If Kaski is Teerenpeli's Christmas kitchen, Savu is its sauna. The word means simply 'smoke' in Finnish, and this is the Lahti distillery's peated expression — a whisky that draws directly on the country's profound cultural relationship with wood smoke, birch logs and the hiss of steam on hot stones.
Savu is made from malted barley dried over peat, though the peating level is gentler than Islay benchmarks, giving a smoke that is aromatic and herbaceous rather than tarry. It is matured in bourbon and sherry casks and bottled at 43% ABV, non-age-statement, preserving the delicate interplay between Finnish barley character and the smoke's woodland edge.
Teerenpeli has been in business since 2002, part of a broader hospitality group that runs restaurants and brewpubs across Finland. The distillery uses copper pot stills, Finnish spring water and locally malted grain, and Savu in particular feels tied to place in a way few peated whiskies outside Scotland manage. This isn't maritime smoke — it is forest smoke, inland, still, cold-edged.
Drink it late in the evening, ideally in a room where a candle has just been snuffed. The finish will chime quietly with the air. A lovely, thoughtful Finnish peated malt that feels less like a statement and more like a memory of somewhere cold and pine-scented.
