Hacking Vodka 570
enrico_suave writes "A group of geeks aimed to find out whether running cheap vodka through a brita water filter would make it drinkable. They claim after several passes through the filter the cheap vodka surpassed the premium Ketel One in drinkability tests. I think they should have done the test 'double blind' although drinking Vladmir Vodka probably could make you go blind anyways... =)"
Common knowledge? (Score:5, Funny)
I believe this has actually been known for a long time.
Here is the canonical list of the top ten things that taste better once filtered through a Brita pitcher six times, in decreasing order of improvement, according to the Brita FAQ [brita.com]:
- Orange juice
- Coca Cola
- Vodka
- Cooking oil
- Urine
- Gasoline
- Blood
- Vinegar
- Water
- Semen
Surprisingly, pus did not make the list....Re:Common knowledge? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Common knowledge? (Score:5, Funny)
Sorry, but wrong. (Score:4, Informative)
Nope, was right, do your research (Score:4, Informative)
See, for example:
http://www.studentbmj.com/back_issues/0
http://www.talkaboutsupport.com/grou
Re:Ethanol (Score:5, Informative)
Care to back that up? According to this [nih.gov] ethanol causes dehydration, electrolyte imbalance and low blood sugar. Further, it states that pure ethanol can cause hangovers, and that it is unknown whether ethanol or the impurities have the greater effect.
That's why they are shooting for 100% pure, in theory no hangover...
Who is they? Care to back this up? You do realize that it's impossible to get 100% pure ethanol, right? Although one could probably produce 99.999% pure ethanol, as soon as the bottle was opened, it would begin absorbing water from the atmosphere until it reached the azeotropic composition, about 95% purity, if I remember correctly.
Re:Common knowledge? (Score:5, Informative)
Of course, if you're drinking enough of it then your problem is dehydration. If you have a pain in your side and/or your urine isn't colorless, then your probably need to drink more water, whether you've been drinking alcohol or not.
Re:Common knowledge? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Common knowledge? (Score:4, Funny)
Speaking of filters... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Speaking of filters... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Speaking of filters... (Score:5, Insightful)
You know, in a day and age where companies are way too PC or diplomatic when they respond to emails like these, it's really quite refreshing to read an email like that. Kudos, PUR.
Re:Speaking of filters... (Score:4, Informative)
Basically, the guy is spot on. When you are dehydrating, your body gets really stingy with water, and your urine will be only about 5% water. And yes, the other shit in the urine will require more water to process than you get from the processed urine.
Re:Speaking of filters... (Score:5, Informative)
Urine is almost entirely water, with a little bit of other substances dissolved in it. I doubt it's ever more than 5% solutes by weight, in 95% water.
Re:Speaking of filters... (Score:5, Informative)
Dig a large hole.
Piss in said hole or in a small container and place that in the hole.
Place a clean empty contain in the hole. Use this to collect your 'fresh' water.
Cover the hole with polythene; tranparent is best. Weigh it down at the corners to stop it falling in.
Place a small stone in the centre of the polythene to form an angle for the condenced water to run down. Your clean empty container should be under this.
Other green plants can be added to the hole to increase moisure.
I tried this 20 years during a hot sunny day in the UK - hardly desert conditions, I know. I had almost half a cup of water of drinking water at the end of the day. I was was not brave enough to try it without water purification tablets though.
It would buy you an extra day or so and better than drinking your own piss without doubt.
Amount of water in urine (Score:4, Informative)
Close. As one would expect, it's variable, but urine can be up to about 96% water. When you drink an abundance of water, your kidneys are free to pass more diluted urine. When body water is at a premium, the kidneys conserve water by passing concentrated urine, which looks darker and more opaque. Completely transparent urine is sign that you're drinking enough water.
Re:Speaking of filters... (Score:5, Funny)
Dude, if you have shit in your urine, you should see a doctor *pronto*.
Props. (Score:3, Insightful)
Still, props to the company and to the guy working for it for giving an actual response. And a helpful one, at that. Nifty!
--grendel drago
Re:Speaking of filters... (Score:4, Interesting)
I work for an organization that does marine safety training, and my boss related to me a story about a couple who survived something like 68 days in a liferaft in the middle of the ocean with nothing but a little food and a hand-operated desalinator. Not sure of the date but it was some years ago, so they've been around for a while.
Re:Common knowledge? (Score:5, Funny)
Stop telling people not to drink gasoline. We'll all be better off once the people who would drink gasoline, drink gasoline.
Re:Common knowledge? (Score:4, Funny)
God, now they're trying to slashdot the Darwin Awards ! [darwinawards.com]
Thomas-
Re:Common knowledge? (Score:4, Insightful)
It will kill you long before a cancer could develop.
Re:Common knowledge? (Score:5, Funny)
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:not surprising... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:not surprising... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:not surprising... (Score:4, Funny)
Indeed! I would describe it as having a delightful initial nose of ethanol, a pleasant burning as it goes down, and finishing smoothly with a subtle aftertaste of ethanol punctuated by a complex ethanol-infused bouquet.
no no no (Score:3, Funny)
That's Ffud that made all those hillbillies go blind.
Re:no no no (Score:5, Informative)
Re:no no no (Score:3, Interesting)
Absinthe (Score:4, Interesting)
And then there's Suisse La Bleue absinthe, which also turns milky white when mixed with water (the milky effect is called louche). Absinthe remains banned in the U.S. due to the persistent myth that the wormwood in absinthe is poisonous and causes hallucinations. It doesn't, wormwood is not, nor ever was on any DEA controlled substance list. It's banned by the FDA, which prohibits the manufacture, import and resale of any foodstuffs that contain wormwood in the U.S. The FDA hangs on to the myth that one of the chemicals in wormwood, called thujone, is bad, nevermind there is thujone in spices such as sage and tarragon. At least the European Union is forward thinking, because as of this year, absinthe is once again legal all across the European Union, with Switzerland and it's much sought after clear absinthe called Suisse La Bleue (once produced in clandestine labs) being the most recent to re-legalize. For more info, go see La Fee Verte Absinthe House [feeverte.net].
Here in the U.S., available anise based pastis such as Pernod, Ricard, Herbsaint and Absente all exhibit the same louche effect (albeit green, due to coloring in the liqueur)when mixed with water. The colder the water, the more pronounced the milkiness.
Re:Absinthe (Score:4, Insightful)
Off the top of my head (this is Slashdot, I'm damned if I'm going to research my incoherent ramblings- besides which, IIRC I didn't read this online), the absinthes now "legal" in Europe contain only a fraction of the amount of psychoactive substances that the old-school absinthes contained before they were banned.
Old Stuff.. (Score:4, Funny)
Better than a Volcano (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:5, Funny)
Of course, since alcohol doesn't really want to exist in that 100% pure state, it had a nasty habit of dehydrating your tender tissues on the way down, as well as having the unholiest burn of any drink I've ever had (it actually had sort of an oily texture/mouth feel, instead of the usual watery sensation), but oh man did it ever fux0r one up. Cheers!
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:5, Informative)
Benzine is an awful toxin and carcinogen...not so much something you want to ingest.
190 proof grain alcohol is pretty cheap...and you're really not gonna notice a difference, in either taste (they both taste like...burning) or in effect (that last 5% makes almost no difference).
You might want those taste buds later on in life anyway...
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:3, Informative)
Huh. I used the name Benzine for one of my DnD characters. I got it off the soda I was drinking.
do you know what USP means? (Score:4, Informative)
If you're interested, the chemistry behind it: the benzene forms an azeotrope with water that boils at a lower point than the 95-5 EtOH-water azeotrope, allowing the last traces of water to be distilled off. USP ethanol is usually dried out in other ways, like running it over drying salts or using molecular sieves to absorb the excess water....no benzene allowed.
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:3, Informative)
190 proof corn ethanol (95%)
2 shots in an 8 oz glass.
fill glass with Gateraid.
drink.
you will be drunk befor the glass is gone.
at the end of the glass you've had about 5 shots of regular booze.
-nB
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:4, Interesting)
-kaplanfx
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:3, Interesting)
Here's an alternative that they actually serve at a bar. It's called a Flaming Waterfall.
Put a shot of Bacardi 151 and a shot of Sambuka into a brandy snifter.
Light on fire. Pour burning mixture into a pint glass, be sure to raise the snifter high enough so entire bar can see. Place snifter upside-down onto pint
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:3, Interesting)
Anhydrous ethanol is usually spiked (Score:5, Informative)
Re:is usually spiked (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:3, Informative)
just take ye olde college issue hotplate, one deep bowl, a stainless steel or copper bowl that fist over the top of the bigger one in a tight-ish seal, an even smaller bowl that will fit inside the first one inverted with room to spare between it and the second one, and a cup.
first bowl goes on the hot plate.
third one is inverted on the bottom of it.
buy cheap booze and pour into bottom of first bowl.
set cup on top of inverted second bowl
cover with the second bowl and add ice to it.
turn on heat an
Re:Better than a Volcano (Score:5, Funny)
This is only tangetially related but I thought I'd post it anyway. At the start of (well, a week or so into) every new academic year at my college, all of the current mathematicians (such as me) band together, spend a reasonable proportion of the mathematicians' society's annual budget on vodka and assorted other alcoholic drinks, and have an amicable get-together in somebody's room to welcome the newcomers. In 2002 I was among those newcomers. There were about fifteen of us altogether.
I had the good fortune to retire to my room relatively early that night, because some time later in the evening, I'm told, a second-year called Dom got out a fondue set. The details of what happened after that are a little confused, but basically, somebody else also got out a small lump of greenish cheese which he had bought at the dining hall some weeks previously and never mustered the courage to eat. Alcohol did its sinful work, and the idea arose to melt the cheese. Into half a bottle of vodka.
Apparently (and understandably), nobody was able to manage more than a few sips of this crime against humanity of a drink without dire ill effects. The vast majority of the cheese vodka went undrunk and the bottle sort of hung around for the rest of the term... and the next term... and the next, gradually being handed from person to person as each one tried to get rid of it without actually drinking any of it or sacreligiously throwing it away.
That was in October 2002. Towards the end of June 2003, it was decided that enough was enough. The cheese vodka had had its day. It was buried in what I'm told was a rather tearful ceremony in Botolph Court, being a rather grubby area of grass in the middle of some of our student accommodation. Apparently they emptied some tea over the grave; tea being another major interest of a significant number of mathematicians at our college.
Fast-forward to October 2003 and the next official mathmo drinks. I was now among the second-years welcoming the first-years, and obviously we told them our various anecdotes of years gone by. We got to the cheese vodka story. Alcohol once again did its sinful work, and the idea popped into the collective head to go back to Botolph Court and dig it up again.
Which we did.
It was crawling up the side of the bottle to get out.
It comes pretty close to the all-time Worst Idea In Alcoholic History. Not quite up there with "let's drink Lenin's embalming fluid", but pretty darned close. I think *name removed*, one of the first-years, was the only person who tried any of the one-year-old matured cheese vodka. She managed a record-breaking whole capful. She was alternately paralytic and unpleasantly violent for the rest of the evening. Eventually I was one of the ones who helped carry her back to her room, by which time she was already being seriously considered for that year's Most Drunken Mathmo award, usually given in summer.
The cheese vodka is now missing, presumed poured down a sink somewhere, but I suspect that in the fullness of time it will resurface like an old supervillain.
Fantastic! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Fantastic! (Score:5, Funny)
Hey, I often run Vodka through a filtration system (Score:5, Funny)
Vodka testing? (Score:4, Funny)
I wonder why they never featured this one on Bill Nye The Science Guy or on Beakman's World. I don't think that Lester, the self-proclaimed, "Man in a Rat Suit" would have been much different, even if he were the hands-on evaluator...
Obligatory Bad Joke (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Obligatory Bad Joke (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Obligatory Bad Joke (Score:5, Funny)
Gray Kangaroo (Score:3, Informative)
They want $41 for it, which is too expensive for me. But in my undergraduate days, I would definitely have considered it. Though you can probably use a Brita filter like these folks have and save a few bucks.
Some calculations... (Score:5, Funny)
Cheap vodka: $10 (US assumptions)
Name brand filter: $30
Total vodka purity: $40
As compared to: Good vodka - $34.99
Hrmm, I guess it probably made sense when they did the experiment.
Seriously though, it's neat to see hacks like this. It should also be noted that the chick in the middle of this picture [dca.net] is kinda cute. But does anyone know what the pills are in the bottom left corner of that picture?
Re:Some calculations... (Score:5, Funny)
How much vodka have you had tonight?
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Some calculations... (Score:4, Informative)
A three pack of filters is around $17 [amazon.com].
Heck, the pitchers themselves are only around $10....
Seems like a good deal to me, especially if you could use the filter more than once (likely two times at least, if you only filter four passes, possibly three times or more).
Re:Some calculations... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Some calculations... (Score:3, Funny)
Some [Long Term] calculations... (Score:4, Informative)
*A brita pitcher filter can filter 40 gallons before changing
Re:Some calculations... (Score:5, Funny)
She is. I know the first thing I look for in a girl is a 5-'O-clock shadow.
That's a dude, dude.
Re:Some calculations... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Some calculations... (Score:3, Informative)
50 pounds of sugar $18
Three 5 gallon pails $9
Three packs high test yeast $12
Pot Still ~$25
About $10 per gallon 40% for the first 5 gallons, About $6 per gallon each additional run. The trick is to know what nasties boil at what temperatures, redistilling, then resting the 'shine for a few days with a bit of stone carbon to polish. Not bad.
Obligatory reference
"What's so bad about being drunk"
"Ask a glass of water"
Re:Some calculations... (Score:4, Funny)
I dunno, I think I like the chick from Hanson better.
-Colin [colingregorypalmer.net]
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
beer too? (Score:4, Funny)
I am so curious now
Anyone else want to do trials and report the results? My mom would probably get upset.
Re:beer too? (Score:5, Funny)
I poured in a Fat Tire and got a Bud Light. The second pass end up like a Corona, and I didn't have the heart to subject it to a third run.
Re:beer too? (Score:3, Insightful)
or their tripples, or their wheat ales, or just about anything NBB makes.
Re:beer too? (Score:5, Funny)
Beer has been attacked from all sides of late, whether its MADD or Atkins. Need I remind you that it was "liquid bread" that built the pyamids, and that modern democracy was born in the pewter mugs of beer swilling patriots ?
As a homebrewer, I beg, nay, demand that you love and care for your beer as it is. There are many good homes where your unfiltered beer would be welcomed. If you are either unable or unwilling to support your beer, please, please send it to a good home with someone who will love and cherish your beer without questioning its color or purity. May I suggest the Hospice of St. Arnolds ? [saintarnold.com]
Not much of a test (Score:4, Funny)
Try the premium Pur brand (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.purwater.com/yourwater/pitchers.shtm
Double Blind Study (Score:5, Funny)
Ladies and Gentlemen (Score:5, Funny)
PS: Science makes the room spin.
Does this work for Rubbing Alcohol? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Does this work for Rubbing Alcohol? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Does this work for Rubbing Alcohol? (Score:3, Informative)
I object! (Score:3, Funny)
Why back in my day we used our kidneys and liver to filter our alcohol and we liked it!
The SloshDot vodka-tasthing proshedure (Score:4, Funny)
Drink 1st glasss of cheap vodka. Yuck ptooey!
Filter 2nd glass of crap. Almost tolera*hic*tolerable.
Filter 3rd glass of crap. Filter it again. Barely tolerablable.
Filther 4th glass of the stuff. Filther it again and spill some. Get help to filther it a 3rd time. Drink it. Could be better but gimme some more.
Ask friend to filter next glass a few times and give it back to me. I don't know how many time, just do it. Hey, not bad.
Hand glassh to fr*hic*friend and say do it again. This time more fhilther. Fhilther make junk tathe good. *hic*.
Get glass from friend. Hey, this is great!
Pass out.
Wake up the next day and post on Sloshdot.
I wondered what the hell that stuff was... (Score:5, Funny)
We found it--there was a nice patio and a great band. As the evening wore on, we progressed from beer to shooters. A round of vodka seemed a good idea at one point. It smelled like isopropanol (I'm a chemist, I know my alcohols) and tasted as bad as one would expect. To this day, I have wondered what the hell it was we drank, so that I could avoid ever encountering it again. I fear unfamiliar vodkas in unfamiliar bars.
Now, I know it was Vladimir. I can rest easy. Thank you Slashdot!
Now the real question (Score:4, Insightful)
I suppose it would depend on how well the filter held up. If the single filtration kills it, well then it'll be more expensive. If it works for a few times though it could be a fairly cheap alternative.
Something that would be interesting to see a real experiement on is the difference in before/after compositions. Find out what, if anything, is actually getting filtered out. Maybe I should try and talk the chemical engineers at work into trying it.
Re:Now the real question (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't imagine it is, given the prices they quote for Vladimir Vodka, and knowing as I do how much Brita filters cost (about $7 each, or $15 or so for three). Filtering vodka is basically going to ruin your filter; filter vodka six times and you may as well just throw it out. So basically you're paying $20 for a cheap bottle of vodka that you're trying to get to taste good, whereas where I live a bottle of Finlandia, Stoli, or Absolut is around 18 bucks. No
Pepsi Green! (Score:3, Funny)
I was going to mod down that AC troll, but eh, I figured this was more important.
those chicks (Score:3, Funny)
Beware of certain filters (Score:5, Informative)
How is the Gray Kangaroo different than a commercially available water filter?
GK uses more filter material than a standard personal water filter. It also uses filter material which is optimized for liquor. Water filters use a variety of filter materials, some of them improve liquor while others (which eliminate chlorine, lead and other hazards in tap water) do nothing for liquor and only waste space. Also some filters use plastics which are dissolved by hard liquor and end up making your drink taste like crazy glue. Most importantly the GK is designed to easily filter liquor multiple times and built to be rugged enough to be used by a group of heavy drinkers.
LS
Vostok Antarctica Vodka and the Brita (Score:3, Informative)
Initially I was very doubtful of the mixture. It was concentrated from a "vegtable peelings mash" by means of fractional freezing. They concentrated the alcohol by means repeated freezing and thawing. Concentration was done by fractional freezing. Basically they placed the mash outside (where it was -60C or worse) to let the ice freeze, brought it back inside and removed the ice that has formed on the top ... or so
I was told.
So speaking of blindness, I was initially hesitant to sample their finished product. Someone informed me that to refuse a sample would be an insult. I didn't want to offend our hosts so I finally agreed to have a shot. When I was served, I noticed that they poured the vodka out of a Brita water filter. When I inquired about the reason I was told that it made the finished product "better". Apparently they have been doing vodka water filtration for years "in the land way down under''.
The Vostok Vodka was excellent. It was a bit hyper concentrated (beyond the normal Vodka proof), but very fine none the less. The next time you find yourself in Vostok Antarctica you should give their vodka a try! :-)
JUST Finished trying this (Score:5, Informative)
Started off with a 750ml bottle of "Medallion Quality". You don't expect much from a bottle that large that costs in the range of $11 Canadian. Needless to say, it was putrid. Bordering undrinkable. You'd have to be drunk to start with to consume the stuff. Smells reminiscent of rubbing alcohol, tastes like turpentine with an aftertaste not unlike a bowling alley shoe. As my buddy described it, "It feels like a clown is raping my mouth."
We were sure to prime the filter first. It ships with some chemicals in the charcoal, so run a few pitchers of water through.
After 3 filters of the vodka, the odour was drastically reduced. Flavour was not hugely improved, but the aftertaste was lessened and it didn't burn as much going down.
6 filters, the odour is down even more. Taste is much improved. Now comparable to a decent cheap vodka, probably a little better than regular Smirnoff. Goes down not too bad, aftertaste still not great.
10 filters. Odour is near gone. Tastes smooth. Would be undetectable mixed with grapefruit juice.
20 filters. SMOOTH. Goes down like water. Zero odour. Perfect. Easily as good as an upper end vodka like Canadian Iceberg, but not as delicate as the really pricy brands. Definitely a good taste. Pleasant enough to drink straight without shooting it.
Of course we kept a control sample. I did not fully appreciate how good the 20-filtered drink was until I tasted the control sample again. It was truly terrible. While I suggest doing this just to try it, I will not again put that stuff in my mouth unfiltered.
I have heard mixed reports about how well different vodkas turn out. Some are better than others, Medallion had tremendous benefit from the filtering. The taste of the original and final product are not even remotely close.
Also heard complaints about murky vodka. Our first filter result was slightly murky and blue/greyish from chemicals left in the filter. Repeated filtering made it disappear again. I can't help but wonder if those chemicals were doing me any physical harm, but they could not possibly be doing any worse than the original vodka anyways. It's all in the name of SCIENCE!
All in all, this experiment was fun and definitely worth trying. It takes long enough that I wouldn't expect it to be a decent timesaving measure. However, it was fun to do and we will probably repeat the experiment again next Friday with that godawful Russian Prince vodka.
"It feels like a clown is raping my mouth." (Score:5, Funny)
Having done this (Score:5, Interesting)
I ran half of the completed product through a carbon filter, and it seemd to improve the smoothness. Maybe. We had a few merry evenings with the stuff, and no nasty hangovers.
I'll be kicking off the next batch soon. Long live SuperYeast!
I can attest to this! (Score:4, Funny)
After reading this site last week, myself and a couple of friends decided to take the "Brita Challenge". To my complete amazement it worked better than I ever could have hoped.
I hate vodka typically, and the 9-dollar "Kamchakta" vodka that we bought burned like a mofo, and smelled like ass. After filtering it several times, it loses all of those impurities (that some might call 'flavor'), and is much more palatable.
Our findings were that 4 filtrations were plenty, and that it took much less time than the other site claims. We were able to filter a 1.75 L bottle of vodka 6 times in well under an hour.
We surmise that if you stuck 3 or 4 filters together in one long pipe, you could have one hell of a filtration system, and do it quickly too. With a little bit of advertising on collegehumor.com, you could be a thousandare, easy!!
To recap:
1) Filter Cheap Vodka
2) ????
3) Profit!!!
Whiskey? (Score:4, Informative)
I found myself wondering if this method would work for that, or if it is better suited for something which is primarily water based, like vodka?
Re:Whiskey? (Score:4, Informative)
A few related links... (Score:3, Informative)
a friend of mine recently put up a discussion of vodka on his lj, and it's worth a look
Vodka 101 [livejournal.com]
Here's the short version:
1. Don't drink anything that comes in a plastic bottle
2. If you must drink domestic Vodka, make it Skyy
3. Priviet is awesome if you can find it, and not very expensive
Re:Brita filters aren't just physical filters (Score:4, Informative)
What might be good, would be to use what's known as an "Extruded" carbon cartridge like the ones you get in the water treatment industry. Essentially a porous solid block that has 5 micron holes in it. Hacking one of these together might be a good idea for a college project. Hmm.
Re:Brita filters aren't just physical filters (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Wadka! (Score:3, Informative)
Now that I've calmed myself, I must inform as many as possible that it is the exact opposite. The Russian language does NOT have a true W sound, and they would NOT pronounce it "wadka". "Vodka" is exactly how it is truly pronounced.
I have no problem with people making fun of different countries' customs, but please, at least do it correctly.
Rotten eggs? (Score:4, Informative)
Well, if it was, you'd probably burp a smell of rotten eggs.
I think natural selection took care of eliminating the species that developed sulfuric-acid-based gastric fluids