As you may know from this blog or my social media, I work in central London. Just down the road, in fact, from the City of London distillery. Whilst coronavirus might mean we can’t travel or go anywhere, a fantastic deal online meant I pity-bought myself a bottle of their Authentic gin. The Authentic gin is the first gin the distillery launched back in 2012, becoming the first gin distilled in the city of London. The gin itself is pretty simple with just seven botanicals – classic juniper, coriander seed, angelica root and liquorice root alongside a load of citrus peel (orange, lemon and grapefruit). Distilled in a pair of 200l litre stills named Jennifer and Clarissa (after The Two Fat Ladies), the Authentic gin launched and defined the brand that now boasts an impressive nine gins (in fact, I’ve already reviewed their citrus led Six Bells and the Square Mile gin).
city of london gin
City of London Distillery Square Mile gin
A few weeks ago, I went to the City of London Distillery for one of their distillery tours (which I recommend, it was great fun on a Wednesday night [note: I paid for this myself, it wasn’t gifted]). As we left, obviously I bought myself a bottle of gin. The City of London Distillery opened in 2012 on Bride Lane (literally five minutes from my office) with their traditional London Dry gin which was quickly followed by the Square Mile gin that I am trying today. Since then, they have also launched a Sloe gin, an Old Tom gin, their Christopher Wren gin, and a number of flavoured gin such as the Six Bells gin they launched with Craft Gin Club. The Square Mile gin is distilled with juniper, coriander seeds, fresh orange and lemon amongst others and won a Double Gold Award at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition in 2017 which is a pretty big deal. Bottled at 47.3% ABV, it is also the strongest gin they make (I am slightly surprised they haven’t added a navy strength gin to their family, but hey, there’s still time).
Ginvent 2016 – City of London Christopher Wren Gin
It’s Saturday! Day 3 of Ginvent brings us the City of London distillery’s Christopher Wren Londom Dry Gin. City of London distillery produces a range of gins including an Old Tom and a Sloe gin – I’ve heard of them before but never had the chance to try them. London is obviously steeped in history for gin, being home of Mother’s Ruin and the Gin Craze – and indeed inspiring my favourite image of Gin Lane and the crazy drunk mother dropping her baby off a wall. A relatively new distillery, City of London opened in December 2012 and they now have five gins in their arsenal.
It certainly smells zestier than the last two days of gin – sweet orange is a major botanical in this gin which worries me as we all know I hate orange. Fresher than yesterday’s heavy Strane gin, it’s certainly more citrusy than before. Drinking it straight from the glass I pick up the orange straight away, the boy manages to notice is is more citrusy but not specifically orange. It’s alright. I’ll make him do this more often and he’ll learn.
Sticking with the standard Tesco tonic, the orange isn’t as obvious and the flavour becomes more general-citrus – the lemon comes to the front. Boy likes this (probably because he isn’t a freak that hates orange). We both love lemon so this is a good gin.
A 70cl bottle (at 45.3%) is currently £41.95 on Master of Malt. Personally, I’m not convinced I would pay this much for a bottle as it’s not my favourite gin ever, but I’ll certainly keep an eye out in a bar and give it another go.
They are also all over social media and you can find them on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
Let me know what you think of Christopher Wren on Twitter and Instagram – and don’t forget to check out the rest of Ginvent over here.