Shaken Or Stirred Poem by gershon hepner

Grain, potatoes and molasses
of sugar beet are fine for making
vodka to amuse the masses,
when they’re shaken or they’re stirred,
I mean the masses not the potion
with an olive or some tonic
added to the vodka ocean,
martinized and hydroponic,
but use of maple syrup is
outrageous, I believe, and grapes,
though great for wine, create a mis-
begotten version of the drink
whose etymology is water,
ingredient from which good men shrink
when gathered in a drinking quarter.
In Poland they use apples, plums,
in Latvia wine which they have burned,
to make the drink for alky bums
but personally I’ve always spurned
the drink however it is made,
preferring Islay’s single malts,
or margaritas that are sprayed
around the rim with kosher salts.

Dan Bilefsky writes about the controversy that is raging in Europe regarding the distillation of vodka from sources other than grain, potatoes or molasses of sugar beets (“Vodka World Shaken, and Stirred, by Fruit Spirits, ” NYT, November 26,2006) :
Polish lore has it that vodka was distilled from coal during Communist times after efforts to use chickens backfired. In Sweden, vodka was once produced from paper-mill residue. But vodka purists of today have little patience for alternative ingredients. “Real vodka can only be made from grain or potatoes, ” says Rolands Gulbis, chairman of Latvijas Balzams, the largest vodka distiller in the Baltics, whose vodka-making tradition dates at the very least to 1900, when Czar Nicholas II of Russia built a vodka storage house here. “If vodka can be made out of grapes, then we might as well call an apple an orange and rename brandy as beer.” But the definition of vodka is no longer as clear as the transparent spirit itself. A vodka war has broken out in Europe. On one side are traditionalists in Poland, Finland, Sweden and the Baltic countries who argue that only spirits made exclusively from grains, potatoes and sugar-beet molasses are worthy of the name. On the other are distillers in Italy, France, Britain, and the Netherlands who are fighting for a more liberal definition. They contend that vodka’s ingredients do not affect its taste. After all, James Bond specified that his vodka martini should be “shaken, not stirred.” He never insisted it be made from grain or potatoes…
The vodka-belt countries of central and eastern Europe and Scandinavia argue that they are fighting to preserve a centuries-old tradition. “You don’t expect grapes in your beer, you don’t expect grapes in your vodka, ” Mr. Gulbis said. “You buy beer because it is beer; you buy vodka because it is vodka.” The origins of vodka, however, are hotly disputed. Russians will tell you that they invented vodka, so basic a drink there that the word itself is a diminutive of “water.” They point to distilling techniques that emerged in Russia in the 12th century. But Poland, one of the countries lobbying most actively for the European Union legislation, also claims to be a vodka pioneer. As early as the eighth century, Polish peasants are said to have made crude alcoholic spirits by freezing wine, based on a secret recipe believed to have been brought to Poland by Italian monks. The first written record of vodka in Poland dates from 1404 in the Sandomierz Court Registry.

11/26/06