There’s a whole lot more to Smirnoff than meets the eye

Think outside the glass, and let Smirnoff Vodka be the basis for a whole new world of inventive drinks.

JOE

There’s a whole lot more to Smirnoff than meets the eye

You think all vodkas are the same, do you?

We’d love to be able to tell you we are sophisticated cats in JOE Towers. We’d love you to imagine that life here is like an episode of Mad Men, with cool drinks, suits and snappy one-liners going on.

Sadly, the reality is more like an episode of The Walking Dead and what we know about the world of spirits is about the same as your average medium in a dodgy headscarf; nothing.

So when Smirnoff got in touch with us to shed some light on their rich heritage we thought, hey, it’s just vodka, how much can there be to tell? Truth is, there’s a lot more to it than a few bits of grain, a fire and some patience. An awful lot more. Here we discover what it is that makes Smirnoff the perfect foundation to build cocktail magic upon.

So where did it all start? Piotr Arsenievich Smirnov, the man who founded the Smirnov distillery in the 1860s, pioneered a technique for creating extraordinarily pure vodka, with his son Vladimir then perfecting the filtration technique, a method that is still used today for Smirnoff No 21.

Smirnoff uses Grain Neutral Spirit and demineralised water to make its vodka, before being triple distilled – but the purification doesn’t stop there. Every drop of Smirnoff No 21 spends eight hours filtering through hardwood charcoal, passing through it 10 times in total. No additives are used and the vodka is checked a total of 57 times to ensure it is extraordinarily pure.

We’ve all drank vodkas that have, how can we put this, felt more like liquid fire being poured down our throats than a fine spirit, so that extra effort makes all the difference.

The key to a good cocktail has nothing to do with a coloured umbrella or a swizzle stick in the shape of a mini-sword – the key is having a really good base spirit, something that is an ideal blank canvas for you to build on.

Now that we are suitably educated on the purity of Smirnoff Vodka, the next step is finding out how to use it properly in some tasty cocktails. Don’t worry if nothing springs to mind, we will be back to you shortly with some inspirational ideas.