What's the best mid-range vodka for a home bar?

Grey Goose or Belvedere. I don’t drink vodka unless it’s one of these, since I haven’t found anything better.

Grey Goose is my house vodka. If that’s too pricey or we’re hosting something with more than just a couple people I go with Stolichnaya.

Oh and one of my coworkers is a fiend for Ketel One, I never cared for it but it’s popular with his crowd.

Grey Goose or Belvedere is top shelf and expensive. If thats what youre looking for, id say definitely go with the Goose.

My personal fav’s for not so expensive Vodka are – Svedka and Ketel One. Kind of cheap but i mean if youre making drinks who is gonna notice?

I hate that this is your current life dilemma out of pure spite and jealousy but…. yes.. as @Axemusica said… I’d probably go with Grey Goose myself.

@JesusWasAJewbot I notice. That’s why I said the two that I only drink. Everyother vodka taste like I’m drinking gasoline. Besides, when stocking a home bar I wouldn’t consider the two that expensive compared to, lets say a 25yr old bottle of scotch.

Agree with @Axemusica unless the alcohol is really covered I also taste the difference in mixed drinks, say between Grey Goose and Absolute. Stoli is a pretty “clean” on in my opinion, I wouldn’t be drinking too many martini’s with it (but then neither are you) but I’ve always thought it mixed well.

Buy cheap vodka and run it through your Britta filter a few times. It will then compete with the best.

@pdworkin You didn’t see the episode of mythbusters where they proved that to be busted, right?

Yes, but I was hoping to mislead the OP and you fucked it up.

oops, sorry @pdworkin.

Disregard my last quip, hehe ;P

I am going to be contrary here and say “premium” vodka is ridiculous. Really cheap vodka can be awful, but I wouldn’t pay more than $15 US for 750ml (prices vary a lot from state to state based on taxes, that’s my Illinois cap. I buy Gordon’s 1500ml for $16.99, sometimes $12.99 on sale.

If you are near a Trader Joe’s which sells liquor, they used to have excellent Monopolowa vodka for about $14/liter. It’s been a few years for me, not sure if they still sell it.

And to back up my claim about premium vodka, I brought in a panel of experts:

“The idea for the Dining section’s tasting panel was to sample a range of the new high-end unflavored vodkas that have come on the market in the last few years in their beautifully designed bottles and to compare them with a selection of established super-premium brands. To broaden the comparison, or possibly as a bit of mischief, our tasting coordinator, Bernard Kirsch, added to our blind tasting a bottle of Smirnoff, the single best-selling unflavored vodka in the United States…After the 21 vodkas were sipped and the results compiled, the Smirnoff was our hands-down favorite.

NY Times – January 26, 2005

I don’t care what mythbusters say, running your vodka through a britta filter works. That’s because the main difference between cheap vodka and expensive vodka is how many times it’s filtered. They filter it through charcoal, and the more expensive stuff is filtered more.

Britta filters work with charcoal. If you run cheap vodka through a britta filter 4–5 times it’s way smoother. I’ve done it myself and asked other people’s opinions too. It won’t make $5 taste like $50 vodka, but if you’re mixing then it really takes the nasty chemical edge off and makes everything way more drinkable. Mythbusters actually said it makes it taste better, but the top shelf stuff still wins out overall.

Absolut Vodka

I find that even Grey Goose is too pricey on a student’s budget. I personally enjoy Finlandia quite a bit, my dad agrees.

Russian man speaking! :P

I use Smirnoff.

I picked up 42Below on sale as the clerk recommended it. Drinks smoothly but that’s all I’ve been able to notice as I’ll generally be mixing it.

Any comments?

By law, vodka is a neutral spirit with no characteristics that differentiate it from any other vodka. Any differences that people detect should be a result of the power of suggestion and the resulting imagination. Therefore, the cheapest vodka should be as good as the most expensive.

Incidentally, vodka has been the largest selling distilled spirit in the US for over 25 years and one of every four alcohol drinks consumed in the world is vodka or vodka-based.

http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/FunFacts/Beverages.html