Neutral is a myth
A vodka cata and formación with Valentino from Ketel One — and how to taste the thing everyone says has no taste.
Ficus · MadridJune 20264 min read
Tasted with
The numbers
- The house
- Nolet family · 11 generations
- Tasting rule
- Don't swirl a spirit
- Built for
- The perfect martini
- The tell
- Price is often just marketing
Everyone says vodka has no taste. This chapter of The Making of the Spirits set out to disprove it — a cata and a formación with Valentino from Ketel One, three 'neutral' premium vodkas poured blind, and a lesson in how to actually taste a spirit.
Move a wine glass and you lift the aromatics. Move a spirit and you just lift the alcohol.
From the session
The lesson
Even 'neutral' rewards attention: taste a vodka properly and it tells you about its grain, its water and the people who make it. Neutral was never the goal — clean was.
