Sweden · Other producers

Åre Bryggcompagni

Craft brewery and fruit wine producer from the mountains of Jämtland, making sparkling and still berry wines from Nordic fruits including strawberry, rhubarb, raspberry, and blackcurrant.

The producer

Åre Bryggcompagni opened in 2013 in the mountain resort district of Jämtland, central Sweden, founded by Anders Abrahamsson and Daniel Flink, with Calle Nygren joining later as a third owner. The operation is based in Huså, at Järpen, in a region better known for ski slopes than fermented drinks of any kind. The brewery built its reputation on craft beer, particularly a range of wild-fermented ales aged at a second facility opened around 2019, but the bottles listed at Systembolaget under the wine category are not beers. They are fruit wines: sparkling and still drinks fermented from Nordic berries and garden fruits, from a brewery that applied the same fermentation logic to a different raw material.

Three bottlings sit at Systembolaget. Trädgårdsvin is a sparkling wine fermented from strawberries, rhubarb, and red currants: fruity, pearling, and fresh, with slight sweetness and a citrus-edged finish. Hallonsnår is sparkling too, made from raspberries and red currants, with a darker berry character and the same bright acidity underneath. Anrik Bärvin is still and oak-touched, drawing on a wider berry range including blueberry, blackcurrant, lingonberry, raspberry, and almond and herb notes in the background. None contain grapes. All three are sold at Systembolaget and at local Åre restaurants.

Known for

Nordic fruit wine from Jämtland; sparkling berry wines fermented from strawberry, rhubarb, raspberry, and red currant.

Notable facts

The story

From wild ale to garden wine

Anders Abrahamsson and Daniel Flink opened Åre Bryggcompagni in 2013 with craft beer as the entire plan. They built a range of IPAs, lagers, and farmhouse ales, then spent years developing spontaneously fermented wild ales that needed a second facility in Huså to age properly. Around 2019, that second site opened. Somewhere in the same period, the brewery added fruit wines to what it made: sparkling drinks fermented from strawberries, rhubarb, and garden berries, labelled as wine and submitted to Systembolaget for listing alongside grape wines from Burgundy and Alsace. No announcement, no rebranding. The same fermentation logic the brewery had applied to barley and wild yeast it now applied to red currants and rhubarb, and Systembolaget listed the results in the wine section. Trädgårdsvin went onto the same shelf as Riesling and Pinot Noir, and the brewery that started making mountain IPAs in Jämtland became, without apparent fanfare, a wine producer.

From the atlas

Åre Bryggcompagni

At A Glance

Producer: Åre Bryggcompagni Country: Sweden Region: Jämtlands Län Village: Huså (Järpen), Jämtland Type: Craft brewery and fruit wine producer Fruit wines: Sparkling and still, fermented from Nordic berries Distribution: Systembolaget; Åre restaurants

The Producer

Åre Bryggcompagni opened in 2013 in the mountain resort district of Jämtland, central Sweden, founded by Anders Abrahamsson and Daniel Flink, with Calle Nygren joining later as a third owner. The operation is based in Huså, at Järpen, in a region better known for ski slopes than for fermented drinks of any kind. The brewery built its reputation on craft beer, particularly a range of wild-fermented ales aged at a second facility opened around 2019, but the bottles now listed at Systembolaget under the wine category are not beers. They are fruit wines: sparkling and still drinks fermented from Nordic berries and garden fruits, made by a brewery that decided the same fermentation logic applied to a different kind of raw material.

The range is small and specific. Three confirmed bottlings sit at Systembolaget: Trädgårdsvin, a sparkling strawberry, rhubarb and red currant wine; Hallonsnår, a sparkling raspberry and red currant wine; and Anrik Bärvin, a still, oak-touched multi-berry wine. None contain grapes. The category they occupy is unusual in a Swedish retail context: fruit wines listed alongside grape wines in the state monopoly, from a producer that describes its wider philosophy as making balanced drinks suited to the dinner table.

Place

Jämtlands Län is a large, sparsely populated county in the mountains of central Sweden, best known internationally for the Åre ski resort. The landscape is Nordic highland: short summers, birch and pine forest, wild berry terrain. No grape viticulture operates here. What grows are the berry crops that characterise northern Scandinavian food culture: wild raspberries, lingonberries, blueberries, and blackcurrants alongside cultivated strawberries, red currants, and rhubarb. These are the raw materials Åre Bryggcompagni works with.

The brewery describes itself as having roots in the Jämtland mountain world, and the fruit wine range reflects that geography directly: garden and wild berries from a short growing season, with the acidity and brightness that cooler climates produce in fruit. The Systembolaget listings carry the Åre kommun designation, placing the wines firmly within the local mountain district.

Soil And Site

No vineyard data applies here. Berry sourcing, whether grown on site, foraged locally, or purchased from regional growers, is not confirmed in available sources. The physical setting is Nordic highland terrain, with thin soils and a short frost-free season that concentrates flavour in summer berries. The acidity in the fruit wines, particularly in the sparkling styles, reflects the cooler northern growing conditions of Jämtland.

Story

Anders Abrahamsson and Daniel Flink founded Åre Bryggcompagni in 2013 as a craft brewery with a clear mountain focus. The early range was built around classic beer styles interpreted through modern craft brewing: IPAs, pale ales, pilsners, lagers, and farmhouse-style grisettes. Over the following years, the brewery developed what it calls the Northern Wild Ales series, spontaneously fermented beers aged through extended contact with wild yeast and bacteria. Around 2019, a second facility opened in Huså specifically to house this slow, complex production.

At some point in that expansion, fruit wines entered the portfolio. The decision is not documented in detail, but the outcome is clear: a brewery known for wild fermentation began applying fermentation to garden and Nordic wild berries, producing drinks labelled and sold as wine through Systembolaget. The brewery's stated philosophy, making balanced drinks suited as much to the dinner table as to the glass alone, carried across from beer to fruit wine without a visible break in direction. What changed was the raw material.

Vineyards And Cellar

No vineyards. The fruit wine range uses strawberries, rhubarb, red currants, raspberries, blueberries, blackcurrants, and lingonberries as fermentation ingredients. Fermentation method for the fruit wines is not confirmed in available sources. Anrik Bärvin, the still berry wine, shows clear oak character in the glass, suggesting at least some time in wood, though the vessel type and duration are not documented. The sparkling wines, Trädgårdsvin and Hallonsnår, are carbonated and served chilled, with a mousse that lifts the fruit character without weight.

The brewery's background in wild and spontaneous fermentation with the Northern Wild Ales series suggests familiarity with extended, slow fermentation processes, but whether this carries over to the fruit wine production is not confirmed. The cellar approach for the fruit wines remains an open question in the public record.

Wines

Three fruit wine bottlings are confirmed at Systembolaget.

Trädgårdsvin (Garden Wine) is a sparkling fruit wine made from strawberries, rhubarb, and red currants. It is the most detailed of the three in available sources: fruity, pearling, and fresh, with slight sweetness, a tidy strawberry character up front, and a crisp, bitter citrus note on the finish. Rhubarb and red currant provide a tartness that keeps the sweetness from reading as heavy.

Hallonsnår (Raspberry Thicket) is also sparkling, made from raspberries and red currants. The character is raspberry-forward and distinct, with subtle sweetness and a berry brightness that parallels Trädgårdsvin in style but moves to a darker, slightly sharper fruit register.

Anrik Bärvin (Heritage Berry Wine) is still rather than sparkling. It carries oak alongside a wide berry profile: raspberry, blueberry, blackcurrant, lingonberry, and almond and herb notes in the background. Of the three, it is the richest and most layered, though the oak presence separates it in style from the sparkling pair.

All three are sold through Systembolaget and at local Åre restaurants.

In The Glass

The sparkling wines are the clearest expression of what the mountain berry climate produces. Trädgårdsvin opens with ripe strawberry, direct and clean, with rhubarb pulling the sweetness sideways into a tartness that the red currant acidity sharpens. The mousse is gentle, the finish dry-edged and citrus-bright. It is a light wine, better chilled, and the bitterness on the finish prevents it from reading as a sweet fruit drink.

Hallonsnår sits in a similar frame but with darker fruit: the raspberry character is the dominant note, again with slight sweetness and the same red currant tartness underneath. Sparkling, fresh, best cold.

Anrik Bärvin is different in weight and tempo. The oak presence slows the palate down. The berry range is wider, with blueberry and blackcurrant alongside raspberry, and the lingonberry and herb notes add a Nordic bitterness at the back. Almond sits in the mid-palate. It drinks more like a structured still wine than a fruit drink, though it is built from the same Nordic raw material as the sparkling pair.

A Bottle To Understand It

Start with Trädgårdsvin. It is a sparkling fruit wine made from strawberries, rhubarb, and red currants, and it is the most direct argument for what Åre Bryggcompagni is doing with Nordic fruit. The strawberry character is clear and ripe, the rhubarb adds a tart backbone, and the red currant keeps the acidity alive through to a citrus-edged finish. Slight sweetness, gentle mousse, best served cold. It is not a grape wine and does not attempt to imitate one. It tastes like Jämtland in summer: bright, tart, and berry-forward, fermented until the fruit becomes something worth opening a bottle for.

Anecdote

Anders Abrahamsson and Daniel Flink opened Åre Bryggcompagni in 2013 with craft beer as the entire plan. They built a range of IPAs, lagers, and farmhouse ales, then spent years developing spontaneously fermented wild ales that needed a second facility in Huså to age properly. Around 2019, that second site opened. Somewhere in the same period, the brewery added fruit wines to what it made: sparkling drinks fermented from strawberries, rhubarb, and garden berries, labelled as wine and submitted to Systembolaget for listing alongside grape wines from Burgundy and Alsace. No announcement, no rebranding. The same fermentation logic the brewery had applied to barley and wild yeast it now applied to red currants and rhubarb, and Systembolaget listed the results in the wine section. Trädgårdsvin went onto the same shelf as Riesling and Pinot Noir, and the brewery that started making mountain IPAs in Jämtland became, without apparent fanfare, a wine producer.

Final Word

Åre Bryggcompagni sits in a category Swedish retail rarely has to define: a craft brewery whose Systembolaget presence is entirely in the wine section. The fruit wines are made from Nordic berries grown in a short-season mountain climate, fermented and bottled without any grape involvement, and sold as wine because Swedish law and the Systembolaget classification system accommodate fermented fruit drinks under that label. Whether a Systembolaget shopper finds them in a search for Jämtland producers or a traveller picks one up at an Åre restaurant, the wines offer something a grape wine cannot: the direct taste of a Nordic summer, with all the acidity and brightness that implies.

Sources

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