the worst rip-off

This is a review of Elixir vodka from Kyrgyzstan. I sampled it in Kyrgyzstan in 2017. It’s clear, 40% alcohol, and I just recently found out that its design was 100% stolen.

This one was called Elixir vodka, and it came in a bottle that I found nothing short of mezmerizing.

I bought it in Bishkek and schlepped it up to the shores of Issyk-kul where I was waiting for my Turkmen visa. I wasn’t expecting it to play a role in my recovery when I got sick and started mixing it with fresh lemon juice, honey, and jasmin tea. But it did. Good times.

goddamnit

I originally published this review in 2017. One year later, in 2018, I received a comment from “Zaya” about how this vodka bottle design was plagiarized from a brand called Eden. It’s now 2022, and I’m finally getting around to updating the reviews with some background information, and oh boy…

Those assholes at Elixir vodka really just stole the Eden design and went with it. They have no website and no social media presence that I could find. Nothing. At all.

What I did find, however, was the original Eden vodka brand. It’s owned by APU Company from Mongolia (which also owns Chinggis Khan vodka). It has a Facebook page and an Instagram account, both of which are active.

I sent them a message asking where I could buy their vodka.

[online search from April 14th 2022]

So far, Kyrgyzstan seems to be the land of many rip-offs. Ular, Vivat, Ozon: all rip-offs. But Elixir vodka was the worst of them all. It was a 1:1 copy where they had simply changed one line on the label: DISTILLED AND BOTTLED IN MONGOLIA had now become DISTILLED AND BOTTLED IN KYRGYZSTAN.

Motherfuckers.

mezmerized

Anyway, back to our review. Elixir vodka cost about the same as Kyrgyz Standard, which was probably due to the fact that I had bought both of them in an upscale supermarket in Bishkek instead of up here at the lake, which was cheap Ayu and Nano Platinum territory. Anyway, I paid about 10€ for 0,7 liters.

Elixir vodka is good

The first thing I noticed was that Elixir vodka had a faint, sweetish smell. I tried it neat and at room temperature, and the the taste was sweet and light, a pleasant sensation that burned just a little on the way down. So the taste was great.

The aftertaste was there, too, aromatic and lasting. It wasn’t anything overly interesting or subtle, but it was definitely a good aftertaste that had a herbal note to it.

Overall Elixir vodka is pretty good, but I won’t recommend it. Because fuckem.