A bottle from the days when the Soviet Union sent vodka westwards under names that have since been forgotten again. The glass is heavier than anything made today, the label printed in a different kind of colour, and the contents have sat untouched for roughly half a century.
Please note: Scratches and marks may be present on the bottle, see the photograph. The bottle is sold as a collector's item and the quality of the contents cannot be guaranteed.
Expert description
Boaka Vintage Vodka is a Russian Vodka bottled in the 1970s at 45%.
Boaka belongs to that crowd of vodka brands built up around export from the Soviet Union and later vanished so thoroughly that almost no written trace remains. The brand is no longer produced, and these days the bottles turn up at auction more readily than production records turn up in any archive.
The 45% is worth noticing. Classic Russian vodka lands at 40%, and the higher strengths were typically reserved for bottlings destined abroad, where duty rules and market expectations both worked differently. The result is a more compact vodka than the version the brand sold at home.
Vodka does not develop in the bottle the way whisky develops in a cask. With no wood there is nothing to draw colour or tannin from, so what you are holding is essentially the spirit that went in some five decades ago. What can change is the closure, which may have let a little air in over the years, so the fill level may have dropped slightly.
Tasting notes
Nose
Dry and grainy with the faint muskiness that old glass and old paper give off. The strength announces itself more plainly than you are used to from a modern bottling.
Palate
Powerful and more angular than today's vodkas. The grain stands out dry, and the extra degrees lay down a warmth that settles in the middle of the tongue.
Finish
Long and warm with a dry, mineral trail. There is no sweetness to rest on at the end.
Specifications
Name: Boaka Vintage Vodka
Producer: Boaka
Region/Country: Russia
Type: Russian Vodka
ABV: 45%
Size: 75 CL
Bottled: 1970s
Flavour profile
Dry · Powerful · Grainy · Vintage character
Investment potential
Medium. Soviet bottlings from the 1970s grow scarcer with every year that passes, and Boaka is no longer produced, so no new bottles will ever join the pool. The age is genuine, and the combination of 75 CL at 45% is not a bottling you come across today. Condition pulls the other way: scratches and marks on the glass count heavily with collectors, and no original box comes with it. That is why the assessment lands at Medium rather than higher.
Did you know?
All Soviet spirits export ran through a single state body, Soyuzplodoimport, established in 1966. That is part of the reason bottles from the period so often carry Latin lettering and text aimed at foreign buyers, even though production took place behind the Iron Curtain.
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