I'm a sucker for cool packaging, and NEFT knocks it out of the park. It's a squat oil can with blocky, Cyrillic lettering. It absolutely looks like the kind of vodka we'd all be drinking in some kind of dystopian nightmare where Russia won the Cold War.
Here's just one weird hiccup: this brand that checks all of the Russia boxes is made in.... Austria? My reaction was eerily similar to all of those cowboys who ran out of Pace Picante Sauce.
“The NEFT Vodka isn’t a hard pass from me, but it’s a pass nevertheless. The value just isn’t here considering the flaws.”
Here's where we get into the veritable grab bag of “some good, some bad.” We'll start with the good. The nose is quite nice on this Vodka. Mark that on your calendar, because it's probably one of the few times you'll ever hear me say it. There's some nice honeydew melon along with some citrus rind and cake frosting that makes for a great first impression and suggests some distinctiveness. A nice change from your typical vodka nothingness.
I got some of that on the development, too. Along with the melon, which at times reminded me of a good Japanese sake, I also picked up some dates, vanilla, and star anise. Additionally, there was some savory stuff to dig into, like a salted butter flavor that popped up from time to time. These are the makings of something great: the kind of Vodka that, inexplicably and against all odds, seems to taste like something.
Now for the bad. Most immediately, the arrival is not great. It's sour and acidic at first blush, and a little rubbery in texture as it sits in the mouth. The finish is gentle, but the final element you're left with is a lingering bitterness that never fully seems to subside. When your sipping experience begins and ends on a down note, it’s hard to appreciate a solid middle.
Consider those negatives alongside the price, and the reality is that you're paying another $20 over “good” vodka for one that comes in a really cool package.
Like a lot of the one star reviews I tend to write, the NEFT isn't bad. But, at times like this I remind myself that there's a reason I don't have a wishy-washy, “right in the middle” review rating. I'm unlikely to get another bottle of this stuff on the merits of the experience alone, and doubly so given a price equivalent to Beluga Allure. I don't envision a time or place where I'd recommend it to someone.
Beyond that, the marketing department indulges in a little bit of gaslighting. On their website, NEFT mentions: “You can taste the winter it was planted and the summer it was harvested. The result, a rich, slightly sweet taste born of pure ingredients - no sugar or additives.”
What they neglect to tell you here is not a single vodka you can buy off the shelf will actually have sugar or other additives. Like, that's why it's vodka. It's the most neutral, no-extra-shit kind of spirit you could possibly buy. Those who watched the show Mad Men might remember Don Draper's first moment of marketing genius in suggesting that Lucky Strike cigarettes go with the motto: “It's toasted.”
If it worked for Lucky Strike, NEFT might as well give something similar a try with this Russia-by-way-of-Austria vodka, no?
It’s not a hard pass, but it’s a pass from me nevertheless.
