When you unveil Prairie Golf's VE-7101 from its windmill-adorned head cover, you will immediately recognize it as a putter built on the principle of quality. That, of course, is no accident.

     The Prairie Golf VE-7101, like all of Prairie Golf's putters, is CNC milled to an accuracy level of .0003. CNC what? CNC (Computer Numerically Controlled) milling is a process of manufacturing putters that has become extremely popular in recent years. In short, it consists of taking a computer-rendered model of a putter, translating that model into a series of paths for the mill to follow, and then "carving" the entire putter from a single block of material. This process allows manufacturers to produce a series of putters with the same look and feel. What's more, the process of CNC milling, plain and simple, results in a flatter and more consistent putter face. Those of you familiar with Titleist's highly respected Scotty Cameron Series will understand the qualities of a "milled" putter.

     CNC milling, however, like all methods of production, is not without its peculiarities. Because the milling process requires the use of a soft, impressionable material, milled putters, consequently, will have a softer feel than putters fashioned from such traditional production methods as investment casting. As for Prairie Golf, their putters are milled from a solid block of carbon steel aircraft aluminum. The result is a well-balanced putter with exceptionally soft feel and a flat, consistent face.

     These qualities, needless to say, come in handy on the putting green, and the VE-7101 was no exception. In several rounds on several courses of varying quality, the VE-7101 kept me well within my putting average and occasionally below. I did, however, notice that the VE-7101 tended to perform slightly better on more consistent putting surfaces. Nonetheless, "slightly" is the key term here. On the whole, this putter was steady and reliable, and the same cannot be said of all putters. Some putters perform extremely well on highly manicured greens and very poorly on the neglected greens of a public course, and vice versa.

     I was also impressed with the amount of feedback offered from a putter with such a "soft" feel. Regardless of where I made contact with the ball, I was well aware of when I made it. Mistakes were correctable and good putts were repeatable, an obvious advantage of the soft, flat, diamond-milled face of the VE-7101 putter.

     If there's one complaint I have about this particular model, it's the offset. Because of the large degree of offset, I found that I had to align my hands forward to keep the putter on a straight line. Granted, it simply took some experimentation to figure out, but if your hand position is not normally forward, then you may want to take a look at some of Prairie Golf's other, less offset models.

     Minor concerns aside, Prairie Golf's VE-7101 is an attractive, reliable, and quality-made putter, well worth a test drive.