Gin reviews

Batch Industrial Strength Gin

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Note: The Batch team sent me a sample of this to try, but I will let you know if I’m not a fan.

You may have seen my review of Batch Brew‘s signature gin (here) and their Innovations Gin Rummy (here). Today we are trying their Industrial Strength gin which is part of their main range, after making its debut in their experimental Innovations range. This is their take on a navy strength gin – this is 55% ABV – which has won double gold and best gin at the San Francisco World Spirits competition, not bad for a gin distilled and bottled in Burnley. This version is a twist in their signature which tones down the spice and amps up the juniper with a touch of lemon balm (or Melissa officinalis) for a sweeter note.

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Batch Innovations Gin Rummy

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Note: After I said I didn’t really like barrel aged gins, Batch got in touch and sent me theirs to try to change my mind. Trust me, you’ll know if it doesn’t work.

I find Batch Brew interesting. I came across their signature gin via Craft Gin Club (which you can read about here) and, alongside their key spirits they have a monthly subscription service under Batch Innovations. Every month they produce a new spirit, and this isn’t limited to gin. Since February they’ve released an industrial strength gin, sherry cask rum, absinthe gin, a fruity vodka and a hop vodka. But today we are trying their Batch Gin Rummy; they took their signature gin, blended it with some of their Industrial Strength gin and stored for a month in the barrels used for their sherry cask rum (which were formally Glenfiddich barrels). The gin was originally meant to be a rum, but it wasn’t going the way head distiller Ollie wanted, so they went with this instead. With the subscription service bringing money in, they are free to experiment and try new things – and they are then available to buy from their website should you wish to dip into their back catalogue. The contrasting flavours mean you can drink this as a gin and tonic, or as a rum and coke. Very confusing. So how does it taste?

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Edgerton Pink Gin

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Next up in my series of “I have lovely friends that buy me gin” is Edgerton Pink gin courtesy of my lovely friends Tasj and Martyn. You look at a pink gin and instantly think of strawberries and raspberries, but interestingly the colour for this gin comes from pomegranate extract. They combine this with a classic juniper forward gin, citrus and spiced notes because they believe that colour is strongly linked to the success of the brand. Created by Martin Edgerton Gill and inspired by his father’s love of the Pink Gin cocktail after time spent in the Royal Navy, the traditional drink is gin combined with Angostura bitters to cure seasickness. Martin took this and twisted it using his knowledge of herbal teas to create a contemporary pink gin using fifteen different botanicals – including supposed aphrodisiac damiana leaves.

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Bristol Dry Gin

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The best thing about having lovely friends combined with a birthday and house warming party is that nice people buy you nice gin. Today’s gin is courtesy of my friend Jo, who lives in Bristol, who gave me a bottle of Bristol Dry Gin. When I last visited her I had spotted it in a bar, but as we had popped in for a snack before afternoon tea, I thought it might be a tad too early for a gin. Launched in 2016, Bristol Dry gin was developed by a group of bartenders under the ethos that they were creating a gin for everyone, not just those that can pay £40+ per bottle. Since 2016, they have expended their range to include a Docker’s Strength (55% so named after the dockers from Bristol), the Turbo Island Edition which is a whopping 75% ABV, and a vodka. Today though we drink their Dry gin which underwent rigorous taste testing at their base in The Rummer Hotel, which historically has a reputation for their pionnering cocktail bar. They keep their botanical list pretty secret, stating only the use of “juniper, citrus and angelica root”, so, let’s see if I’m able to guess any more.

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Ginvent 2018 – Tarquin’s Tan Ha Mor gin

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Anyone that knows anything about the Gin Foundry calendars knows that Tarquin’s is ingrained into everything they do. One of the first to be involved with Junipalooza, they have also been featured in every Ginvent calendar since the beginning (you can read about their Cornish Dry, Seadog and British Blackberry). This year is no exception and we get to try a brand new and exclusive gin, the Tan Ha Mor. So what makes this gin unique? Working in collaboration with our favourite Gin Foundry folk, they built two firepits on their local beach and smoked English oak chips with coriander, juniper, pink grapefruit and oranges which had previously been smoked in seawater. These were then left to macerate in their Seadog gin before being bottled at 50.5% ABV – the co-ordinates of the beach they roasted the botanicals on.

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Gŵyr Pinwydd gin

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Note: Siân kindly sent me a bottle of their new gin to try, but as always I will let you know what I really think.

You might have seen my post about Gŵyr‘s first gin (if not, you can catch up here) and today we try their new seasonal offering. What does Pinwydd mean I hear you ask? Well, luckily my Welsh is brilliant (and Siân translated it for me) and I can tell you it means “pine trees”. If you’re as smart as I hope you are, you might have guessed that this gin features pine tips as the new flavour. The pine tips are foraged from North Gower – a very different region to South Gower where the team live and distill. They gathered their ingredients and made up their first batch, which they quickly discovered was “too piney” and after some experimenting they found that pink peppercorns were the answer to balancing the flavours. This gin is the first in what they hope will be a seasonal range showcasing what the region has to offer , and this is the ‘winter’ edition. Other seasonal botanicals include orange pulp, zest and cranberry, on top of their original recipe of juniper, angelica, coriander, orris and lemon zest. So, how piney does this gin really taste?

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TBGC Finger Lime Gin

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Note: The team at Maverick Drinks sent me a bottle to try, but as always – I’ll let you know what I think.

That Boutique-y Gin Company have done it again. They’ve found a random new fruit for us all to try. Today is is a finger lime. Finger limes come from Australia and they burst open with caviar-like balls which pop in your mouth (FYI this is not something I am a fan of, I have a strange thing about textures) to release a zesty burst of citrus. There’s some debate around whether a finger lime is actually a citrus fruit – currently it is classed as a “microcitrus” although apparently on a molecular level it is nothing like citrus fruits at all. But anyway. Enough nerdy chat. Let’s drink some gin.

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TBGC Cucamelon gin

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Note: The team at Maverick Drinks sent me a bottle of this to try, but as always I will let you know what I think.

That Boutique-y Gin Company seem to have exploded recently. At first, there were a few collaborations using the unwanted spirits from distilleries. Then a few more. And a few more. Then suddenly they had a massive range including some gins they have made all by themselves. Today we are trying the Cucamelon gin. What is a cucamelon I hear you ask? Basically, it’s a native plant to Mexico and Central America which looks like a mini watermelon, but tastes like a cucumber injected with some lime. Obviously. TBGC distil these whole along with other botanicals to create what they call a “fresh, citrusy drink”. They say this works well as a G&T, but even better as a gimlet or a Cucumber Cooler with watermelon juice and mint leaves.

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Cabin Pressure gin

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We’ve all heard of small batch gin where small teams hand craft their gin and run the whole business from their homes. Cabin Pressure gin is about as small as it can get – a husband and wife team working out of their garden shed in Horsham; indeed when we met David at the Sussex Festival of Gin, his wife was frantically bottling the next batch back home as they didn’t have enough stock for the coming week. They’re able to distil their gin in their shed as they use the lesser used method of vacuum distilling which allows them to distil at a lower temperature and generally in a much safer way. Due to the lower temperatures, they manage to retain more flavour from their botanicals. Talking of botanicals, they use just six of them, all of which are either organically cultivated or organic wild harvested. They use juniper (obviously) along with green cardamom, angelica root, ginger, liquorice and coriander, unusual perhaps in that it lacks a citrus fruit.

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Gin Eva La Mallorquina Olive gin

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Note: I met the Gin Eva team at Junipalooza and the kindly sent me some samples to try, as always I’ll let you know if I don’t like it.

You may have already seen my posts on Gin Eva‘s Mallorcan Dry and Bergamot gin and today we are drinking their special edition La Mallorquina. Named after a traditional olive variety that can only be found on Majorca, they use the leftover olives from a olive mill that have had the oil extracted. They then steep these in pure grain spirit for several weeks before the distillation process to then blend with juniper and coriander distillates. Whilst they say this works well as a gin and tonic, this is really designed to be drunk as a dry martini – even better if you replace the vermouth with sherry. That might be a bit much for me, but let’s see how it tastes.

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