Mackmyra The First Edition
”Det här, Skotten, det är whisky!” (This, Scotsman, this is Whisky!) she said, producing a stylish looking bottle. The label was covered in foreign scribbling, the content a very light golden. “That,” I replied, “remains to be seen”.
What my Swedish relative had brought over, a year or so ago, was a bottle of Mackmyra – The First Edition. For weeks before her visit she’d made various attempts to convince me that it was, hands down, the best Whisky ever made – needless to say, I was skeptical. Perhaps equally needless to say, I turned out to be right. Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not saying I’m always right or that the world’s finest Whisky couldn’t be Swedish, but Mackmyra is a very young distillery.
Mackmyra was registered as a business in 1999 by 8 civil engineers who had previously attended university together. With work now taking up a lot of their time, they found that they had not seen each other as often as they would’ve liked, and so they decided to go skiing together in the Swedish ski resort Sälen. Soon after arriving, they realized that they had all brought a bottle of whisky. This lead, as it would, to a whiskey tasting; which in turn lead to them wondering why there was no Swedish distillery, and deciding to start one themselves. A year later, they started Mackmyra.
After reading that, I was ever more skeptical of the whisky: how good could it be if made by 8 engineers with no prior experience? Nevertheless, I was intrigued and excited to try it out. My relative was even keener than I was to crack it open, so we sat down and had a drink within minutes of her arrival. As I mentioned before, The First Edition is a very light golden, the nose carries notes of seductive malt and with it a hint of smoke, honey, vanilla, pear and marzipan. The palate is indeed very similar to the nose and quite fruity. While it wasn’t the best I’ve ever had, it did surpass my expectations.
Eye: Light golden.
Nose: Malty, light smoke, vanilla, marzipan and pear.
Palate: Full flavored and well balanced; lightly smoked malt, fruity (pear, dried apricots), honey, vanilla and once again, marzipan.
Considering its history and the fact that this is their first edition, they’ve done really well. I would definitely drink it again, and if you have the money for it and are the type of person to appreciate the novelty value, I’d say buy it. On the downside, it’s pricey and the competition within its price bracket is fierce – if you’re going for optimum quality for money, you’d be better off looking elsewhere for now.
Oh! And I almost forgot, you can add a bit of water to this with good conscience!
Want to buy this whisky? Available in: UK & World (click)
