Grove Koger

When Maggie and I visited the large peninsula of Istria in the northern Adriatic in 2013, we discovered a different side of Croatia, one milder in climate than the balmy south and subtly different in landscape. We headed down the peninsula by bus from the workaday port of Rijeka, through kilometers and kilometers of deciduous forests and sprawling fields of pumpkins (the source of pumpkin seed oil), to the port of Pula and then by taxi to the little Italianate fishing village of Fažana. And it was there that we made the acquaintance of biska, an alcoholic beverage flavored with mistletoe. (Check the map below, reproduced courtesy of Markus Bernet and Wikimedia Commons, for the locations.)

If you think that sounds like an odd concoction, you’re not alone. After all, mistletoe berries are toxic, aren’t they? After checking, however, I discovered that they’re only mildly so. Nevertheless, we were hesitant, but, relying on the sound judgement of James Branch Cabell’s fantasy character Jurgen, who “was willing to taste any drink once,” we bought two little bottles, opened one, and … tasted it.

I’ve learned since that the basis for biska is pomace brandy, which is distilled from the skins and seeds remaining after the grapes have been pressed for wine-making. The distillate is then infused, not with the berries, but with the macerated leaves and twigs of mistletoe. It’s high in alcohol (up to 92 proof!) and mildly bitter.

Apparently the tiny settlement of Hum (pop. 52 in 2021) in northern Istria is regarded as the center of biska production. Foodlore has it that a local priest named Josip Vidov recorded the (or perhaps a) recipe for biska, and the town’s distillers have been making it, and a variety of other flavored spirits, ever since. There’s an annual festival in which the distillers promote their products, and I’m pretty sure that a good time is had by all.

There’s some confusion over whether the mistletoe involved in biska is white (Viscum album, seen above in a photo reproduced courtesy of Andrew Dunn / Wikimedia Commons) or yellow (Loranthus europeus). A study by Karla Hanousek Čiča (Food Technology and Biotechnology, Zagreb, Croatia) et al. specifies white, as does the northern Istrian firm of Rossi, which produces and bottles a version of biska. However, another Istrian distillery, Martesí, utilizes yellow.

In any case, we were looking forward to tasting our other bottle of biska when we got home, but it broke along the way, and that was that. But I’ve wondered … What would Jurgen have done then?

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