A bottle shaped like a gold ingot, stamped 999.9 and filled with coconut. Subtle it is not. Behind the gold sits a wheat spirit from Schiedam, the old Dutch distilling town where grain has been run through stills since the 1600s.

Expert description

3 Kilos Vodka Coco Gold is a coconut spirit drink built on Dutch Vodka from Schiedam and bottled at 30%.

The base is the house 3 Kilos Vodka Gold 999.9, made from selected European wheat. The grain travels to Schiedam in South Holland, where it is fermented and distilled five times, and the spirit is then cut with water purified by reverse osmosis. Only after that does the coconut enter the picture.

Then there is the 30%. The European Union demands a minimum of 37.5% before anything may be called vodka, so Coco Gold is not a vodka in the legal sense but a spirit drink made from vodka. That is not an empty technicality. The lower strength makes it softer and rounder in the mouth, and it is built to be mixed rather than knocked back.

The coconut is obvious but never suntan lotion. It leans towards fresh coconut flesh rather than confectionery, and the wheat base still sits underneath, keeping the whole thing from turning sticky.

Tasting notes

Nose

Fresh coconut flesh first, then vanilla and a light floral note. The alcohol almost hides itself.

Palate

Velvety and soft. Coconut fills the middle with a creamy sweetness, and a mild wheat character sits below it.

Finish

Short and sweet. The coconut hangs around for a moment before everything dries out calmly.

Specifications

Name: 3 Kilos Vodka Coco Gold
Producer: 3 Kilos Vodka
Region/Country: Schiedam, Holland
Type: Coconut Spirit Drink based on Dutch Vodka
ABV: 30%
Size: 75 CL
Distillation method: Five times distilled wheat spirit, cut with water purified by reverse osmosis
Serving suggestion: Ice cold in a Pina Colada, or with pineapple juice and a squeeze of lime over plenty of ice.

Flavour profile

Coconut · Creamy sweet · Soft · Tropical

Did you know?

Schiedam has the tallest windmills in the world. They were built absurdly high because the town distilleries stood so close together that the sails had to clear the rooftops to catch enough wind to grind the malt.

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The 42nd parallel south cuts straight through New Zealand. You cannot get much further from everything else in the inhabited world, and that is exactly the point the whole bottle rests on: clean water, clean air, no neighbours to worry about.

Expert description

42 Below Vodka is a New Zealand Vodka made from wheat and bottled at 40%.

The story starts in 1999 in a garage in Wellington. Geoff Ross had a thought that a country as clean as New Zealand ought to be able to make one of the purest vodkas in the world, and set about it on his own. First he sold to friends, then to bars, and eventually the whole country wanted the bottle. Today it sits on shelves across most of the globe.

The name points at the latitude, and the water is part of the argument: it is drawn from an aquifer beneath old volcanic rock. The wheat is New Zealand grown, and the spirit is cleaned so far that the grain is barely sensed. That makes it one of the most obliging bases behind a bar — it settles underneath the other ingredients instead of fighting them.

Tasting notes

Nose

Clean and cool with a faint citrus trace. The grain sits well back and makes no fuss.

Palate

Soft and almost oily in texture. A mild sweetness from the wheat, with no sharp alcoholic edge.

Finish

Fresh and full in the mouth, but short. A clean, lightly mineral impression is what stays.

Specifications

Name: 42 Below Vodka
Producer: 42 Below
Region/Country: New Zealand
Type: New Zealand Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 70 CL
Serving suggestion: Neat, on the rocks or in a cocktail where the base should keep a low profile.

Flavour profile

Clean · Soft · Lightly grain sweet · Fresh

Did you know?

Less than ten years after the first bottle was filled in a Wellington garage, Bacardi bought the whole brand. Geoff Ross and Justine Troy later wrote a book about the trip from homemade to world market.

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A distillery in Skåne, a copper column built in 1921, and a team of people who still run it by hand. Temperature and flow rate are not set by a computer here. They are adjusted lever by lever, exactly as the generation before did it.

Expert description

Absolut Elyx is a Swedish Vodka distilled from single estate winter wheat in a 1921 copper still and bottled at 42.3%.

The column is called Column 51 and is built entirely from copper. It is operated manually by a small handful of people, led by Krister Asplund, and every handle, valve and level is set by hand. The copper is not merely construction material. It acts as a catalyst, capturing the heavier compounds in the spirit as it travels, and that accounts for much of the oily mouthfeel.

The wheat comes from a single estate, Råbelöf in southern Sweden, where wheat has been grown since the 1400s. Dry cold winters and long warm summers suit winter wheat, and the grain carries the starch balance the distillery is looking for. The water is drawn from a local aquifer.

Tasting notes

Nose

Clean and rich. Freshly baked bread and white chocolate sit on top, with a soft layer of cereal and mellow spice underneath.

Palate

Macadamia nuts and creamed cereal spread out, followed by white chocolate and buttery bread notes. The texture is thick without being cloying.

Finish

Rounded and mildly spiced with a fresh nuttiness. It lingers a long time and closes quietly.

Specifications

Name: Absolut Elyx
Distillery: Absolut Elyx
Region/Country: Åhus, Sweden
Type: Swedish Vodka
ABV: 42.3%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Manually operated 1921 copper column
Serving suggestion: Over a single large ice cube, or in a Martini with a whisper of dry vermouth.

Flavour profile

Silky · Nutty · Bready · Mildly spiced

Did you know?

The copper inside Column 51 is consumed. Thousands of small copper packets sit within the column and are sacrificed as they pull unwanted compounds out of the spirit. They have to be replaced at intervals, because the metal itself is slowly eaten away by the process.

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The fields around Råbelöf have been there since the 1400s. Winter wheat is sown in autumn, sits out the cold in Skåne soil and is harvested the following year — and the whole journey from that grain to this bottle covers less than a dozen kilometres as the crow flies.

Please note: The image is a model photo.

Expert description

Absolut Elyx Single Estate is a Swedish Vodka made from winter wheat grown on one estate, distilled in copper and bottled at 42.3% in a 175 cl bottle.

The large format is aimed at the bar and at the evenings where more than one round gets poured. The contents match the standard bottle: wheat from Råbelöf in Skåne, manual distillation in the 1921 copper column the house calls Column 51, and a bottling strength a couple of points above what a vodka usually carries.

The copper does the work. The metal reacts with the spirit along the way and strips out the compounds that would otherwise leave sharpness, and what remains has a texture closer to cream than to water. That is exactly why it performs in drinks with nowhere to hide — a Martini, a Vesper, Elyx over ice.

Tasting notes

Nose

Soft cereal and fresh bread, with white chocolate and a layer of mellow spice behind.

Palate

Rich and juicy. Macadamia first, then creamed cereal and a buttery sweetness that never tips into sugar.

Finish

Long and rounded. The nutty note holds while the spice falls away slowly.

Specifications

Name: Absolut Elyx Single Estate
Distillery: Absolut Elyx
Region/Country: Åhus, Sweden
Type: Swedish Vodka
ABV: 42.3%
Size: 175 CL
Distillation method: Manually operated 1921 copper column
Serving suggestion: Pour it over one large ice cube, or build a Vesper where the texture carries the drink.

Flavour profile

Rich · Creamy · Nutty · Dry finish

Did you know?

Everything happens within fifteen miles. From the moment the wheat is sown at Råbelöf until the finished vodka stands in the bottle, Absolut Elyx keeps the entire chain inside a radius of roughly twenty-four kilometres around the distillery. Grain, water, distillation and bottling all sit in the same corner of Skåne.

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The most recognisable bottle in the spirits world, shrunk to something that fits a coat pocket. The same curved shoulder, the same clear glass, the same lettering printed straight onto the bottle. Simply in pocket format.

Expert description

Absolut is a Swedish Vodka made from winter wheat grown at Åhus and bottled at 40% in a 5 cl bottle.

Every single drop of Absolut comes from the same place. The wheat is grown around Åhus in southern Sweden, sown in autumn and harvested the following year, and the water is drawn from a deep local well. Distillation runs continuously rather than in batches, a method Lars Olsson Smith developed in the nineteenth century and which earned him the nickname Brännvinskungen, the vodka king.

He launched Absolut Rent Brännvin in 1879. A hundred years later, in 1979, the brand was relaunched internationally in the bottle we know today — drawn from an old Swedish apothecary flask, without a paper label and with the text printed directly into the glass. The miniature is that same bottle in small format.

Tasting notes

Nose

Clean and lightly bready. There is a fine grain character and otherwise very little to hold on to, which is the intention.

Palate

Soft and dry with a discreet grain sweetness. The alcohol registers as warmth rather than as sharpness.

Finish

Short and clean. It releases quickly and leaves no bitterness behind.

Specifications

Name: Absolut
Distillery: Absolut
Region/Country: Åhus, Sweden
Type: Swedish Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 5 CL
Distillation method: Continuous distillation
EAN no.: 7312040017508
Serving suggestion: Ice cold as a shot, or as the base of a single Vodka Tonic with lemon.

Flavour profile

Clean · Dry · Lightly grain sweet · Neutral

Did you know?

Lars Olsson Smith was known as Brännvinskungen, the vodka king. He took on the Stockholm spirits monopoly by selling his brännvin from Reimersholme, outside the city customs line, and ferried people out there so they could buy around the system. That business laid the foundation for Absolut.

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Passion fruit tastes of two things at once: enough acidity to wake the mouth up, and a sweetness that lands afterwards. It is a fruit that can carry a whole drink on its own — and here it sits on top of a vodka from the grain fields of Skåne.

Expert description

Absolut Passionfruit is a Swedish Vodka carrying natural passion fruit flavour, bottled at 38%.

The base is the same as everywhere else in the house: winter wheat from the land around Åhus and water from a deep well in the same place. The flavour comes from natural aromas, and no sugar is added. That detail matters, because sugar is what makes the fruit in many flavoured vodkas turn flat and syrupy after the first mouthful.

Alongside the passion fruit sits a stroke of orange blossom. That floral note is why the bottle lifts a tonic rather than merely colouring it, and it gives you something to build on in drinks with ginger or lime. All of it bottled at 38%, the strength Absolut uses across its flavoured range.

Tasting notes

Nose

Clear passion fruit with acidity at the edge, and behind it a floral note leaning towards orange blossom.

Palate

Fresh, juicy fruit fills the mouth. The sweetness is held back and the acidity keeps everything upright.

Finish

Lightly sweet and fruity, but short. It leaves cleanly without depositing anything sticky.

Specifications

Name: Absolut Passionfruit
Distillery: Absolut
Region/Country: Åhus, Sweden
Type: Swedish Vodka
ABV: 38%
Size: 70 CL
EAN no.: 7312040350339
Serving suggestion: In a Vodka Tonic with lime, or in a Mule where the ginger meets the fruit.

Flavour profile

Passion fruit · Tangy · Floral · Lightly sweet

Did you know?

Passion fruit does not grow in Sweden. Everything else in the bottle does: the wheat comes from the fields around Åhus and the water from a well in the same place. The fruit aroma is therefore the only ingredient that travelled any distance to get there.

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Vanilla is the kind of aroma people react to before they have thought about it. It sits in childhood baking, in the cream on a cake, in anything warm. Absolut put it into a clear bottle and left the rest as vodka.

Expert description

Absolut Vanilia is a Swedish Vodka carrying natural vanilla flavour, bottled at 38%.

The expression arrived in 2003 and rests on the same base as the rest of the house: winter wheat grown around Åhus in southern Sweden and water from a deep, protected well. Natural vanilla sits on top of that base. No sugar is added, which separates it from a number of other flavoured vodkas where the sweetness comes from syrup rather than from aroma.

The result is more robust than the name suggests. The vanilla is of the warm, creamy sort, and beneath it lie butterscotch and a stroke of dark chocolate. Because there is no sugar in the bottle it dries out towards the end instead of turning sticky — which is exactly why it works in drinks that already carry sweetness from liqueur or coffee.

Tasting notes

Nose

Warm bourbon vanilla with a breath of butterscotch. The aroma is clear without being perfumed.

Palate

Creamy vanilla fills the middle, followed by caramel and a suggestion of dark chocolate. There is enough body that it does not vanish in a mixed drink.

Finish

Drier than the opening promises. The chocolate hangs on while the sweetness pulls back.

Specifications

Name: Absolut Vanilia
Distillery: Absolut
Region/Country: Åhus, Sweden
Type: Swedish Vodka
ABV: 38%
Size: 70 CL
EAN no.: 7312040350100
Serving suggestion: In a Vanilla Espresso Martini, or over ice with a strip of orange peel.

Flavour profile

Vanilla · Butterscotch · Dark chocolate · Creamy

Did you know?

There is not a gram of added sugar in the bottle. The sweetness you experience is pure aroma — the brain reads the vanilla scent as sweetness even though there is nothing sweet to measure. It is also why the finish dries out instead of clinging.

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Beer has been brewed in Southwold on the English east coast since 1872. When the distillery arrived in 2010, nobody had to go looking for a wash to distil. It was already fermenting in the brewery next door.

Expert description

Adnams East Coast Vodka is an English Single Malt Vodka from Adnams Copper House Distillery in Southwold, distilled from 100% East Anglian malted barley and bottled at 40%.

Adnams is a brewery first and a distillery second, and that explains most of what this vodka is. The house makes its own wash from East Anglian malted barley, the same grain that goes into the beers, and distils it on in the Copper House Distillery. The grain is followed from local fields to the bottle, and that thinking runs through the whole spirits range.

Using malted barley rather than wheat or neutral molasses is a choice with consequences. Barley delivers an obvious malt sweetness that an ordinary vodka would have filtered away, which is why Adnams calls it a Single Malt Vodka. The character sits closer to a young malt spirit than to a Polish rye vodka.

In the glass that means body. The texture is soft and close to velvety, and there is a clear trace of caramel and toffee that is added nowhere but comes from the grain itself. It stands up to being drunk neat, and in a drink you can tell there is something behind the alcohol.

Tasting notes

Nose

Softly malty with the smell of freshly baked bread. A hint of caramel and cooked apple sits behind it.

Palate

Full and lightly sweet. The malt stands out clearly with caramel and toffee, and the texture is soft without turning fat.

Finish

Medium and warm. The malt sweetness hangs on, and a small dry grain note appears at the end.

Specifications

Name: Adnams East Coast Vodka
Distillery: Adnams Copper House Distillery
Region/Country: Southwold, England
Type: English Single Malt Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Distilled from the house's own wash of 100% East Anglian malted barley
EAN no.: 5016878600025
Serving suggestion: Neat in a small glass at cool temperature, or in an Espresso Martini where the malt sweetness carries the coffee.

Flavour profile

Malty · Full · Caramel and toffee · Soft texture

Did you know?

The same barley spirit is the foundation of the house's Copper House Dry Gin. Adnams calls it the botanical they do not talk about, because without the malt vodka underneath, the gin would not taste the way it does.

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In a field above Lunan Bay, chilli plants grow between the potato rows. They are picked, smoked and left to steep in vodka. Arbikie Chilli Vodka is the loudest bottle on the estate, and there is very little like it in Scotland.

Expert description

Arbikie Chilli Vodka is a Scottish Vodka from Arbikie Distillery, built on the house potato vodka and steeped with home-grown chipotle chillies, bottled at 43%.

Chipotle is smoke-dried jalapeño, and it is the smoke rather than the burn that carries this bottle. Arbikie grows the chillies on the farm in Angus and drops them in whole. No extracts, no colourings, no concentrates, which is why the liquid sits pale brown instead of clear.

The base is the same potato spirit the distillery began with. Potato distillate has a weight and a creaminess that grain does not deliver in the same way, and that texture is exactly why the chilli never turns sharp or dusty. The heat settles on top of the softness rather than cutting through it.

Flavoured vodka carries a mixed reputation, and syrup and flavouring compounds are usually to blame. Neither appears here. The chilli steeps until it has given up both smoke and heat, and the bottling strength of 43% gives the spice room to spread.

Tasting notes

Nose

Smoke first, like a bonfire on its way out. Behind it sits dried chilli, a touch of sweetness and something earthy close to baked potato skin.

Palate

Creamy and full at the start, almost soft. Then the chilli arrives: a deep, smoked warmth that builds rather than strikes. Clearly present without ever punishing.

Finish

Long and warm. The smoke hangs on longest while the spice slides slowly down the throat.

Specifications

Name: Arbikie Chilli Vodka
Distillery: Arbikie Distillery
Region/Country: Angus, Scotland
Type: Scottish Vodka
ABV: 43%
Size: 70 CL
Serving suggestion: In a Bloody Mary where the chilli replaces the tabasco, or ice cold as a shot alongside barbecue.

Flavour profile

Smoky · Spicy · Creamy · Earthy

Did you know?

Chipotle is not a chilli variety but a condition. It is a jalapeño left to ripen until it turns red and then dried over smoke, and that is precisely the treatment these chillies get before they meet the vodka.

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On some mornings you cannot see the North Sea from Arbikie, even though it sits right there. The cold coastal fog the Scots call haar rolls in across Lunan Bay and settles around the distillery like a sheet. This bottle is named after that fog.

Expert description

Arbikie Haar Wheat Vodka is a Scottish Vodka distilled from Zulu wheat grown on the Arbikie Distillery fields and bottled at 43%.

The wheat variety is called Zulu and grows in the fields known as Black Laws, a short walk from the distillery. That both the variety and the field can be named says something about the way the place works: the raw material is followed all the way through rather than bought in as finished neutral spirit.

Wheat gives a softer and sweeter distillate than barley, and Arbikie has chosen not to strip that character out. Vanilla and caramel sit in the glass as a result. Those are notes usually associated with cask maturation, but here they come from the grain and the distillation alone.

The distillery suggests it in an Espresso Martini, or with cloudy apple juice, soda and a squeeze of lime. Both play on the caramel sweetness sitting at the bottom of the bottle.

Tasting notes

Nose

Apple and caramel, clear and inviting. Behind them sit a thread of baked wheat and a faint floral note.

Palate

Creamy and round with vanilla up front. Caramel follows, and a light spice arrives last to keep the sweetness in check.

Finish

Medium and soft. Vanilla and caramel fade out while the spice stays behind.

Specifications

Name: Arbikie Haar Wheat Vodka
Distillery: Arbikie Distillery
Region/Country: Angus, Scotland
Type: Scottish Vodka
ABV: 43%
Size: 70 CL
EAN no.: 5060398440104
Serving suggestion: In an Espresso Martini, or with cloudy apple juice, soda and a squeeze of lime.

Flavour profile

Creamy · Vanilla · Caramel · Lightly spiced

Did you know?

Arbikie also makes whisky, but has decided to release it only at 14, 18 and 21 years old. Each bottling will carry both the vintage and the name of the field the barley grew in.

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A pea pulls nitrogen out of the air and leaves the soil better than it found it. That does not sound like something belonging in a vodka bottle. At Arbikie it is nonetheless the entire starting point.

Expert description

Arbikie Nadar Vodka is a Scottish Vodka distilled from peas grown at Arbikie Distillery and bottled at 43%.

Peas are legumes and fix their own nitrogen. They therefore need no synthetic fertiliser, and fertiliser is otherwise one of the heaviest entries in the ledger when grain becomes spirit. The sums end with each 70 cl bottle saving more than 1.53 kg CO2e beyond what it costs to produce.

Behind the bottle sits five years of doctoral research by distillery master distiller Kirsty Black in partnership with Abertay University. A gin came first, in 2020, and the vodka followed the year after as the first climate positive vodka in the world.

In flavour terms it is not neutral, and that is deliberate. The peas leave something green and floral that grain vodka never delivers, and 43% gives the spice room to open out.

Tasting notes

Nose

Fresh and floral with crushed white pepper behind it. A green, almost vegetal breath sits underneath the whole thing.

Palate

Intense and lively. The spice arrives early and broadly, yet the mouth fills at the same time with a creamy sensation that softens the edges.

Finish

Long and distinct. The pepper draws out while the floral note returns right at the end.

Specifications

Name: Arbikie Nadar Vodka
Distillery: Arbikie Distillery
Region/Country: Angus, Scotland
Type: Scottish Vodka
ABV: 43%
Size: 70 CL
EAN no.: 5060398440524
Serving suggestion: Neat and cool in a small glass, or in a Martini where the floral side has room.

Flavour profile

Floral · Spicy · Creamy · Green

Did you know?

The name comes from the Gaelic word for nature. Arbikie used it first on a gin in 2020, and that one is equally climate positive. The ledger for the gin bottle reads minus 1.54 kg CO2e.

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Before the potato fields above Lunan Bay turned into vodka, scarecrows stood in them. The Scots called them tattie bogles, and they kept watch over the rows for generations. The name has stayed with a bottle that still begins in the same place: down in the soil.

Expert description

Arbikie Tattie Bogle Potato Vodka is a Scottish Vodka distilled from three potato varieties grown on the Arbikie Distillery fields and bottled at 43%.

The varieties are Maris Piper, King Edward and Cultra, and they are lifted when the starch is at its best. Potatoes give a heavier, fatter distillate than grain, and that weight is what carries the whole flavour picture. This is vodka with a body, not one polished down to water.

Arbikie calls the method field to bottle. Growing, harvesting, fermenting, distilling, bottling and labelling all happen on the farm in Angus, so every bottle traces back to the field the crop stood in. That is rare in vodka, where most producers buy neutral spirit in from elsewhere.

The bottle was named UK Vodka of the Year at the World Drink Awards, and it shows itself best where texture matters. A Dry Martini with a dry vermouth is the place to start.

Tasting notes

Nose

Creamy and mild with black pepper at the edges. Behind it sits something faintly sweet and floury, like potatoes just off the boil.

Palate

Silky and full. Black pepper arrives halfway through, and underneath it lies a suggestion of pear and cooked grain. No sharp edges anywhere.

Finish

Soft and medium length. The pepper lingers while the weight slowly releases its grip.

Specifications

Name: Arbikie Tattie Bogle Potato Vodka
Distillery: Arbikie Distillery
Region/Country: Angus, Scotland
Type: Scottish Vodka
ABV: 43%
Size: 70 CL
EAN no.: 5060398440005
Serving suggestion: In a Dry Martini with a dry vermouth, or cold in a small glass where the texture has room.

Flavour profile

Creamy · Silky · Peppery · Full-bodied

Did you know?

The very first spirit to run off the Arbikie stills was this potato vodka. The distillery is built into an old cattle shed on the farm, and the vodka reached the market before both the gin and the whisky followed.

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A miniature is not a small disappointment. It is one serving, filled, labelled and sealed exactly like its bigger sibling, and it lets you form your own opinion without committing to a whole bottle.

Expert description

Beluga Noble is a Russian Vodka made from malt spirit at the Mariinsk Distillery in Siberia, bottled at 40% in a 5 cl miniature.

What is inside is identical to the full bottle. The malt spirit is blended with artesian water from deep Siberian wells, filtered through birch charcoal and given small amounts of honey, oat extract and milk thistle before the whole blend is left to rest for 30 days. Only then does it get bottled — in this format too.

5 cl amounts to roughly one proper serving, which suits the things a large bottle cannot do: a tasting with several brands lined up side by side, a single evening with nothing left over, or a place in luggage where space is short.

Because the vodka is soft and sweet rather than dry and sharp, it also works as a welcome glass before a dinner that turns salty later. The label and the little fish emblem are the same as on the 70 cl bottle, simply scaled down.

Tasting notes

Nose

Honey and pale grain, with a soft touch of vanilla and a cool mineral undercurrent.

Palate

Full and smooth. The malt fills the middle with mild sweetness, the oat turns the texture creamy, and then a dry herbal note reports in.

Finish

Clean and soft. It falls away calmly and leaves a faintly bitter herbal tail.

Specifications

Name: Beluga Noble
Distillery: Mariinsk Distillery
Region/Country: Mariinsk, Siberia, Russia
Type: Russian Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 5 CL
Distillation method: Column distilled malt spirit, filtered through birch charcoal
EAN no.: 4603928003373
Serving suggestion: Put the bottle in the freezer for an hour and pour it into one small glass, ideally with something salty.

Flavour profile

Soft · Honeyed · Creamy · Clean

Did you know?

Mariinsk sits some four thousand kilometres east of Moscow, right on the Trans-Siberian railway. The town is small enough to be missed on a map, yet it has had a working spirits plant since the beginning of the twentieth century.

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Four thousand kilometres east of Moscow lies a town on the Trans-Siberian railway where the winters are long and the water is drawn from far below the frost line. Spirits have been made there since 1900, and since 2002 some of it has been called Beluga.

Expert description

Beluga Noble is a Russian Vodka made from malt spirit at the Mariinsk Distillery in Siberia, bottled at 40%.

The base is malt spirit rather than the more common plain grain spirits, and that is part of the explanation for the rounder mouthfeel. The spirit is blended with artesian water from deep wells in the Siberian bedrock and then run through a tall column of birch charcoal, which catches the heaviest compounds.

Then comes the part the house hangs its name on. Small amounts of honey, oat extract and milk thistle extract are added, and the vodka is left to rest for 30 days before it goes into glass. The rest is not cask maturation but a stretch of time in which the components settle down and find one another.

The result is a vodka deliberately softer and sweeter than the classic dry Eastern European style. It is built to be drunk ice cold and neat alongside salty, rich food — caviar is the house recommendation, and it holds up.

Tasting notes

Nose

Pale honey and wet grain, with a touch of vanilla and something mineral underneath.

Palate

Round and almost oily. The malt gives mild sweetness, the oat lays down a creamy film, and only at the end does a dry, herbal edge arrive.

Finish

Soft and medium. The sweetness withdraws slowly and leaves a clean, faintly bitter herbal note.

Specifications

Name: Beluga Noble
Distillery: Mariinsk Distillery
Region/Country: Mariinsk, Siberia, Russia
Type: Russian Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Column distilled malt spirit, filtered through birch charcoal
EAN no.: 4603928000976
Serving suggestion: Ice cold in a frozen glass alongside caviar, or neat with smoked fish and pickled vegetables.

Flavour profile

Soft · Honeyed · Creamy · Clean

Did you know?

Beluga is the name of the beluga sturgeon, the largest freshwater fish in the world, which can live for more than a hundred years. It is also the fish the most sought-after caviar comes from — and therefore the fish stamped onto the label.

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Four thousand kilometres east of Moscow lies a town on the Trans-Siberian railway where the winters are long and the water is drawn from far below the frost line. Spirits have been made there since 1900, and since 2002 some of it has been called Beluga.

Expert description

Beluga Noble is a Russian Vodka made from malt spirit at the Mariinsk Distillery in Siberia, bottled at 40%.

The base is malt spirit rather than the more common plain grain spirits, and that is part of the explanation for the rounder mouthfeel. The spirit is blended with artesian water from deep wells in the Siberian bedrock and then run through a tall column of birch charcoal, which catches the heaviest compounds.

Then comes the part the house hangs its name on. Small amounts of honey, oat extract and milk thistle extract are added, and the vodka is left to rest for 30 days before it goes into glass. The rest is not cask maturation but a stretch of time in which the components settle down and find one another.

The result is a vodka deliberately softer and sweeter than the classic dry Eastern European style. It is built to be drunk ice cold and neat alongside salty, rich food — caviar is the house recommendation, and it holds up.

Tasting notes

Nose

Pale honey and wet grain, with a touch of vanilla and something mineral underneath.

Palate

Round and almost oily. The malt gives mild sweetness, the oat lays down a creamy film, and only at the end does a dry, herbal edge arrive.

Finish

Soft and medium. The sweetness withdraws slowly and leaves a clean, faintly bitter herbal note.

Specifications

Name: Beluga Noble
Distillery: Mariinsk Distillery
Region/Country: Mariinsk, Siberia, Russia
Type: Russian Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Column distilled malt spirit, filtered through birch charcoal
EAN no.: 4603928000976
Serving suggestion: Ice cold in a frozen glass alongside caviar, or neat with smoked fish and pickled vegetables.

Flavour profile

Soft · Honeyed · Creamy · Clean

Did you know?

Beluga is the name of the beluga sturgeon, the largest freshwater fish in the world, which can live for more than a hundred years. It is also the fish the most sought-after caviar comes from — and therefore the fish stamped onto the label.

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Every party has a moment when the bottle moves onto the table instead of staying in the kitchen. A 175 cl bottle of frosted glass with a lit palace on the side is built for precisely that moment.

Expert description

Belvedere Ultra Premium is a Polish Vodka made from Dankowskie rye, distilled four times and bottled at 40% in a 175 cl bottle.

The large format is aimed at the host. An extra litre and a half over the standard means you do not have to disappear into the kitchen for a fresh bottle halfway through a round, and every drink comes from the same bottle all evening. The weight is noticeable, but you can still hold it by the neck with one hand if you support the base.

The liquid is the regular house expression. The rye is Dankowskie from Polish fields, the water comes from artesian wells beneath Polmos Żyrardów, and distillation runs four times: once at an agricultural distillery and three times through column stills at the plant in Żyrardów. No additives, no sugar, no glycerol.

In company it is the rye that does the work. It gives the vodka enough body that a Moscow Mule or a Cosmopolitan does not simply taste of whatever was poured on top. When drinks are being built one after another, it helps to have a base you can still detect in glass number five.

Tasting notes

Nose

Dry grain aroma with baked bread and a little cream caramel. A cool mineral pull sits underneath.

Palate

Full and lightly oily. The rye arrives first as mild sweetness, then as a clear peppered warmth across the middle of the tongue.

Finish

Dry and spiced, with a touch of bitterness at the edge. It lets go slowly.

Specifications

Name: Belvedere Ultra Premium
Distillery: Polmos Żyrardów
Region/Country: Żyrardów, Poland
Type: Polish Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 175 CL
Distillation method: Four times distilled
EAN no.: 5901041003423
Serving suggestion: Cold in Moscow Mule mugs with ginger beer and lime, or in a large jug of Cosmopolitan.

Flavour profile

Full · Peppered · Bready · Dry

Did you know?

Belvedere carries the Polska Wódka designation. It is protected in the same way as Cognac and Champagne and demands that the grain is grown in Poland, that the entire production takes place in Poland, and that nothing but water is added. Only a handful of brands are allowed to use it.

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Behind a bar there are bottles you pour from and bottles you point at. Three litres of frosted glass with a palace printed down the side belongs to the second kind. It does not get put away when the evening ends.

Expert description

Belvedere Ultra Premium is a Polish Vodka made from Dankowskie rye, distilled four times and bottled at 40% in a 300 cl bottle.

At this size the bottle becomes furniture. The frosted surface catches light differently from clear glass, and the image of the Belweder Palace with its bare trees spreads across an area where the detail finally becomes properly legible. Put a light source behind it and the palace draws itself through the glass.

The vodka inside is the regular house expression. Dankowskie rye from Polish fields is run once at an agricultural distillery and then three times through column stills at Polmos Żyrardów, where it is blended with water from artesian wells on the grounds. There are no additives whatsoever, and as a Polish Vodka there may not be.

The rye character is the entire point behind a bar. Belvedere carries enough body to be felt through citrus, ginger and coffee alike, and because it has not been distilled down to plain neutrality, two drinks built on it do not simply resemble each other in different colours.

Tasting notes

Nose

Toasted bread and white pepper, with a touch of vanilla behind. The aroma is broad rather than sharp.

Palate

A soft start where the rye sits creamy in the middle, before a spiced warmth rises and stays put.

Finish

Long and dry. The pepper holds, and a nutty, almost floury impression turns up at the end.

Specifications

Name: Belvedere Ultra Premium
Distillery: Polmos Żyrardów
Region/Country: Żyrardów, Poland
Type: Polish Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 300 CL
Distillation method: Four times distilled
EAN no.: 5901041003164
Serving suggestion: Pour it slowly into an Espresso Martini, where the rye can hold its ground against the coffee.

Flavour profile

Spiced · Creamy · Toasted · Long

Did you know?

Belvedere sits within LVMH, the French luxury group that also owns Moët, Hennessy and Dom Pérignon. That is why a Polish rye vodka keeps company with champagne and cognac inside the same portfolio.

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West of Warsaw the Mazovian plain runs flat, and on it grows a rye Polish farmers have worked with for generations. Dankowskie is its name. It was not chosen because it yields the most, but because it yields the most flavour — and that is the whole starting point for Belvedere.

Expert description

Belvedere Ultra Premium is a Polish Vodka distilled four times from Dankowskie rye and bottled at 40%.

It is made at Polmos Żyrardów, a distillery that has been running since 1910 in the factory town of Żyrardów. The rye comes from Polish fields and the water is drawn from the distillery's own artesian wells. Neither sugar, glycerol nor flavouring is added, before or after distillation.

The four distillations are not four identical runs. The first pass happens at an agricultural distillery close to the fields, after which the spirit goes three times through column stills at Żyrardów. The craft lies in stopping before the rye has gone. Plenty of vodkas are distilled until nothing remains but alcohol and water; here the grain is allowed to stay.

That is why Belvedere tastes of something. There is a clear rye character, a creamy middle and a peppered edge that make it more interesting neat than most, and more stubborn in a drink where it refuses to simply disappear.

Tasting notes

Nose

Fresh rye bread crust and vanilla, with a lightly milky tone underneath. The alcohol is barely noticeable.

Palate

Creamy and full through the middle, where the rye brings a mild sweetness. Black pepper and a nutty pull follow.

Finish

Medium and dry. The pepper holds on for a while as the sweetness falls away.

Specifications

Name: Belvedere Ultra Premium
Distillery: Polmos Żyrardów
Region/Country: Żyrardów, Poland
Type: Polish Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Four times distilled
EAN no.: 5901041003003
Serving suggestion: In a Martini stirred rather than shaken, so the creamy texture holds. Or cool and neat alongside roe.

Flavour profile

Creamy · Rye spiced · Vanilla soft · Peppered

Did you know?

The building on the bottle is the Belweder Palace in Warsaw, from which the brand takes its name. The palace has housed Polish heads of state, and the image with its bare trees in front is printed so that it glows through when the bottle is held up to a lamp.

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Berlin keeps wild gardens between its apartment blocks. The elder bush by the railway line, the cornflower in a neglected courtyard, the wild rose climbing a firewall. Berliner Brandstifter collects exactly those flowers and puts them into a vodka.

Expert description

Berliner Brandstifter 2016 Vodka is a German Vodka from Berliner Brandstifter, distilled from French sugar beet, refined with Berlin flowers and bottled at 43.3%.

The house was founded in 2009 by Vincent Honrodt, whose great-grandfather ran a spirits business in Berlin in the early twentieth century. The name translates as arsonist, and it is meant as a joke: in old Berlin slang, an arsonist was also somebody who burned spirit.

The base is a distillate of selected French sugar beet, five times distilled and seven times filtered. That gives a rare mildness despite the 43.3%, and it leaves a faintly earthy sweetness that grain vodka simply does not have. On top come the flowers: wild rose, elderberry, blackcurrant, violet root and cornflower, all grown and hand-harvested at the Speisegut farm in Berlin.

The flowers macerate for several weeks and are then distilled individually before the distillates are blended into the base. Each batch rests for some weeks in a 700-litre tank so the aromas can settle, and is then bottled in runs of 999. Label and number go on by hand in Berlin.

Tasting notes

Nose

Floral and fresh. Elderflower arrives first, then blackcurrant leaf and a fine powdered touch of violet root.

Palate

Mild despite the strength. A faintly earthy sweetness from the sugar beet carries blackcurrant and rose petal, with a peppery glint at the end.

Finish

Medium and drying. The flowers withdraw slowly and leave a clean, lightly mineral impression.

Specifications

Name: Berliner Brandstifter Vodka
Producer: Berliner Brandstifter
Region/Country: Berlin, Germany
Type: German Vodka
ABV: 43.3%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Five times distilled from French sugar beet, seven times filtered, refined with Berlin flowers
Edition: 2016
EAN no.: 4260393531000
Serving suggestion: Neat and cool in a small glass, or as a vodka soda over ice where the flowers get some air.

Flavour profile

Floral · Mild · Blackcurrant · Lightly earthy sweetness

Did you know?

The bottle has won as much for how it looks as for what is in it. It took gold at both the German Design Award and the European Product Design Award in 2017, the same year the vodka itself collected a DLG Golden Award for product quality.

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Bimber is Polish slang for moonshine. It is not a random name for a distillery on an industrial estate in north west London. The founder's family has been distilling in Poland for generations, and the name is a nod to the kitchen table where it all started.

Expert description

Bimber London Vodka is an English Vodka from Bimber Distillery in Park Royal, distilled from wheat and barley and bottled at 40%.

Bimber opened in 2015 and is known above all for its Single Malt Whisky, which went from unknown to sought after in under five years. The distillery does almost everything itself: floor malting its own barley, fermenting slowly in wooden washbacks, distilling in direct fired copper pot stills and running its own cooperage. That is a way of working most Scottish distilleries abandoned on cost grounds long ago.

The vodka is made from wheat and barley and arrived so that bars could pour a house spirit with the same origin as the whisky. It has not been pushed so hard that all the grain is gone. A light citrus edge and a soft grain sweetness remain, which makes it more useful in a Vodka Martini than a fully stripped industrial vodka.

London has no long tradition in vodka, but the city has distilled gin for centuries, and that craft lineage is what Bimber leans on. The range today covers whisky, gin, vodka and a handful of cask aged curiosities, and volumes are still small enough that every batch gets tasted through.

Tasting notes

Nose

Clean and light with clear lemon peel on top. Beneath it sits a soft grain aroma, close to freshly milled flour.

Palate

Soft and rounded with a light sweetness from the wheat. The barley adds a little structure halfway through, and the citrus freshness holds.

Finish

Short to medium and clean. The citrus stays longest, and there is no sharp alcohol edge.

Specifications

Name: Bimber London Vodka
Distillery: Bimber Distillery
Region/Country: London, England
Type: English Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Distilled from wheat and barley
EAN no.: 5060444430561
Serving suggestion: Cool and neat, or in a Vodka Martini with lemon peel. Works well in a Vodka Soda with lime too.

Flavour profile

Citrus · Soft · Grainy · Clean

Did you know?

Bimber is one of very few distilleries in the United Kingdom that floor malts its own barley. It is a slow, space hungry method where the grain is turned by shovel on a floor rather than in a machine, and British spirits production largely gave it up during the twentieth century.

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Paris, 1814. Russian soldiers are sitting in the occupied city and are not allowed to drink in the taverns. They get a glass anyway, quickly and discreetly, while saying bystro — Russian for quick. That, if you believe the story, is where France got the name for its most beloved kind of eating house. This vodka believes it.

Expert description

Bistro Vodka is a French Vodka made from French wheat by Spiritique, bottled small batch at 40%.

The French have no long vodka tradition, but they do have centuries of experience in distilling finely. That is the tradition the house draws on here. The grain is high quality French wheat, the distillation is fine grained rather than brutal, and batches are kept small enough that tasting can happen along the way.

In the glass it is bright and pale, and the remarkable thing is that the alcohol does not burn. The attack is soft, the middle round and floral, and the close is long without turning bitter. This is a vodka built on finesse rather than force, and it lacks the sharp edge many people associate with the category.

Bistro has taken gold at the Bartender Spirits Awards, where the judges are bartenders rather than critics. That tells you where it belongs: behind the bar, as the base of a drink where it is not meant to shout over anything but to carry the whole thing. Spiritique also makes gin, whisky and liqueur, all in smaller batches in France.

Tasting notes

Nose

Soft and elegant. A fine wheat character with a floral tone and pale citrus peel over the top.

Palate

Round and light, with no burn on the attack. The wheat gives a mild sweetness, and a creamy, almost nutty texture sits underneath.

Finish

Long and dry without bitterness. The freshness holds longest and no sharp warmth arrives at the end.

Specifications

Name: Bistro Vodka
Producer: Spiritique
Region/Country: France
Type: French Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Small batch, distilled from French wheat
EAN no.: 3760290620025
Serving suggestion: Cool and neat in a small glass, or in a Vodka Martini with lemon peel.

Flavour profile

Soft · Floral · Creamy · Dry

Did you know?

The story about the Russian soldiers is a good one, but French linguists do not buy it. The word bistro first appears in print in the 1880s, some 70 years after the occupation of Paris, which points instead towards dialect words such as bistouille and bistingo. It is still printed on the bottle, because who wants to ruin a good story.

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At 69 degrees north the Lyngen Alps throw their shadow over a distillery that has grown used to working in the dark. In winter the northern lights stand above the roof for hours. Bivrost takes its name from that very bridge, the one that in Norse mythology connects the world of men with the world of the gods.

Expert description

Bivrost Norsk Arctic Vodka is a Norwegian Vodka from Aurora Spirit Distillery, distilled from Arctic barley and bottled at 40%.

Aurora Spirit Distillery sits in Lyngen in northern Norway, well above the Arctic Circle, and calls itself the world's northernmost distillery. The water comes from the glaciers of the Lyngen Alps: meltwater from ice that froze more than 5,000 years ago and has lain untouched in the mountain ever since. It is filtered, and otherwise handled as little as possible.

Distillation runs through the full column, 15 plates and a five metre tower, where the spirit is cleaned again and again before it is cut with the glacier water. The result is a vodka without sharp edges, but it has not been polished into nothing. A soft grain character from the barley remains, the kind most heavily distilled vodkas strip away completely.

Tasting notes

Nose

Clean and cool. A lightly sweet grain note, a suggestion of vanilla and something mineral, close to wet stone.

Palate

Soft and almost oily in the mouth. The barley shows up as a mild sweetness, followed by a touch of white pepper.

Finish

Short and clean. The sweetness drops away quickly and leaves a cool, mineral impression behind.

Specifications

Name: Bivrost Arctic Vodka
Distillery: Aurora Spirit Distillery
Region/Country: Lyngen, Arctic Norway
Type: Norwegian Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 50 CL
Distillation method: Column distilled
EAN no.: 709004060020
Serving suggestion: Ice cold from the freezer in a small glass, or in a Martini where the grain sweetness has room to show.

Flavour profile

Clean · Soft · Mineral · Lightly grain sweet

Did you know?

Bivrost is the rainbow bridge of Norse mythology, the road between the world of men and the world of the gods. The distillery's whisky range is called Nine Worlds after the nine realms of that same mythology, and every release is named after one of them.

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Tell someone you have vodka made from milk and you usually get a raised eyebrow. Five centilitres is exactly what it takes to end the argument — there is enough in the bottle for everyone round the table to check for themselves.

Expert description

Black Cow Pure Milk Vodka is an English Vodka from Black Cow in West Dorset, distilled from the whey of milk and bottled at 40% in a 5 cl miniature.

The content is the same as in the full bottle: whey from the farm's milk is fermented, distilled and bottled by hand in Dorset. Only the volume differs, and volume is precisely what makes the small format so useful when somebody needs convincing.

The miniature belongs in a tasting line-up of unusual raw materials. Set it against a vodka made from potatoes, one from grapes and one from grain, and the difference in mouthfeel becomes something you can point at rather than read about. The milk lays down a weight none of the others carry.

As a gift it is easy to give. Small enough for a gift bag or an advent calendar, and it comes with a story the recipient has not heard before. It also takes up no room in a suitcase if the bottle has to travel to someone at the other end of the country.

Tasting notes

Nose

Mild and lightly sweet, with a trace of condensed milk and a cool undertone.

Palate

Thick and velvety in the mouth. The sweetness is subdued, and there is no burn, only an even, round fullness.

Finish

Soft and short. It slips away without bitterness and leaves a faint dryness.

Specifications

Name: Black Cow Pure Milk Vodka
Producer: Black Cow
Region/Country: West Dorset, England
Type: English Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 5 CL
EAN no.: 5060323760086
Serving suggestion: Chill the bottle and pour it neat into two small glasses, or use it for a single Espresso Martini.

Flavour profile

Velvety · Mild · Round · Lightly sweet

Did you know?

The curds from the same milk become cheese. The farm makes both cheese and vodka out of every litre it brings in, which means there is effectively nothing left over once both are finished.

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On a farm in West Dorset the cows stand out on grass, the milk comes in, and the cheese gets made as it always has. What used to run down the drain afterwards now ends up in a bottle. That is the whole story behind Black Cow — and it is every bit as odd as it sounds.

Expert description

Black Cow Pure Milk Vodka is an English Vodka from Black Cow in West Dorset, distilled from whey off grass-grazed cows' milk and bottled at 40%.

The idea turned up in 2011 over a few drinks between two neighbours, one of whom, Jason Barber, is a fifth-generation dairy farmer. A year later the first bottle was ready, and Black Cow became the world's first vodka made purely from milk.

The method follows the dairy. Milk is separated into curds and whey; the curds go to cheese, while the whey — usually a leftover — is set to ferment with a yeast developed specifically to turn milk sugar into alcohol. The resulting "milk beer" is distilled into a neutral spirit, which is then blended by the house's own process, triple filtered and bottled by hand on the farm.

The raw material shows. Lactose ferments differently from the starch in grain or potatoes, and the trace compounds left after distillation pull towards something soft and lightly creamy rather than towards grain sweetness or peppery bite. This is not a vodka that tastes of milk, but nor is it a vodka that tastes like all the others.

Tasting notes

Nose

Soft and faintly sweet, with an impression of whipped cream and a small fresh citrus edge.

Palate

Full and smooth with a clear creaminess that settles like a film across the tongue. The sweetness is mild and carries no sharp edge.

Finish

Clean and soft, medium in length. The creaminess lets go slowly, and a light mineral dryness arrives at the close.

Specifications

Name: Black Cow Pure Milk Vodka
Producer: Black Cow
Region/Country: West Dorset, England
Type: English Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Distilled from fermented whey, triple filtered
EAN no.: 5060323760000
Serving suggestion: Neat and properly cold in a small glass, or as the base of an Espresso Martini where the creaminess has a part to play.

Flavour profile

Creamy · Soft · Mild · Round

Did you know?

The herd numbers around 250 cows grazing the fields around the distillery, and every single bottle is filled by hand on the farm itself. It is less than a mile from Jason Barber's dairy to the place where the vodka is made.

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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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Blue has always been the bartender shortcut to making a glass look like something. Here the colour comes from Andalusia, from a house that has otherwise spent more than a century on cask aged wine, and behind the blue hides passion fruit.

Expert description

Bodegas Cruz Conde VDKA Blue is a Spanish Vodka Liqueur with passion fruit from Montilla in Andalusia, bottled at 17%.

The spirit is made at the house distillery, Destilerias La Cordobesa, where copper stills from the first half of the twentieth century are still in service. It is the same place the family produces anis, pacharan, brandy, rum, gin and whisky, and the VDKA range is simply the most modern branch on a fairly old tree.

At 17% Blue falls outside the vodka category. The European Union draws the line at 37.5%, which is why the producer calls the range a spirit drink derived from vodka. That is a deliberate decision: a liqueur at this strength can carry a whole drink without making it strong, and it can be poured generously without taking command of the glass.

The passion fruit is the real difference. It brings a tart tropical edge that suits the loud blue far better than plain sweetness would. Mixed with citrus and ice it becomes the kind of drink people photograph before they drink it.

Tasting notes

Nose

Passion fruit and a hint of mango. Lemon peel and a light sugar sweetness sit behind them.

Palate

Sweet and tart at once, and lively with it. The tropical fruit fills the middle and the acidity cuts through before the sweetness can settle.

Finish

Short, fresh and slightly tart. The fruit lets go quickly and the mouth comes clean again.

Specifications

Name: Bodegas Cruz Conde VDKA Blue
Producer: Bodegas Cruz Conde
Region/Country: Montilla, Andalusia, Spain
Type: Spanish Vodka Liqueur with passion fruit
ABV: 17%
Size: 70 CL
EAN no.: 8413026817347
Serving suggestion: Over crushed ice with pineapple juice and lime, or topped with sparkling water in a tall glass.

Flavour profile

Passion fruit · Tropical · Sweet and tart · Cocktail friendly

Did you know?

The same distillery in Montilla also makes whisky and agave distillates. An Andalusian bodega that fills Pedro Ximenez into casks and runs agave through copper stills belongs among the rarities of Spain.

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In Montilla the bodega stands with whitewashed walls and cool half darkness, and behind them lie the casks of fino and Pedro Ximenez. Somewhere else in the same house they are filling bottles with red. Not wine, but vodka and red fruit, an Andalusian side road nobody saw coming.

Expert description

Bodegas Cruz Conde VDKA Red is a Spanish Vodka Liqueur with red fruits from Montilla in Andalusia, bottled at 17%.

Bodegas Cruz Conde was founded in 1902 by the army commandant Rafael Cruz Conde and sits in Montilla south of Cordoba. The house is known first of all for wines from D.O. Montilla-Moriles, but alongside the wine the family has spent decades building a broad spirits catalogue: brandy, vermouth, anis, rum, gin and, yes, vodka.

The 17% deserves a pause. The producer itself calls the VDKA range a spirit drink derived from vodka, and below 37.5% it cannot legally be sold as vodka in the European Union. In practice it is a vodka liqueur: sweetened, coloured and dialled down in strength so it can be mixed without shouting over the rest of the glass.

Red is the red fruit version. The colour is strong and almost neon in the glass, and the sweetness arrives with the first sip, but the fruit carries a light acidity that keeps it from reading as pure sugar. It was designed as a cocktail ingredient, and that is where it makes the most sense.

Tasting notes

Nose

Strawberry and raspberry, clear and straight up. Behind them sits a boiled sweet tone and a faint hint of cherry.

Palate

Sweet and light bodied. Red fruit fills the entire middle, while the alcohol registers only as a mild warmth right at the end.

Finish

Short and berry sweet. A touch of acidity turns up and clears the mouth faster than the sweetness suggests.

Specifications

Name: Bodegas Cruz Conde VDKA Red
Producer: Bodegas Cruz Conde
Region/Country: Montilla, Andalusia, Spain
Type: Spanish Vodka Liqueur with red fruits
ABV: 17%
Size: 70 CL
EAN no.: 8413026817354
Serving suggestion: Over ice cubes with lemon soda, or as the colour in a simple berry cocktail with lime.

Flavour profile

Red fruits · Sweet · Light · Cocktail friendly

Did you know?

The wines of Montilla-Moriles mature under a veil of yeast just as sherry does, but they are usually never fortified. The Pedro Ximenez grape turns so sugar rich in the Andalusian heat that the wine reaches the strength the flor needs entirely on its own.

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Very few bottles tell you what happened to the contents. This one has printed the process on the label: two filtrations, two materials and two entirely different ways of taking something away.

Expert description

Bols Charcoal & Copper Filtered is a Dutch Vodka from Lucas Bols, filtered through both copper and activated charcoal and bottled at 37.5%.

Copper is the oldest trick in the trade. The metal binds sulphur compounds that would otherwise give a spirit something close to struck match or boiled cabbage, which is why stills have been built in copper for centuries. Put copper to work after distillation as well, and the last of those compounds get one more chance to be caught.

Activated charcoal works differently. It removes nothing by chemical bonding but by trapping the larger molecules in the pores of the carbon, while ethanol and water pass through more or less unhindered. Fusel oils and heavy aroma compounds stay in the filter, and the spirit comes out lighter than it went in.

The balance is the whole craft. Filter too hard and the small grain character that makes a vodka worth tasting disappears too, leaving something clean with nothing at all to say. Here the level is set so the bottle turns dry and smooth rather than washed out, which makes it an efficient building block behind a bar.

Tasting notes

Nose

Almost silent. Cool and mineral, with only a faint suggestion of grain and a touch of fresh metal.

Palate

Dry and sharply cut. There is very little sweetness, the body is slim, and the profile runs straight without any bends from the first sip.

Finish

Very short. It lets go quickly and leaves a trace of pepper and no weight at all.

Specifications

Name: Bols Charcoal & Copper Filtered
Producer: Lucas Bols
Region/Country: Netherlands
Type: Dutch Vodka
ABV: 37.5%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Filtered through copper and activated charcoal
EAN no.: 5900471026200
Serving suggestion: Use it in a Vodka Tonic or a Bloody Mary, where the dry profile leaves room for everything else.

Flavour profile

Dry · Clean · Slim · Mineral

Did you know?

Activated charcoal has an absurdly large internal surface area. A single gram can amount to several hundred square metres, because the carbon is riddled with microscopic pores — and that area is exactly what the filtration lives off.

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Behind most bars in the world stands a row of bottles marked Bols. They are usually brightly coloured, sweet and full of liqueur. This one is the sober member of the family — the clear bottle that is not meant to taste of anything in particular, only to do its job.

Expert description

Bols Classic is a Dutch Vodka from Lucas Bols in Amsterdam, distilled four times from 100% grain and bottled at 37.5%.

Lucas Bols has been around since 1575 and ranks among the oldest spirits brands of all. The house grew large on genever and on a liqueur range that still fills shelves in bars worldwide, and all that experience in hitting the same flavour every single time sits behind the clear bottle too.

The vodka is made solely from grain and distilled four times. The aim is not to build character but to remove whatever gets in the way: fusel oils, harshness and the heavy notes that linger. What is left is a spirit mild enough to drink cold and neutral enough to vanish into a drink without fighting the other ingredients.

The 37.5% is no accident. It is the lower limit the EU allows for a spirit to be called vodka at all, and the lower strength makes the bottle friendlier in long drinks, where alcohol otherwise takes over quickly.

Tasting notes

Nose

Discreet and neutral. There is a trace of pale grain and a distant citrus note, but nothing steps clearly forward.

Palate

Soft and light in body, with a suggestion of sweetness midway. It is smooth rather than full and meets no resistance along the way.

Finish

Short and clean. It closes without heat and without bitterness.

Specifications

Name: Bols Classic
Producer: Lucas Bols
Region/Country: Amsterdam, Netherlands
Type: Dutch Vodka
ABV: 37.5%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Four times distilled from 100% grain
EAN no.: 8716000968906
Serving suggestion: Ice cold in a small glass, or as the base of a Screwdriver or Moscow Mule.

Flavour profile

Neutral · Soft · Light · Mild

Did you know?

Lucas Bols ran the house for more than 400 years before vodka joined the range. The clear bottle first went to market in 1989 — long after genever, kummel and half a hundred liqueurs had found their place.

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In Ellon, north of Aberdeen, stands a brewery that one day decided to build a distillery next door. Malt, yeast and beer were already in the building, so the question was never what they would distil. It was how far they could push it.

Expert description

BrewDog Rogue Wave is a Scottish Vodka made from Single Malt produced at the brewery itself, batch distilled and bottled at 40%.

The ingredient list is short and unusual: malted barley, malted wheat, ale, yeast and water. The vodka begins life as a fermentation closer to a beer than to an industrial grain mash, and that is the whole difference. Sugar, esters and malt are present from the start, and some of it survives the journey through distillation.

Serious money went into the equipment. Vapour passes through the world's first triple bubble copper pot still and then meets a 19 metre rectification column, with the process stretching across seven days. That sounds like a recipe for stripping out all character, but the counterweight is that the spirit is filtered only once. The distillery says it should keep its soul.

You can taste that in the glass. Rogue Wave is clean and crisp without being empty, and a streak of icing sugar and vanilla sits under the surface, which is the malt putting its head up. If you need a vodka that can carry an Espresso Martini without vanishing beneath the coffee, this is a sensible place to look.

Tasting notes

Nose

Crisp and clean with a sweet malt breath. Icing sugar and a trace of vanilla sit on top, with nothing sharp behind.

Palate

Soft attack with clear grain sweetness from the malt. Halfway through it turns dry and a light cereal tone appears, a reminder of where it started.

Finish

Clean and medium long. The sweetness drops away, leaving a dry malted tone and a little warmth.

Specifications

Name: BrewDog Rogue Wave
Distillery: BrewDog Distilling Company
Region/Country: Ellon, Scotland
Type: Scottish Vodka
ABV: 40%
Size: 70 CL
Distillation method: Batch distilled from Single Malt in a triple bubble copper pot still and a 19 metre rectification column, filtered once
Serving suggestion: Cool and neat in a small glass, or in an Espresso Martini where the malt meets the coffee.

Flavour profile

Malted · Crisp · Sweetish · Dry

Did you know?

BrewDog was started in 2007 by two men and a dog. James Watt and Martin Dickie hand bottled the first batches in Fraserburgh, and the dog was called Bracken. Fourteen years later the company had a distillery housing the world's first triple bubble copper pot still.

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