Review #15: Christiana Ultra Premium Vodka, Ketel One Vodka, TIto's Handmade Vodka, Grey Goose Vodka

I'm not sure there's any point to this.

I'm curious about all this, but the whole thing seems a little bit stupid -- who can purify and filter their ethanol the best so that it doesn't taste like anything. But maybe I'm wrong about all that. I guess I'll see.

Day 1 - fridge cool, sipped neat, lowball glass. all 40% abv.

Christiana ($33): pleasantly sweet, not at all hot. palate: nothing. velvety a little heat going down. ethanol sweetness with a bit of oily texture. like a soft vodka-flavored vodka (?)
packaging: Scandinavian modern, plastic stopper

need to find a palate cleanser, I guess. should have planned better. or do I need to bother? here's some bread and almonds, anyway. but who bought dill pickle flavored chips?

Tito's ($19): nose is a little feinty (?), but faintly. palate is both a little sweet and a little rough, but sort of trivially so. somehow rounder than the Christiania. finish is more nothing, but leaves an aftertaste of not much.
packaging: crudely crude -- generic bottle with a coarse paper label with copper foil stamping

Ketel One ($22): "inspired by small batch craftsmanship," ha ha ha. nose is even fainter than the Christiana -- the smell of almost nothing. maybe a little graininess, less sweetness. a little hotter on the palate, but not much. otherwise not much hint of any flavor or texture. maybe a very mildly acidic note, like cucumber water. finish: pronouncedly nothing.
packaging: faux gothic minimalist. 2-color label with some metallic ink.

Grey Goose ($28): nothing on the nose. faintly vodka-like. a little bit of graininess and heat, maybe. sort of pleasant. palate is sweet-ish, soft-ish, hot-ish. squishy that way. it somehow manages not to come together for me. (how?) finish seems somehow empty.
packaging: graphic designer pretty. if you look past the geese, and through the transparent goose, then you can see more geese. none of them are grey, but the bottle is mostly frosted.

Should I explain to my wife what I was doing with all these glasses, or just wash them and put them away before she notices?

Day 2 - 1:1 OJ and vodka.

Ketel One: a little vodka-y. the roughness even stands out more against the OJ.

Tito's: this tasting is stupid. I should have bought a bag of limes.

Christiania: vodka slightly less noticeable until finish. velvety finish again.

Grey Goose: most noticeable on palate of the bunch. otherwise about the same.

**

So this was pretty pointless for me: I like my alcohol with flavor. I'm impressed that the Christiania managed to stand out, but the whole thing still seemed pointless. I can imagine someone being excited by it, and even managing to appreciate the subtle distinctions between the vodka -- for there are differences! -- but I can't: I just don't drink enough vodka, or find enough occasions to drink vodka, to care at all. (I do care about water, oddly enough, but I drink a lot of that!)

bonus analogies: Christiania: Acqua Panna, Tito's: Apollinaris, Ketel One: Vittel, Grey Goose: Evian