Chase Vodka is a single estate

potato The potato is a starchy food, a tuber of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'' and is a root vegetable native to the Americas. The plant is a perennial in the nightshade family Solanaceae. Wild potato species can be found from the southern Unit ...

vodka Vodka ( pl, wódka , russian: водка , sv, vodka ) is a clear distilled alcoholic beverage. Different varieties originated in Poland, Russia, and Sweden. Vodka is composed mainly of water and ethanol but sometimes with traces of impuriti ...

made in

Herefordshire Herefordshire () is a county in the West Midlands of England, governed by Herefordshire Council. It is bordered by Shropshire to the north, Worcestershire to the east, Gloucestershire to the south-east, and the Welsh counties of Monmouthsh ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, UK by William Chase, who is also known for founding Tyrrells crisps. Chase Vodka was voted ''Best in the world'' in April 2010 at the

San Francisco World Spirits Competition The San Francisco World Spirits Competition was founded in 2001 by Anthony Dias Blue as an off-shoot of the San Francisco International Wine Competition. It assesses hundreds of entrants annually (1,407 in 2013 from 63 countries) with tastings inv ...

. Their distillery has the tallest rectification column in Europe, possibly the world.

Company history

The Chase Distillery, the UK's first single-estate distillery, was founded on a farm in Herefordshire in 2008. It is a family business run by its founder, William Chase Proceeds from the sale of Tyrrells were then used to establish the Chase Distillery, which produced its first batch of vodka in June 2008. In its first year, Chase Distillery sales reached £140,000, and continued growth enabled the company to create a worldwide export market that included 36 countries between 2010 and 2016. As of February 2016, the Chase Distillery was selling 10,000 bottles of spirits per week.

Product description

Chase Vodka is a premium potato-based vodka made from specialty potato varieties such as Lady Claire and King Edward. It is a single-estate vodka, meaning that the base ingredients used for the vodka are produced on site (including the apples used for Naked Chase Apple Vodka). The production process involves peeling, heating and mashing the potatoes before adding

yeast Yeasts are eukaryotic, single-celled microorganisms classified as members of the fungus kingdom. The first yeast originated hundreds of millions of years ago, and at least 1,500 species are currently recognized. They are estimated to constit ...

for fermentation. Next the potatoes are transferred to a traditional copper pot still where steam is used to raise the temperature and encourage

distillation Distillation, or classical distillation, is the process of separating the components or substances from a liquid mixture by using selective boiling and condensation, usually inside an apparatus known as a still. Dry distillation is the heat ...

. Vapours rise up through the 70 ft tall rectification column, resulting in a vodka that has effectively been distilled 119 times. Finally, distilled water from the onsite

borehole A borehole is a narrow shaft bored in the ground, either vertically or horizontally. A borehole may be constructed for many different purposes, including the extraction of water ( drilled water well and tube well), other liquids (such as petrol ...

– which draws water from underneath the farm's apple trees – is used to dilute the vodka to 40%

ABV Alcohol by volume (abbreviated as ABV, abv, or alc/vol) is a standard measure of how much alcohol (ethanol) is contained in a given volume of an alcoholic beverage (expressed as a volume percent). It is defined as the number of millilitres (mL) o ...

Flavours

Chase Original Vodka is described on the company website as "a beautifully smooth vodka with a naturally sweet and creamy taste". Other potato vodka products from the Chase Distillery are flavoured with

elderflower ''Sambucus'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Adoxaceae. The various species are commonly called elder or elderberry. The genus was formerly placed in the honeysuckle family, Caprifoliaceae, but was reclassified as Adoxaceae due to ge ...

(Chase Elderflower Liqueur), fresh fruit (Chase Fresh Fruit Liqueurs),

Seville orange Bitter orange, Seville orange, bigarade orange, or marmalade orange is the citrus tree ''Citrus'' × ''aurantium'' and its fruit. It is native to Southeast Asia and has been spread by humans to many parts of the world. It is probably a cross bet ...

(Chase Marmalade Vodka), smoked oak (Chase English Oak Smoked Vodka) and rhubarb (Chase Rhubarb Vodka). Chase also produces an apple vodka (Naked Chase Apple Vodka), using apples sourced from their estate, in addition to a range of gin products (Williams Gin).

Awards

Chase Vodka was named as the world's best vodka at the 2010 San Francisco World Spirits Competition, beating 249 other vodkas from countries including

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

and

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

References

External links