Can you say Viska #11, she said...

Thanks Femke!

 SHE SAID:  The best part of being me, from a whisky perspective, is my lack of fear.  There is no whisky to be left un-nosed!  I want a t-shirt that says "have whisky - will imbibe"  (I accept gifts if anyone wants to make me one like that, hehe).  Over the summer I took a great deal of time to relax, do some planning, read and it was all mostly related to whisky.  At one point I saw a tweet looking for people who might be interested in a mystery tasting.  So, I entered.  I practice blind nosing/tasting alot at home but never actually entered a competition before. My samples arrived, the date arrived and we did a mystery tweet competition hosted by none other then Femke (http://whiskygirl.nl/) The competition was alot of fun and she really forced us to consider every aspect of each whisky we were tasting.  The interesting part of Femke's master plan was that the whiskies followed a theme.  She has since done a second mystery twitter tasting and is now looking to do a third in January.  If you are interested please contact her!  You will really enjoy it and have your nose put through its paces, guaranteed!  So with my certificate of having survived the first one, I was getting brave and decided to enter a second one.  This time it was with Oliver Klimek (www.dramming.com), but not on twitter.  Samples arrived, had a deadline to imbibe and send results back to him.  5 whiskies, I guessed one remotely close:  The North American one (no surprise), the rest...  way off as far as country, close on the ABV's though.  The really exciting part of my mystery whisky adventures is getting to try something that I would probably never try before I die.  So for this next part of my two week whiskyfabric write-ups, I can thank Oliver for where we have arrived next: Czechoslovokia. Well, that was what it was called when this whisky was made. In 1993 the country split into Czech Republic and Slovokia, however the whisky in question was made before that.

The Pradlo Distillery located in the western part of Czechoslovakia decided they would take their kick at the can and create a single malt whisky.  They purchased and installed a traditional cast iron hammer mill, used Czech barley and 100% Czeck oak barrels.  In October of 1989 they laid down several barrels of the single malt whisky (coincidentally within weeks, the Berlin wall fell and the collapse of the Soviet Dominion over Eastern Europe began). The barrels lay sleeping while the world changed around us, for 20 years.  Bottled in 2009 and named Hammer Head (after the mill), it was available to the European market but in small amounts.  How Oliver got a bottle is beyond me but he snuck into our blind tasting.  I rated it 3rd out of the 5 whiskies we had to guess.  I was way off with what I thought it was:  An Auchentoshan?!

HAMMER HEAD, CZECHOSLOVAKIAN SINGLE MALT, 20 YEARS OLD, 40.7% ABV

Color:  Dark gold.  Almost has a slight orange tint to it.  Legs plentiful, but not very thin.  Fairly a slow moving and viscous whisky.

Nose:  Very aromatic, I noted rum raisin ice cream, vanilla, lemon mousse. Really light scents.  With water (bad idea), it went to honey, but not much more.

Palate:  Muted compared to nose.  Although I did taste sweet toffee.  Hints of spice but fairly noticeable - nutmeg, or a bit of dried cinnamon.  With water, hints of a grapefruit pith.  Became a bit sour in nature as far as flavors.

Finish:  Short to medium, wicked aftertaste that stayed with me for quite some time (kinda like burnt plastic!?) A bit of spice, like a white pepper.

Empty glass:  Lemon sour candies


Oddly enough this whisky really surprised me when I found out where it was from, for two reasons.  A) I didn't even know whisky was made in that country and B) I could have swore this whisky was about 3-10 years old.  Goes to show???  I doubt I'll ever have the opportunity to own this let alone try it again.  BUT I have to say the one thing I really loved about this is that it inspired me to try whiskies no matter where they are from.  It's a different type of whisky and I can't help but want to ask someone a million questions with regards to the chemistry, barley, oak, colder climate, etc..

So, if you have this whisky, good for you.  If you get offered this whisky, accept it graciously.  If you see it on a bar shelf, TRY it.   Get my drift?   Try it, at least once.  And, if you think of me, even better.

Tonight, long flight to India.  I'm going to be a pooped Lassie, but a happy one.   Cheers all!




On trail, gallabading across Europe at break neck speeds!

Whisky Lassie