the embassy

There is something slightly absurd in the fact that my standard watering hole in Stockholm bears the name ”Ardbeg Embassy”. An inside wall is covered with a gigantic wall paper featuring a distillery  on an island off the scottish coast. The text is ”Ardbeg – Stockholm Embassy”.

On the opposite side there is another large photo from the same island. Blocks of some brown stuff dominate that picture and also here the image is partly covered by text: ”Release the Peat”.

Why? Why has scottish malt whiskey so penetrated Stockholm that I find a pub in Stockholm that has a better selection of malts, than the local, and only, pub in Port Ellen, Islay, just a kilometer or two from the actual Ardbeg destillery.

I first encountered the brown, smoky poison of the scottish countryside in the mid eighties. At that time the state run ”Systembolaget”, that handles all legal alcoholic beverages in Sweden, carried only four malts. The only one worth the paper bills are printed on was Glenfiddish.

Abroad however you could buy bottles of the water of life and in August 1986 I remember carrying a nice bottle of Laphroaig into my first ever flat on the South Side of Stockholm.

If you know your malts, you know that starting off with Laphroaig perhaps isn’t the wisest of choices. The smoke hits you first. Then the taste and after that one-two punsch you try to catch your breath, whilst putting the bottle back into a cupboard and return to the most dreadful of non-drinks – a lager.

That bottle lasted for two years and you might think that I had learned my lesson and return to weaker drinks.

But somehow, after that bottle, nothing else tasted the same. Everything else had a tameness that made me long for the smokey stuff. I was caught.

And, I admit, I thought I was cool. In those days I was slightly (chough) younger and coolness was important. Scottish malts was my thing. Something I had discovered. I was unique.

Strangely enough – all other swedish men in my age bracket were unique in that same malty way. Far from being sole in my pursuits, I found myself more mainstream than ever. In the nineties and noughties the bars and restaurants were flooded with whiskey. And of course nothing blended. Oh no! Anything younger than 18 years from a side of the way barn of scottish remoteness was persona non grata at the discussions of the swedish male of ten years ago. All right… of the swedish middle aged man. The very middle aged man.

One could rebel. One could start on a new path. Seek the road less travelled by. Not to conform to type.

Some of my friends have. Some years ago I was suddenly offered sometihing that would have been unheard of just ten years ago. I was offered – bourbon…

Yes. The sweet american bathtub drink that was invented… well, actually I don’t care when.

And I realized that I was becoming non cool. There was nothing cutting edge in my malt habits. Quite the contrary. The alcohol avant garde had moved on. What was I to do?

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Last summer I joined the tour. I visited four destilleries in Scotland. Three of those situated on the isle of Islay – home to the most peaty of all whiskeys. I listened to the guides and drank the stuff. The staff told us that, aside from the natives (aka british), the largest nationality among the visitors were… the swedes.

So here I am. Looking at a wall of scottish delight, pondering the ways of the world of alcohol and my own uncoolness. Feels kind of… well… good.  The fact is, that malt whiskey is so common in Sweden that one of the best places to find it – world wide - is right at my doorstep.

On the other side of the counter I see two bottles of ”Port Ellen”, an Islay whiskey that went out of production some twenty years ago. It is ”slightly” expensive. In the mirror behind the bottles I catch the sight of my receding hairline.

I’m home…

PS. I highly recommend not to wear leather motorcycle gear to destillery showings. It squeeks more than one would imagine… DS.