Today’s gin is one you might recognise. Caorunn gin is widely available in supermarkets and bars – first time I had it was in a Wetherspoons (FYI, having it with Mediterranean tonic and garnished with an olive and some rosemary is great). Made in the Scottish highlands with 11 botanicals – six traditional and five locally foraged – Caorunn means rowan berry, which (funnily enough) is one of their local botanicals. They also use bog myrtle (sweet and resinous), heather (honeyed and perfumed), Coul Blush apples (crisp and clean) and dandelion leaves for a touch of sharpness. As well as this gin, they have launched a Highland Strength edition – taking the current 41.8% ABV to 54% – and today’s gin, the Scottish Raspberry gin. Using raspberries from Perthshire, this gin could easily be compared to the huge number of pink gins that have flooded the market recently. Caorunn decided to join the fruit gin trend quite late, but have avoided the pink colour. The sweetness of the berries is distilled in their unique copper berry chamber which allows the vibrancy of the fruit to come through, but without the colouring. So, how does it taste?
raspberry gin
Ginvent 2016 – Pinkster Gin
Merry day 12 of Ginmas and today’s Ginvent treat is Pinkster gin. I tried this a few weeks ago when Catriona and I visited the Brighton Gin festival and got rather merry, so it’s nice to have another chance to try this. Pinkster gin is so called after the raspberries used to make it turned the gin a pale pink colour. The raspberries used in the gin are grown locally to their Cambridge base – and any extra are turned into their boozy berries!
It certainly smells sweeter than the usual gin smell, but not in a cloying way. Straight up, it’s quite intense on the tongue, definitely tastes like gin! The sweeter taste is at the back of the throat – just before the burning taste! Mixed with tonic, it’s light and summery. Not too sweet or tart, it’s well balanced with the drier notes. This would go well in a cocktail (I’m thinking half gin, half Prosecco yes?), or used to jazz up some Pimms in the summer. It doesn’t feel quite right drinking it sat in my bedroom with the heating on full blast, but come summer this would be perfect down the beach.
A bottle of Pinkster gin is £30.33 on Master of Malt – I think this is about right, I don’t think I would pay more than £30 for the bottle but in the summer this will be a delight. Pinkster are available on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Let me know what you think about Pinkster over on Twitter and Instagram, and catch up on Ginvent here.