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.
cornish gin
Caspyn Gin
Note: I met the team behind Caspyn Gin at Imbibe Live and they kindly sent me some samples post-event. As always, I’ll let you know if they’re grim.
Caspyn Gin is the product of Pocketful of Stones distillery, yet another craft gin from Cornwall – this time in Long Rock, just outside Penzance. They currently produce two gins – the Cornish Dry and Midsummer Dry – as well as the Cornish Summer Cup. The original Caspyn gin is loaded with floral and citrus notes using the less regularly used botanicals hibiscus flowers, Japanese tea, gorse and lemongrass. The Midsummer version takes the original gin and infuses it with fresh English cucumbers. This leaves the gin with a slight green tinge (apparently, I can’t quite spot it). The Cornish Summer Cup is their take on the English cup (aka a Pimms to us plebs) loaded with fruit such as raspberries and strawberries mixed with star anise and wild carrot seeds. So all in all, for a small batch distillery, they’ve got a lot going on – there’s an Absinthe in the pipelines. And, more importantly, my bottles arrived with my name on them. So they’re the best.
Curio Gin
I went to Junipalooza last weekend on World Gin Day and I bumped into the folks from Curio gin. After gushing about their branding and having a chat, they kindly gave me a bottle to review properly on the blog. Curio Gin comes from Mullion in Cornwall – a mere 30 minutes from my Dad’s house (Happy Father’s Day Dad!) and has one of my favourite bottle labels ever. Their range includes the Rock Samphire Gin, a Cardamom Vodka, a Cocoa Nib Vodka and their Cornish Cup. Hand foraged on their local cliff tops, the rock samphire is blended and distilled in small batches.