Vodka is special. I love vodka in most of its incarnations. Cocktails made with the perfect infused vodkas offer flaver and verve. Best of all are icy little shots of pure vodka consumed with the spicy little Russian dumplings from the place down the street, or lovingly crafted vodka martinis in perfectly chilled glasses, with an extra olive for accent. The Russians have known that vodka was special for centuries, and icy little shots of vodka tossed back with vigor have served to ward off melancholy, and warm those long winter nights.

Prized for its purity, and the ease of infusing the spirits with various flavors, vodka has been traditionally flavored and aromatized with rowan, mint, fruit, nuts, acorns, sage, peppercorns, and nearly any other pleasing or interesting flavor you can imagine. (Including bacon, but that's another post.)

It never occurred to me that the best vodka I'd ever taste would come from Idaho. Then my local liquor store guy pulled a bottle of Koenig Potato Vodka off the shelf and told me, "if you like vodka martinis, you've got to try this stuff! One of the best vodkas produced anywhere—I've ever tasted comes from Idaho's Koenig Distillery. They use traditional European-style copper-pot distillation to produce an amazingly smooth, sippable, and altogether superior small batch potato vodka. If you happen to be a dedicated vodka drinker, you already know that the best vodka is potato vodka.

Koenig says about their process:

"At Koenig Distillery, we carefully craft our super-premium vodka slowly, one small batch at a time. Using the world’s finest potatoes, Rocky Mountain water and unique, hand-hammered copper pot stills from Germany, we have created a combination that is truly Idaho famous."

Koenig Vodka is vodka, Northwest style. Local potatoes, local mountain water, lovingly distilled by people who love Idaho and the Northwest region, Koenig's vodka outclasses the more expensive Grey Goose, Ketel One, Smirnoff, or any of the other familiar liquor-store standbys. Greg and Andy Koenig combine the Old-World distilling experience of their Austrian father with the fertile and sunny slopes of the Idaho Rockies, where their mother's family homesteaded before the Great Depression. The Koenig brothers very fine wine and spirits are the perfect combination of generations of Northwest wine-making and European distilling traditions.

I'm still stunned and delighted that the vodka I'd prefer over Grey Goose, Ketel One, or Three Olives was made in Idaho.