britain discovered two years ago). The ban followed years of agitation by an alliance of temperance groups and total abstainers and, as with all such “well-meaning” legislation, was supposed to “improve the health of the nation”.

A century ago, alcohol in general was frowned upon, and beer was especially out of favour for purely political reasons. This was because at the time, Iceland was engaged in a struggle for independence from Denmark, and Icelanders strongly associated beer with Danish lifestyles. As a result, beer was "not the patriotic drink of choice", and for much of the 20th Century it was both unpatriotic and illegal to drink beer.

Looking back, not liking one’s Danish forefathers seems a very strange reason for wishing to ban beer, and to me is like "cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face", but then much closer to home, in both time and space, the United Kingdom has done pretty much the same thing by voting (narrowly) to leave the European Union.

Iceland’s total ban on alcohol only lasted until 1922, when the sale of wine was legalised in the country. This came about following economic pressure from Spain, which threatened to cease importing salted cod from Iceland (Iceland's biggest export), unless Iceland relaxed the ban on imported Spanish and Portuguese wines.

Then, following another strange turn of events, the sale of all alcoholic beverages, with the exception of beer with an alcohol content above 2.25%, was lifted. This was partly due to the medical profession prescribing strong alcohol (spirits) for all sorts of ailments and the fact that many Icelanders were either brewing their own alcohol, or smuggling it into the country.

Beer continued to be excluded, and the ban remained in force, even after Iceland gained full independence from Denmark in 1944. The spurious argument put forward by the anti-alcohol lobby, was that as beer was cheaper than wines or spirits, legalising it could lead to a big rise in alcohol abuse.

When I was a student I remember, there was a girl from Iceland on the same course as a friend of mine, and during her time at university, she certainly made up for not being allowed to drink beer at home. My friend's course-mate's case was not unique, and as international travel brought Icelanders back in touch with beer, bills to legalise it were regularly moved in the Icelandic parliament.  Eventually, in 1989, a full turnout in the upper house of Iceland's parliament voted 13 to 8 to permit the sale of beer, thereby ending prohibition in the country.

The legalisation of beer remains a significant cultural event in Iceland as beer has become the country’s most popular alcoholic beverage. In the years which followed the long overdue repeal of the ban on beer, standard lagers from both Viking Brewery, familiar  for their Gylltur golden lager, and the somewhat-more experimental Einstök Brewery, dominated the scene.

Slowly but surely, the influence, particularly of American craft beer brewers began gaining ground and by 2015, there were seven microbreweries in Iceland. By the following year the number of Icelandic breweries had risen to nine, and this year (2018), the country can boast 26 companies which brew beer.

One such brewery is Borg Brugghús, and this is the company whose beers I picked up at Keflavik airport. According to their website, “Borg Brugghús is a progressive craft brewery founded in 2010 whose principal aim is to incorporate Icelandic cultural traits and local ingredients into its wide variety of beers and pair with food”. They certainly produce an incredibly wide variety of different beers, with over 70 listed on their website.

I bought the bottles at the airport because the only place you can buy alcohol in Iceland, apart from in bars, is at one of the state-owned chain of liquor stores called Vínbúdin. My purchases certainly clocked up some miles on their way back to the UK, as they travelled to the US in my hand baggage, and then journeyed in my suitcase from Richmond to Chicago, by train, followed by a short flight across to Cleveland. 

The homeward journey saw then touching back down briefly in Keflavik, from where I caught a connecting flight to Gatwick. My bottles survived intact, which is more than can be said for some cans of Jever Pils, which one of my Japanese colleagues brought over on a flight from Hamburg. Finding the contents of your suitcase, swimming in beer is not an experience to be recommended, so the moral is, use plenty of padding and pack carefully.

So what of the Borg Brugghús  beers? Well, they are all numbered according to style, and there is then sub-numbering within a particular beer type. My examples were as follows:

Borg Brugghús Úlfur Nr 3. India Pale Ale 5.9%. Úlfur is an Icelandic take on India Pale Ale. Amber in colour, with a slight haze, this beer is dry-hopped with specially selected American hops (varieties not specified), to give it a “wonderfully fruity taste and aroma”. The beer has quite a harsh bitterness,  but I wouldn’t argue with the overall description.

Borg Brugghús Snorri Nr 10 5.3%. Very pale in colour, with a slight haze, and topped with a dense foam head. According to the label the beer is brewed from Icelandic barley and flavoured with Arctic thyme. It is named after Snorri Sturlusson, chieftain of the Borg estate.

I’m not sure whether the said chieftain is ancient or modern, but who really cares as the beer is certainly an interesting one, with the thyme complementing the hops rather than over-powering them.

Borg Brugghús Myrkvi Nr 13. Porter 6.0%. Described as an unfiltered, full-bodied Porter with a dark twist. The beer is “seasoned” with Colombian coffee, roasted in Reykjavik. Unfiltered and un-pasteurised, oats are also included in the grist.

The beer pours jet black, and is topped with a nice creamy head. Rich tasting with notes of roasted barely and coffee. Well-balanced and with a good mouth feel. This beer was definitely the show-stopper, as far as I was concerned, being satisfying and rather more-ish beer. I would be quite happy to sink several bottles of this excellent porter."Skal!" 


If you fancy sampling some of these beers for yourself, then Iceland is only three hours flying from southern England, and thus  is far closer than many people think.

There is obviously much to see and do, especially if the outdoor life appeals to you, and with some of the most spectacular scenery in the world, you certainly won’t be short of that “wow” factor.

You will also enjoy the night-life, especially if you spend a few days in  Reykjavik, as not for nothing is the Icelandic capital known as the "party capital of the north". You will get the chance of sampling some of these amazing beers, and you will get to enjoy them in some pretty cool bars.

I only spent a very brief amount of time in the country, but Iceland is somewhere I would like to return to, especially after my DNA analysis revealed an ethnicity which is 14% Scandinavian!