Vodka stirs up a lot of arguments behind the bar. Let's look at it with a clear head: what the product actually is, and whether it earns a spot on the back bar.

Some people keep vodka around for one job: they wipe down surfaces with it and swear it's good for nothing else. I get the point, but it's a bit harsh for my taste. Others are warm on it and reach for it all the time.

Let's take the most objective look we can. And let's start simple: what vodka even is.

What vodka actually is

Vodka is made by blending a very heavily rectified spirit with water, then filtering it. That's it. It's far simpler than most of the other bottles on the shelf. It's a straightforward spirit with nothing to hide: alcohol cut with water and run through a filtration system.

There are nuances, of course, and as we know, the devil is always in the details. Although here it's more of a little demon than a full-blown devil.

Vodka can be made from all sorts of base material: wheat, rye, corn, potatoes, grapes, and plenty more. Broadly, almost anything with carbohydrates will do. The base does affect the final result, but not the way it does with a regular distillate. Here it plays out differently.

You see, once a spirit is rectified to 96.6 percent (you can't push it further, the physics of rectification won't allow it), almost none of the flavour or aroma of the base survives. That's the spirit that goes into vodka.

To catch the difference and actually taste the base, you have to put two vodkas side by side and sip them in turn at room temperature. Then you might pick up a faint difference. Wheat comes off a touch softer and silkier, corn a little sweeter, rye slightly spicy. Again, the difference is barely there, and most people won't notice it.

Is the expensive bottle worth it?

Beluga, Grey Goose, Belvedere and the rest. It depends on what you need it for. Most of what you pay for in those bottles is the brand, and that's worth understanding.

There's a point past which vodka simply stops getting better, and it isn't somewhere above Grey Goose. That ceiling sits at the premium mass-market level: Absolut, Finlandia and bottles priced near them. By then you already have very clean spirit and very good filtration. Put Finlandia head to head with Grey Goose at room temperature and you'll struggle to tell them apart. Chill them and you've got no chance. At that point even the producers couldn't pick their own out of a line-up.

The rule is simple: don't buy the cheapest vodka, and don't buy the most expensive. If your budget is unlimited, go ahead and buy the priciest, you won't go wrong. You've got to set yourself apart from the peasants somehow.

A word on cheap vodka. It's often sharper, and no amount of chilling hides that edge. More impurities, worse filtration. Which tends to mean a rougher hangover from those impurities later. Though the amount you drank still matters more than the quality, worth keeping in mind.

Vodka in cocktails

Vodka can and should be used behind the bar, you just have to be clear on when and why. Here are the main cases.

And drinking it neat?

I was one of those people who liked vodka neat, back when I still drank. You don't drink it for flavour, vodka is about the ritual. Grabbing a bottle and getting drunk alone at home is grim and bleak. In good company, with the right food alongside, the whole thing changes.

And a few questions to chew on. Do you think bar vodka should live in the freezer or not? What about the expensive stuff? And if it's frozen, how do you tell it from the cheap or mid-range bottle?

So, to wrap up. There's nothing wrong with this product. You just have to understand it and know how best to put it to work.

If you want to go deeper

If you want a better grasp of how the bar and cocktails actually work, I wrote the Guide to the Classics. It covers the fundamentals of spirits and preparation techniques, and it breaks cocktails into eight clear families, each explained on its own. For every family I walk through 8 classic cocktails so you can trace how they vary. All of it backed by tricks and shortcuts from my own time behind the bar.