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Vodka is typically a colorless liquid preparation meant for consumption containing ethyl alcohol (ethanol) purified by distillation from a fermented substance such as fruit, vegetables, or grain. The word shares a root with the word for "water" in various Slavic languages (voda, woda, вода).

Except for various types of flavorings, vodka consists of water and alcohol (ethanol). It usually has an alcohol content ranging from 35% to 50% by volume. The classic Russian vodka is 40% (80 proof). This can be attributed to the Russian standards for vodka production introduced in 1894 by Alexander III from research undertaken by the Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev. According to the Vodka Museum in Moscow, Mendeleev found the perfect percentage to be 38, but since spirits in his time were taxed on their strength, the percentage was rounded up to 40 to simplify the tax computation. At strengths less than this vodka drunk neat (not mixed with other liquids) can taste 'watery' and above this strength the taste of vodka can have more 'burn'. Some governments set a minimum alcohol content for a spirit to be called "vodka"; for example, the European Union sets a minimum of 37.5% alcohol by volume. [1]

Although vodka is generally drunk neat in its Eastern European and Scandinavian homeland, its growth in popularity elsewhere owes much to its usefulness in cocktails and other mixed drinks, such as the Bloody Mary, the Screwdriver, the Vodka Tonic, and the Vodka Martini.

Flavouring
Apart from the alcoholic content, vodkas may be classified into two main groups: clear vodkas and flavoured vodkas. From the latter ones, one can separate bitter tinctures, such as Russian Yubileynaya (anniversary vodka) and Pertsovka (pepper vodka).

While most vodkas are unflavoured, a wide variety of flavoured vodkas have long been produced in traditional vodka-drinking areas, often as homemade recipes to improve vodka's taste, or for medicinal purposes. Flavourings include red pepper, ginger, various fruit flavours, vanilla, chocolate (without sweetener), and cinnamon. Ukrainians produce a commercial vodka that includes St John's Wort. Poles and Belarusians add the leaves of the local bison grass to produce Żubrówka (Polish) and Zubrovka (Belarussian) vodka, with slightly sweet flavour and light amber colour. In Ukraine and Russia, vodka flavoured with honey and pepper (Pertsovka, in Ukrainian, Z pertsem, in Russian) is also very popular. In Poland, a famous vodka containing honey is called krupnik.

This tradition of flavouring is also prevalent in the Nordic countries, where vodka seasoned with various herbs, fruits and spices is the appropriate strong drink for all traditional seasonal festivities, midsummer in particular. In Sweden alone there are some forty-odd common varieties of herb-flavoured vodka (kryddat brännvin). In Poland there is a separate category, nalewka, for vodka-based spirits with fruit, root, flower, or herb extracts, which are often homemade or produced commercially by small distilleries. Its alcohol content may vary from 15 to 75%.

The Poles also make a very pure (95%, 190 proof) rectified spirit (Polish language: spirytus rektyfikowany), which is used in a variety of ways. Technically a form of vodka, it is sold in liquor stores, not pharmacies. Similarly, the German market often carries German, Hungarian, Polish, and Ukrainian-made varieties of vodka of 90 to 95% alcohol content (as well as Stroh rum (a spiced rum) of the same potency). A Bulgarian vodka, Balkan 176°, is 88% alcohol.

Other processing
Due to the high alcohol content (anything over 50%) of certain brands of vodka, it can be stored in ice or a freezer without any crystallization of water. In countries where alcohol levels are generally low (the USA for example, due to alcohol taxation levels varying directly with alcohol content), individuals sometimes increase the alcohol percentage by a form of freeze distillation. This is done by placing the vodka in an open vessel (bowl, etc) in the freezer, and then after it has reached a temperature below the freezing point of water, adding one or more ice cubes, to which the free water within the vodka will crystallize, leaving a higher alcohol concentration behind.

Vodka and the EU
Vodka producers in Finland, Poland and Sweden are campaigning for EU legislation that will categorize only spirits made from grain or potatoes as "Vodka" instead of any spirit made from any ethyl alcohol (provided, for example, from apples and grapes). This proposition has provoked heavy criticism from south European countries, which often distill used mash from wine-making into spirits (although higher quality mash is usually distilled into some variety of pomace brandy, lower-quality mash is better turned into a neutral-flavoured spirits instead). Any drink then not made from either grain or potatoes would then have to be labeled as "Spirit Drinks" instead.