The Vodkaphiles Review

Made in: Poland
Distributed/Imported in the US by: Millenium Imports
Main raw material: Stobrawa potatoes
Expected retail price: $ 25.00
Named after Poland's favorite son, composer Frederic Chopin, this vodka is made exclusively from hand-picked Stobrawa potatoes. Distilled four times and crafted in small batches, it is one of the very few luxury potato-based vodkas in the world.

Characteristic	Score	Possible
Aroma/Fragrance	15.33	20
Appearance/Texture	17.83	20
Taste/Aftertaste	43.17	50
Packaging/Marketing	7.50	10
Totals	83.83	100

A nice, smooth texture, with very little of the rough aftertaste I have come to expect with potato vodkas. Chopin has a slightly sweet, almost smoky flavor. The packaging is very classy and elegant and marketing via the stobrawa potato's uniqueness helps set the vodka aside as something truly different.

My favorite to date - who knew?

Pleasant aroma of light, lemony citrus and apple, with faint medicinal quality, herbs, minerals and spirits. It is zesty and a bit sweet. It is clear, crisp and clean. Body is medium full with good viscosity. Fine texture, with good depth. Palate resembles the nose with added notes of black cherry eau de vie. Trace of anise on aftertaste. Heady, pungent and zesty, dry and spirity. Smooth finish is a bit sweet, with a faint vegetal tone. Palate lacks some focus and definition. Very pretty packaging, evoking ice and purity. Use of a cork evokes quality. The bottle is lovely, with frosted, etched glass. Delicious Vodka alone or as an accompaniment to certain foods.

I love this one. It definitely has a stronger, more Eastern European flavor than, say, Ketel One, and in that respect it tastes much more like "real" (authentic) vodka. May not be to everyone's taste -- I suspect Americans like the cleaner taste of Absolut or Ketel one, but I think this is a great vodka.

The bottle for this and for Belvedere is very elegant, but I find it a bit stylized.

I am not sure the connection between Chopin the pianist/composer and vodka works. I don't think of vodka when I think of Chopin. He is a famous Pole, and that's the only connection here because the vodka is made in Poland. The packaging trades on his name and image and that's all it has going for it. If you don't accept the connection they are trying to draw, then the packaging won't work for you either.

Clean, more neutral, grain, charcoal, stone and flint character with lesser pronounced aromatics.
Mildly astringent but offers straight forward purity. Slightly grainy in flavor profile. A no-nonsense clean style with mass appeal by virtue of its neutrality.
Package clean, well designed but more washed than its counterpart in Belvedere. Nice attractive stately appearance. Like cork finish and lack of pourer. I can monitor my own pours.