Just a quick point, If making your own vodka (or hard spirit) you are not litkely to get it higher than 80%ethanol w/v. Below 80% ethanol it is easy to separate the water and alcohol, but after that special distilling equipment is needed (high pressures and so on).
But in finlandia and Absolut they add materials to it so that the police can determine if the vodka people are drinking is bought or homemade. This is because it is illegal in Sweden (at least) to make your own vodka. Or anything with an alcohol content over 5% w/v. The Homemade also gives tremendous hangovers to those that drink it.
Badtz, you are one brave man! If you can drink straight ethanol… wow not many men can… I’ve never seen a womam…
Anyway, ethanol is a known dessicant, never used straight on wounds, as disinfectant (it is not use now, anyway). So, it probably ain’t very pleasant to drink. But it has less natural contaminants (reagent-grade has none, including hexane or whatever was used in its distillation/production), which are thought to cause “hangover”. Hangover itself is a poorly defined and studied constellation of symptoms and signs, but it’s thought that, in general, vodkas have less of this “contamonants”, compared to “flavored” whiskey and brandy. In my experience, hangober is more individual, than drink-specific. But this is just an observation.
This surprised me, because the only company I know of outside New Zealand that caters to home distillers is a Swedish company (Gert Strand AB). Following their links I learned that it is indeed illegal in Sweden. But home distilling is legal in some countries, including New Zealand, Austria, Italy, and Ukraine.
I use it in my lab for some specific reagents. I had to change my recipies to account for the extra water it has now.
And I’ve also drank it straight. No, not at work! In high school of course.
It’s pretty cool if anyone feels like trying. When you toss back a shot, you barely even feel it splash in your mouth. It soaks through your tissues so quickly that hardly a drop reaches your throat.
And it leaves a bad taste in your mouth. I like to think it’s the dehydrated carcasses of all the normal flora bacteria you just killed.
**However…the difference is that premium vodkas are made of grain (wheat, and on a higher scale rye), as well as more care in distillation (as the Grey Goose example shows). **
While it is true that most of the premium vodkas are made from grains, they are not premium because the are made from grains. They are premium because of the extra care taken during the distillation process.
True vodka drinkers know that the best vodka is made from potatoes. The best vodka I’ve ever had was a polish vodka made from potatoes.
I’m not a true vodka drinker, so I’m afraid I don’t remember the name.
An alternative technology for producing ultra high purity ethanol is via molecular sieves. In Australia, Manildra Starches produces Ethanol 100 (actually 99.9%) from wheat in small quantities without needing to use hexane as a dessicant. I would expect there would be any number of US ethanol producers that can/do produce high grade ethanol this way.
Is that all? I wonder if they make different proofs to sell in different jurisdictions, depending on what the jurisdictions allow. The highest proof liquor I’ve ever seen for sale in Maine is 151º Bacardi rum. In New Hampshire the highest I’ve seen is 101º Wild Turkey, IIRC. I have never seen Everclear for sale in either state. BTW, the 151º made my esophagus hurt for a few minutes afterward.
Certainly. In fact, I believe it’s one of the only practical ways to product anhydrous ethanol (100% ethanol). The process basically involves distilling the ethanol-water mixture to ~95% ethanol and then using the sieves to remove the remaining 5% water. However, the process is expensive relative to distillation and equipment costs are significantly higher.
BTW, the hexane is not used as a dessicant. It’s used to break the azeotrope that occurs at 95% ethanol in ethanol-water mixtures so that further distillation becomes possible.
I’m going to have to check my local liquor store (in Richardson, TX). I was not aware they had lowered the strength of Everclear, but I haven’t bought any in well over a year.
An interesting aside-all of the really good Russian vodkas (those that are exported) are distilled from grain. However, inside Russia, the state liquor monopoly has sanctioned the selling of vodka, which has as its base, ethanol produced from natural gas! This stuff is loaded with fusel oils and higher alcohols, not to mention contaminants intoduced from the source gas-ugh! Imagine the headaches you would get from drinking this swill-no wonder the life expectancy of men in Russia is down to 57 years!
First things first
Bashere
The only polish vodka made from potatoes is called Luksusowa, and yes it is quite good. Translated “Vodka” means litte water, or better translated it is an affectionate term for water. There are vast differences in vodkas, they stem from the ingredients used, wheat, rye, potatoes, to distillation methods, single, double, triple, purities, and of course flavourings. All these I won’t go into here. Lets just say that Vodka is generraly the most pure spitit, thus the lack of taste and smell. I say lack, but we all know that there are varying taste differences from vodka to vodka. I would also maintain that Poland is still one of the best producers of Vodka (Luksusowa, Belvedere, Chopin, Krulewska, Wyborowa, to name a few) Russia goes in with Stolychnaya, and sweden and Finland also deserve an honorable mention. Unfortunately i have not yet tried Grey Goose so I can’t judge, but have heard it is an excellent Vodka, however i don’t trust anyhthing from the frogs. Purity of water used also factors in when we talk about taste. and so on. So to surmise the difference between the good and cheap vodkas are vast. They are mixed to usually 40% some at 43%. So enjoy.
Ah, yes bisongrass. I almost forgot.
Specifically Zybrowa
Form the rare European Bison, which are making quite a return from the old days when there were very few to be found.
If I may pirate this thread for a sec, instead of starting anew, why is an alcohol beverage rated at double its alcohol content amd called “proof”? Some posts noted that the vodka was 95% proof, which means only 47.5% alcohol, but most referred to the proof as double the percentage of alcohol. But, to reask, why is proof double the percentage?
And, BTW, the past participle of “drink” is “drunk.”
Oh, and my personal fav is this homemade horseradish vodka served at a local Russian restaurant. It wakes you up like no other drink. Actually, all of their homemade vodkas are great; cranberry, garlic-pepper, horseradish and lemon.
There is a big difference between the rot gut varieties of vodka and the premium brands. A sip of straight generic brand vodka will reveal a wide array of unpleasant flavors, bitterness and after taste. A sip of straight premium vodka has a pleasant taste, is not bitter and doesn’t have a bad after taste. I don’t know why this is, neutral grain spirits should have a neutral flavor but they aren’t all the same. Grey Goose, Pearl, Skyy, Tanguery and Stolie are good vodkas, no unpleasant tastes of hang overs from hell. I have tried the flavored Absolut vodkas and don’t care for them. If you want flavored vodka then make your own from some good vodka.
Barbie, yesterday (I think) I read somebody’s explanation of term “proof” and the whole nine yards. Now I can’t find it. Do a search. Can enter ‘gunpowder’ as a keyword as well as ‘proof’.
If it helps: vodkas’ ‘proof’ is traditionally (tradition originates in Russia/Poland) expressed as percentage of ethanol in water, in weight/volume units, that is 40 grams of ethanol in 100 cc(ml, cm^3)of the end product. Only when exported to ‘proof’ countries, it’s labeled as “80 degrees proof”.
One can buy a bottle of vodka and do home experiments: mix it with juces, preserves, herbs, dried berries, whatever. Some will turn vodka turbid or non-transparent, some are better placed in cheese cloth, some may be made ex tempore, some are to be kept for a day/week in the frige or on the cupboard… Like with cooking, sky is the limit. Brandy can be used too, but brandy tends to keep its own taste, while vodka is very forgiving. Then there is the whole huge field of what to eat with vodka. Or (rarely) nothing. Brandy (or liqueur) is good after meal (digestif) while vodka is good before meal (aperitif). For instance, cheese and vodka is awful, pickle and vodka is good.