Ven sits in the middle of the Öresund strait, a flat patch of land with slopes falling to the water and some of the best farmland in Sweden. A couple of hundred people live there. There is also a distillery that calls itself the smallest pot still distillery in the world, and which grows its grain within sight of the still.
Expert description
Spirit of Hven Swedish Organic Vodka is a Swedish Organic Vodka made from certified organic grain, rested in oak casks, redistilled and bottled at 40%.
The unusual part is in that sentence. The vodka is not bottled straight off the still but first spends between six and twenty-four months in oak casks. It is then distilled again, and it is that second pass which removes the colour while the texture and part of the cask character stay behind. The result is a vodka that is crystal clear in the glass but behaves fuller than its colour suggests.
The distillery was founded in 2008 by Henric and Anja Molin, and Henric Molin still runs the distillation. The house keeps both a laboratory and its own hotel, and the technical level is high: distillation is deliberately run below the 96.5% a column can reach, because those final percentage points are exactly where the aroma compounds live.
The grain is certified organic and sourced as locally as possible. The island soil shifts from mineral rich clay in the north to sand in the south, and the microclimate that comes from lying between two coasts is part of the explanation for how somewhere this small can ship spirits to more than 40 countries.
Tasting notes
Nose
Soft and lightly sweet. Vanilla first, clearly from the cask, then a pale grain note and a suggestion of dried hay.
Palate
Full and round without being heavy. The vanilla continues, the grain gives a mild sweetness, and a lightly spiced warmth sits underneath.
Finish
Medium length and dry. The vanilla lingers longest and the close is soft rather than sharp.
Specifications
Name: Spirit of Hven Swedish Organic Vodka
Distillery: Spirit of Hven
Region/Country: Ven, Skåne, Sweden
Type: Swedish Organic Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 50 CL
Distillation method: Pot distilled, rested in oak casks and then redistilled
EAN no.: 7350044859021
Serving suggestion: Cool and neat in a small glass with shellfish, or in a Martini where the vanilla gets room.
Flavour profile
Vanilla · Soft · Full · Lightly spiced
Did you know?
Ven is the island where Tycho Brahe built his observatory Uraniborg in the sixteenth century and mapped the night sky with the naked eye. The distillery has folded his legacy into its naming: the house Single Malt Whisky is called Tycho's Star, after the new star he observed and described.
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