LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM
JENSEN’S GIN COMES FROM THE HEART OF LONDON - DISTILLED IN BERMONDSEY WHICH HAS ALWAYS HAD A STRONG CONNECTION TO GIN.
FOUNDER’S
WELCOME
From Italy to Tasmania, we’ve enjoyed a gin-fuelled few months in which members have sampled some of our favourite bottles. And the international adventures are far from finished. For this volume, we’re transporting you to one of the most famous gin cities in the world. London, of course. We talk to Christian Jensen – founder of Bermondsey Distillery – about his personal quest to find the perfect London dry gin recipe and meet legendary barman Alessandro Palazzi of Dukes, who shares the secret to stirring up a perfect martini.
OUR APRIL MEMBER GIN, JENSEN’S BERMONDSEY DRY GIN FROM LONDON, HAS BEEN DISTILLED TO “TASTE HOW GIN USED TO TASTE”
Ian Hart introduces Sacred Spirits’ award-winning Old Tom Gin as well as their traditional English vermouths, while closer to home we take a look at a range of boutique tonics that are the perfect partner to an array of gin botanicals. This month’s Ginsider is Paul Jackson and, as editor of The Gin Guide, he knows a thing or two about finding the perfect pour. You’ll also find cocktails recipes and a round-up of the best places to sample London’s gin scene when you are next in town. We are so excited to be sharing this month’s bottle with you and would love to hear how you are enjoying the Gin Society experience, so email hello@ ginsociety.com to let us know your thoughts. Until next time, enjoy!
Andrew Burge Founder, Gin Society
VISIT US AT WWW.GINSOCIETY.COM
GIN LIKE IT USED TO BE
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THE HOME TO JENSEN’S GIN IS A CONVERTED ARCH BENEATH THE RAILWAY LINES IN BERMONDSEY, LONDON
G I N
S O C I E T Y
F E A T U R E
J E N S E N ’ S
G I N
G I N
Founded on forgotten recipes and traditional botanicals, Bermondsey Distillery started life as the personal project of gin enthusiast Christian Jensen. Almost 20 years later and its London Dry and Old Tom bottlings are transporting a loyal following of devoted drinkers back in time.
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T I M E T R A V E L I N T O K Y O
Christian Jensen, founder of Jensen’s gin
“Sometimes, you go into a gallery and you know what pieces of art you like but it’s hard to explain in detail why you like them – for example, what is good about a particular painting – and it’s the same with gin,” says Christian. He’s sitting in the converted railway arch that is today home to Bermondsey Distillery and Jensen’s gin. But while Christian might not always have the right words to
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describe the gins he’s drawn to, he certainly knows what he likes – and when starting out, that was the old-style gins he feared were becoming increasingly hard to find. “When I was a student, back in the ’80s and ’90s, I never really got into beer and couldn’t afford champagne. So I drank gin. “But it was while working in Tokyo in 2000 that I realised the supply of good-quality gin was decreasing. I was in a bar and, for no particular reason, I complained about gin not being as good as it used to be. The bartender was in complete agreement.” Comparing a bottle of Gordon’s from the 1960s
EVEN THOUGH JENSEN’S GIN IS A CLASSIC LONDON GIN, CHRISTIAN’S INSPIRATION CAME WHEN HIS BARTENDER IN TOKYO TOLD HIM TO
“Go home
and make some gin.
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// Christian says his
two Jensen’s gins have very different personalities: “Old Tom is like your friend who wants to be the centre of attention all the time. If you want a gin that’s in your face and you’re not going to be able to drown it out with tonic or anything else, the Old Tom is perfect for that.” Unsweetened, earthy and packing a big botanical punch, it has a deep flavour that adds complexity to many drinks.
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JENSEN’S HAVE NOW EXPANDED THEIR OFFERING TO TWO GINS, WITH THE ADDITION OF AN OLD TOM
// In contrast, he
compares the Bermondsey Dry to an old friend who no one ever notices but is always there. Smooth and rounded, with delicate floral and citrus notes, it’s highly versatile and great in a dry martini: “It works with every other combination of your friends – it’s very supportive and it will integrate.”
with a bottle produced that year, Christian became convinced there was a marked difference between the two products – not just in age, but in composition. Thankfully, the owner of the bar – a 20-seat spot situated on the fifth floor of a building adjacent to Roppongi Crossing – indulged his interest by sourcing and serving vintage gins from around the world. Working as software developer by day and learning about gins by night, Christian became a regular. “Every day a couple of blocks of clear ice would be delivered and the team would spend a couple of hours making ice balls and shaved ice by hand,” he recalls. “Sometimes, if I had some time in the afternoon, I would go there and chat with them
READ MORE ABOUT CHARLES IN THE MASTER MAKER ARTICLE ON P24
while they were making ice. It was fascinating.” A few years later, when it was time for Christian to return home to London, the owner presented him with one of his favourite bottles of vintage gin as a leaving present. “He joked, saying, ‘Go home and make some gin. I can’t keep finding this old stuff!’”
G E T T I N G T H E R E C I P E R I G H T The idea of creating his own personal gin supply inspired Christian to contact eighth-generation London distiller Charles Maxwell. “To be honest, he thought it was peculiar and strange that anybody wanted to make gin
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because it was kind of a dead product at the time. He suggested I make vodka because people weren’t really drinking gin.”
up with Charles every few weeks to sample the latest batch. The Jensen’s still under the railway arches
But Christian’s passion saw the project get underway and the pair started formulating recipes. The brief was simple. “I wanted a London Dry – a classic, juniperforward gin. I told Charles I didn’t want any modern botanicals. I just wanted it to taste how gin used to taste. For that reason, we didn’t include any botanicals that couldn’t have been found in London 200 years ago, so that means we worked with things like juniper, of course, coriander, orris, angelica, liquorice and citrus peel.” Christian spent much of the next few months travelling, catching
//
COMING HOME TO BERMONDSEY
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“To this day, it still baffles me that he was willing to put up with me for almost a year,” he says.
“I moved to Bermondsey in 1996 and most of my friends thought I was completely insane. There used to be no one around; now it’s one of the coolest village streets in London,” says Christian, who’s seen Tate Modern and White Cube art galleries and Renzo Piano-designed The Shard skyscraper transform the area over past two decades. And while Borough Market remains one of the city’s main
But the pair’s perseverance paid off. In 2005 and more than 150 iterations later, they reached their goal. “I genuinely felt we ended up with something that I liked more than the bottle I had been given in Tokyo.” Years later, when someone suggested
Christian make an Old Tom gin, it was back to the drawing board. During the 19th century gin craze, London had been home to hundreds of distilleries, but as production moved north, many of the stills were destroyed and the recipes lost. “I spent months researching Old Tom. It took a lot of detective work and I found a collection of notebooks from a distiller in a local London archive who was making around 15 different styles of gins and all kinds of cordials.” Now armed with an Old Tom recipe from 1840, production began on Jensen’s second gin.
Jensen’s tasting room
food hubs, the street-food stalls that line Maltby Street Market and the trail of craft breweries that make up the Bermondsey Beer Mile have attracted a new generation of food and drink enthusiasts. The area has always had a strong connection to gin – though perhaps not for the most glamorous reasons. If you go back a few hundred years, London was basically
just a square mile in size, referred to as the City of London. Dominated by rules and regulations, anything criminal or controversial spilled over to the south side of the river and Bermondsey – think theatre (Shakespeare’s Globe is just a short walk away), prostitution and illicit drinking. By the mid-19th century the area was a centre for trade
and industry thanks to its Thames-side location. It was also a notorious slum. Today, it’s a very different story – old storage warehouses have been turned into apartments, the river bank is perfect for strolling along and the railway arches have been transformed by local business. The enthusiasm for gin, however, remains the same. 9
T H E
S P I R I T L O N D O N
Working out the perfect recipe hasn’t been the only hurdle along the way. In order to purchase his London Dry gin, Christian had to get a licence. And that meant setting up a business. After ticking that box and deciding on the name Bermondsey Distillery, the next step was to think about how much to distil. “The minimum amount is half a still. Just to start the machine costs the same for one bottle as it does for 1200 bottles. So my initial order - of gin for myself - was 100 cases of 12,” laughs Christian. Bottles were hastily selected from a glass reseller next door (they are the same bottles you see today) while labels were made by a graphic designer friend.
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O F
Just a few weeks later, Christian had his Bermondsey Dry gin – made according to London Dry rules and distilled in London. “There is a very strong connection between gin and London. You could make whiskey here, but I don’t think it’s the right place. It’s not the place to make whiskey and it’s not the place to make rum – it’s the place to make gin.” But as the reality of drinking all that gin by himself sunk in, Christian shoved a couple of bottles in his coat pockets and headed to nearby Borough Market to see if he could drum up some interest. A wine bar and bottle shop called Bedales was one of his first customers
THE TOWER BRIDGE IS FEATURED ON JENSEN’S GIN BOTTLES AND PAYS TRIBUTE TO JENSEN’S SOUTH-OF-THE-RIVER SURROUNDS
after the owner tasted the gin and, like Christian in that Tokyo bar, was reminded just how good an old-style gin can be.
a railway arch on Stanworth Street in Bermondsey, the distillery attracted the attention of PhD student Anne Brock.
“It got a bit scary going into the market at the weekends. I would go downstairs to the shop and I would hear these half-finished tales about this lunatic making gin in his bathtub! I didn’t want to be recognised in case I had to keep the story going.”
“She had studied organic chemistry and didn’t want to end up in pharma. She was interested in craft gin, and I felt she would be perfect so we appointed her to set up the lab.”
Fiction aside, the gin spoke for itself. And before the days of social media, word-ofmouth saw more and more people sample the spirit.
A S S E M B L I N G T H E T E A M Fast-forward to 2012 and Christian decided his birthday present that year would be a still to take production in-house. “I wanted a Londonmade still, so I ordered one from John Dore & Co,” he says. Having
moved
into
Master distiller in place, the team started making gin at their new premises in 2014 - and a new home called for new labels. “Between us it took 13 months to decide on the new label. It had to be premium but not too fancy. It had to explain the story.” The Tower Bridge icon pays tribute to Jensen’s south-of-theriver surrounds while the text explains the inspiration behind the liquid. Perhaps the most important words on the label, however, are those central to Christian’s philosophy, who has now taken over the position of master distiller: “Gin as it was. Gin as it should be.”
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THE GINSIDER
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ROSE GOLD MARTINI
Launched in 2014, The Gin Guide is a who’s who of the best gins and gin distilleries in the world. The site aims to help people in their gin-fuelled explorations while suggesting new producers and uncovering the bottles that bartenders return to time and time again. We caught up with its London-based editor – spirits judge and writer Paul Jackson – for this edition’s Ginsider.
What was your introduction to gin? Many years ago, a friend of mine ordered a G&T when we were at a bar. I was intrigued so I ordered the same, and the rest is history. From there it was gin bars such as Two One Four in Bermondsey that were ahead of the game and were catalysts for my discovery of gin. I was quickly captivated by the diversity and quality of the emerging gin market, which at the time was still comparatively small and growing under the radar. Do you have a preferred way to drink gin? Different gins and different moods always inspire different servings. However, you’ll often catch me with a classic G&T, a Negroni, or a Martinez – a hugely underrated gin cocktail. I’m happiest with simple and highquality servings that allow the spirits to shine through.
PA UL JA C KSON
“
THE MARTINEZ IS A HUGELY UNDERRATED GIN COCKTAIL
ROSE GOLD MARTINI RECIPE 50mL of gin 20mL of dry white vermouth 15mL of Campari a single drop of orange bitters. // Stir well with ice and served in a chilled martini glass or coupe. Rose petal to garnish.
Where do you go when you want to discover a new gin? My inbox! Everyday I’m introduced to new gins from across the world. It’s still so exciting to hear about them, to get to know the teams behind the gins and to become part of their journey. The Gin Guide HQ is home to many hundreds of quality gins, and London has some great cocktail bars that always have something new or special hidden away. Why did you establish The Gin Guide? When first discovering gin I couldn’t find the impartial information, tasting notes, recommendations,
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advice and insights I was looking for. So I created The Gin Guide as a platform to enable gin lovers to learn more about their favourite gins and discover new gins, meanwhile helping quality gin producers have a voice and tell their stories. It’s all about supporting and celebrating the gin industry and the exceptional products, distilleries and people in it.
What does your personal gin collection look like? It looks more like a gin problem than a gin collection! And in terms of storage it really is a problem – London property prices unfortunately don’t cater for needing a gin cellar. It’s such a privilege to have a personal collection of incredible spirits to enjoy and share, including some
PAUL’S DESERT ISLAND GINS BIGGAR Founded by brothers Euan and Stuart McVicar at the bottom of Tinto Hill near the small town of Biggar, this gin is third-party distilled at the renowned Strathearn Distillery in Perth and features locally sourced botanicals including rosehip, rowanberry and nettles, alongside traditional elements such as juniper and orange. Shortly after launching, Biggar Gin won the London Dry Gin category at The Gin Guide Awards 2018. TASTING NOTES: A flavoursome and moreish London dry gin that impressively balances sweet and savoury, freshness and spice, florals and woodiness. Combines juniper, citrus and herbaceous characters with gentle woody, spice and sweet notes.
GREENSAND RIDGE The sustainable production of Greensand
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Ridge gin is truly impressive, from recycling and renewable energy to collaborating with local farmers and supermarkets to utilise excess crops and produce. It is an admirable ethos backed up by an equally admirable gin. TASTING NOTES: Savoury and herbaceous flavours that are beautifully balanced with piney juniper, subtle sweetness from the honey, floral notes of gorse, spice from cassia bark, and citrus, nutty and grassy notes.
UNDERGROUND SPIRITS Underground Spirits has patented their own filtration method using very cold temperatures and very fine filters to eliminate impurities and produce a pure, clean spirit. The gin features 10 botanicals ranging from traditional inclusions to poppy seeds, basil and native Australian botanicals such as Tasmanian pepperberry and river mint. TASTING NOTES: A superbly clean and smooth gin, with a punchy heart of piney juniper and pepper. There’s a balance of citrus and mint freshness as well as the earthier, savoury notes of the spices and basil.
TWO ONE FOUR BERMONDSEY, LONDON
WITH OVER 100 DIFFERENT GINS, TWO ONE FOUR WAS ONE OF THE BARS THAT WAS A CATALYST FOR PAUL’S INTEREST IN GIN
limited edition, vintage and first-batch gins that are very special.
around the world – this city has truly embraced the spirit.
If you were stuck on a desert island, what three gins would you bring with you and why? With so many favourites I could never truly narrow it down to three. At a recent tasting we hosted, gins from Biggar (made at Strathearn Distillery) and Greensand Ridge – both based in the UK – and Underground Spirits from Canberra got the popular vote.
Any signature gin cocktail recipes you’d like to share? Last year we developed a Rose Gold Martini as part of a collaboration with That Boutique-y Gin Company, with 50mL of gin, 20mL of dry white vermouth, 15mL of Campari and a single drop of orange bitters – stirred well with ice and served in a chilled martini glass or coupe. Delicious!
What makes the London gin scene so exciting? You can’t move for gin bars, distilleries, events, festivals, tours, pop-ups and even boat cruises in London. So many of them are worthy and wonderful, despite the need to watch out for a few gimmicks here and there. There’s nowhere else you can find so many opportunities and different ways to discover and enjoy gins from
What do you look for in a great bar? The very best bars have a real understanding of spirits, cocktails and their customers. To stand out above the rest, a winning combination is to have knowledgeable and skilled bartenders who are passionate about their work, along with a setting with personality, an enticing range of spirits, and both classic and creative cocktails. When a bar has an
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amazing backdrop like the copper stills on show – like at the City of London Distillery’s bar – it’s a real bonus too. What was the last bottle of gin you bought and why? Gin is never in short supply at The Gin Guide HQ, but I did buy a bottle of Old Bakery Gin recently – I’ve known the team there since they launched in 2016. I spotted a bottle in a wine shop and realised I hadn’t had their gin in a little while. Plus ‘The Gin Guide Awards Winner’ sticker on the bottle caught my eye! If you could travel to any city or country in the world to sample their gin, where would it be? Gin is reaching every corner of the world and some of the gins being produced in the likes of Australia, South Africa
City of London Distillery bar
PAUL’S GIN LIST Two One Four: https://www.two1four.com/ Biggar Gin: https://www.biggargin.com/ Greensand Ridge: https://www.greensanddistillery.com/ Underground Spirits: https://www.undergroundspirits.com.au/ That Boutique-y Gin Company: https://www.thatboutiqueygincompany.com/ City of London Distillery: https://www.cityoflondondistillery.com/ Old Bakery Gin: https://www.oldbakerygin.com/
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CHECK OUT PAUL’S GIN GUIDE AT THEGINGUIDE.COM
and Europe are simply stunning. The Gin Guide’s ‘World of Gin’ series features distillers and gins from different countries that you may not associate with gin, and through that I’ve become intrigued by Japan’s growing interest in gin and gin production. So I’d love to visit Japan to investigate that more. Hopefully we’ll see Japan in the Gin Journal soon!
CITY SIPPERS 17
CITY OF LONDON DISTILLERY 22-24 BRIDE LANE, LONDON EC4Y 8DT
A working distillery with an onsite bar, this place puts London front and centre with a selection of local gins like The Square Mile, City of London and Christopher Wren (the architect behind St Paul’s), in addition to Old Tom and Sloe Gin varieties. It opened in 2012 as an ode to London’s gin-making history, but also to showcase what could be achieved with improved distillation techniques, modern botanicals and an experimental approach. Grab a seat overlooking the three cooper pot stills and order a G&T.
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City of London Distillery
FROM UNDER-THE-RADAR BARS BELOVED BY AFICIONADOS TO SPECIALIST VENUES OFFERING AN EXTRA-SPECIAL EXPERIENCE, HERE ARE THE BEST PLACES TO GET TO GRIPS WITH THE CITY’S SPIRIT SCENE.
A Negroni at Bar Termini
CITY SIPPERS LONDON
BAR TERMINI
7 OLD COMPTON STREET, LONDON W1D 5JE
Bar Termini
Negronis are the order of the evening at this smart Soho spot. An Italian coffee bar by day, once the sun sets the focus is on aperitivi and housemade classic, superior,
rosato and robusto negronis that have been specially crafted by Tony Conigliaro – an internationally renowned maestro of mixology. It’s a small space but the white-jacketed waiters somehow find a way to ensure every table is well looked after.
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TWO ONE FOUR
214 BERMONDSEY STREET, LONDON SE1 3TQ
GIN & BEER
UNIT 2, RESOLUTION WAY, LONDON SE8 4NT
Worlds collide at this Deptford bar, where Belgian beers sit happily alongside gins organised into classic, complex, citrus and sweet. If you want the full hops-meetjuniper experience, there are a number of cocktails that feature both – like the Sloe Whip that’s made with Tarquin’s blackberry gin, wheat beer, apple juice and mint. Generous cheese and charcuterie plates provide added sustenance.
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Situated at - you guessed it - 214 Bermondsey Street, this intimate bar’s menu features more than 100 gins and is divided into sections including: New Europeans, And Now For Something Completely Different, and The Fruit Infused. It’s also home to the UK’s first smallbatch tonic water, Bermondsey Tonic
Water (BTW), which is made following a traditional Victorian recipe and relies on naturally occurring quinine from cinchona tree bark, as opposed to quinine extract. This results in a smooth tonic that allows the gin’s botanicals to shine through in a G&T. Jensen’s London Dry, BTW and BOLD liqueur (another London-based spirit) feature in the Cherry Collins. See Two One Four image p15
Gin & Beer
CITY SIPPERS LONDON
Dukes Bar
DUKES BAR
Alessandro Palazzi, bar manager at Dukes Bar
35 ST JAMES’S PLACE, LONDON SW1A 1NY
A pilgrimage site for James Bond fans, bar manager Alessandro Palazzi shakes and stirs martinis featuring Sacred English Dry Vermouth and Sacred English Amber Vermouth. Not only was Dukes Bar a favourite haunt for author Ian Fleming, it was also here that he invented the Vesper Martini. Make like 007 and order the drink that rose to fame in Casino Royale before soaking up the old-school ambiance of
this attractive hotel bar in Mayfair. This place might be an institution, but don’t let its no-music policy and no-trainers dress code put you off – the bartenders are more friendly than formal. With five shots of spirits in every glass, Alessandro limits his customers’ orders to two drinks each – grab a spot on one of the blue velvet chairs if you start to feel the effects.
READ MORE ABOUT ALESSANDRO IN MIXING THINGS UP ARTICLE ON P37
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GinTonica
GINTONICA
186 PORTOBELLO ROAD, LONDON W11 1LA
Gin heaven comes to Notting Hill. After all, what else would you expect from a four-storey building called The Distillery? At the home of Portobello Road Gin, you’ll find drinking dens, a restaurant and even a bed for the night, but the highlight has to be the Spanishinspired GinTonica bar. Ice-cold copa glasses hold gins from an international list, while tonics and trimmings have been specially selected. Continuing the Basque bonanza, the food menu is packed with tapas and traditional Spanish recipes.
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GRAPHIC
4 GOLDEN SQUARE, LONDON W1F 9HT
This Soho bar prides itself on taking an arty approach to gin with its Instagram-friendly ‘Paint Tin Punches’. But don’t let these colourful creations fool you – this place is serious about gin and stocks one of the largest selections in the UK. Speciality G&Ts feature fresh ingredients like carrot, lavender and seaweed, while classic cocktails are artfully executed. The monthly gin social events are a great way to meet fellow enthusiasts.
The London Gin Club
Graphic
CITY SIPPERS LONDON
THE LONDON GIN CLUB 22 GREAT CHAPEL STREET, LONDON W1F 8FR
Ever give much thought to the glass you drink from or the ice you add? This Soho spot certainly does. Taking a forensic approach to its gin and tonics, double measures from the 200-odd bottle list are poured into huge copa glasses to ensure maximum fragrance is released from the gin’s botanicals. Then the ice, which is twice-frozen and hand-cracked because too much water would dilute the
flavour. Topping it all off, fresh garnishes are picked specifically to match each and every drink. It might sound geeky, but all this precision makes for a glorious G&T.
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Charles Maxwell
THE MASTER MAKER 24
Having spent the past two decades developing recipes and distilling spirits for both emerging and established brands, London-based gin maker Charles Maxwell certainly knows his stuff. Here, the founder of Thames Distillers charts his path from concept to finished craft gin.
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OF COURSE LONDON DRY GIN CAN BE MADE ANYWHERE IN THE recent surge in gin’s W O R L D , but the people want to make popularity, but swears it their gins in London because it gives them an authentic heritage,” says Charles, acknowledging a failed bid by ginmakers across the city some years ago to secure geographical indication (GI) for the style – a move that would have restricted where London dry gins could be distilled. “But why do people come to us? I like to think it’s because they think we do a reasonable job.” He doesn’t need to be modest. Having worked in the drinks industry for over 40 years, Charles has created more than 130 gin recipes since founding Thames Distillery in 1996. He says he would love to take credit for predicting
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was just luck. “I was determined gin would have a better future than it did when I established the distillery,” he says. “But I didn’t quite see how I was going to develop it. Thankfully, something called Hendrick’s came along and knocked down a host of doors.” However, his approach to creating custom spirits for his clients clearly involves more than a healthy dose of luck – several of his bottles have won gold and silver medals at the International Wine & Spirit Competition over the years, and the distillery has established a worldwide reputation as a go-to place for wannabe ginsmiths.
WRITING A RECIPE FOR SUCCESS “We offer a confidential recipe-development service,” says Charles. “It’s a methodical process, although nothing is ever certain because the glorious thing about making gin is that if you change just one of the botanical proportions you get a very different spirit. And you don’t know exactly what the differences will be until you do it.” He says people often come to him with an idea of the botanicals they want to focus on, and these can range from near or far. “Someone approached us looking to make a gin that featured botanicals sourced from all four corners of the world, whereas we made Gordon Castle Gin using botanicals native to Scotland that had been grown in their walled garden.” It’s the potential to experiment that is so attractive to Charles: “The juniper is the leader of the orchestra, and everything
else comes in behind – you might only have a little group of players or you might have a thundering, massive symphony. That’s the fun of it.” He points to 20 years ago, when even the handful of gins on the market – from Beefeater to Bombay Sapphire – had markedly different flavour profiles. “You don’t need to have the best palate in the world to very quickly see these are very different products,” he says. What’s the strangest request he’s ever received? “Years ago, someone wanted to make a cannabis gin.” He declined at the time, but is now watching with interest as some countries slowly start to embrace cannabis oil as an ingredient. “Of course, we know how to make a traditional London dry gin, but that doesn’t mean all the gins we make are traditional. We’re not frightened to try doing something a little different.”
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MAKING IT WORK IN THE REAL WORLD “We’ve got clients in Hong Kong, Singapore, the US and all the way across Europe in Spain, Germany, Scandinavia. I’m even talking to somebody in Estonia – because gin has grown out of its old traditional markets.”
Again, Charles puts a lot of the distillery’s success down to location. “In overseas markets there is a feeling that if London gin has been made in London, then it has been made in the right place.” But this doesn’t do credit to the care and attention with which he nurtures each new gin. “The process varies but we always try to get people to come
PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE: People have been making and drinking gin in the city for hundreds of years, but you might not have heard of one of its oldest and most influential brands: Nicholson, which started production in 1736. Predating Gordon’s by four decades, the family-run distillery seems to have a knack for popping up in the history books – and recipe books. Pioneered by brothers John and William Nicholson and made with 10 botanicals, their London Dry Gin was specifically mentioned in some of the most influential drinks books of the 1930s – from Harry t The Savoy Cocktail Book to The Waldorf Astoria Bar Book.
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SAVOY COCKTAIL MENU SNIPPETS
A LONG LEGACY It was nicknamed the ‘cricketer’s gin’ after William Nicholson loaned money to the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) to purchase the freehold of Lord’s Cricket Ground in 1866. The club was so grateful it went on to adopt the label’s redand-yellow THE MCC MEMBER TIE stripes
and taste their gin with us. We urge them to think about what happens when you aren’t sitting and sipping it with water. Only 1% of their customers will do that, 99% will add ice, tonic and a slice of something. We advise them to make a martini with it and see how the gin falls. Then we can adjust and make other iterations.” This all takes place through
laboratory distillation and, when the final recipe has been agreed upon, it can be replicated in the stills. Most stick with Thames as their contract distiller, some eventually go on to bring the distillation in-house, like Jensen’s and 6 O’clock Gin. In a few rare cases, the recipe is taken elsewhere, for example Elephant Gin that’s distilled by a German eau de vie maker. But before hitting the stills, the gin needs a story. “Almost certainly whatever someone wants can
A SHARED GIN HISTORY (affectionately called ‘eggs and bacon’) for their uniform. And once Nicholson had a permanent home at the Three Mills Distillery in Bromleyby-Bow, East London, its influence was felt across the city. Bought by J&W Nicholson & Co in 1873, it was here that the neutral grain spirit once used by Tanqueray and Gordon’s was made.
THREE MILLS DISTILLERY
The distillery was turned into a top-secret research laboratory by royal order as part of the war effort in 1916.
Then during World War II its warehouses were bombed in the London Blitz. The company ran into further trouble after the war, as a lack of available grain forced the family to cease production.
THE HERITAGE DISTILLER IS BACK IN ACTION Fast-forward to 2017 and Nicholson has returned to London’s bars and bottle shops, with the distillation process being carried out under the watchful eye of Charles. It’s a reunion of sorts – Charles himself comes from a long line of gin-distilling ancestors and, at one point, his family’s old Finsbury Distillery once contracted gin
production to Nicholson in order to make more of their Stone’s Original Ginger Wine. Seems the gin renaissance we are currently enjoying was still a little way off. Charles always stresses the importance of having attached a unique story to a gin, and the Nicholson family hasn’t had to look far. Today, great-great-greatgrandson Milo is busy sharing their fascinating legacy. And with possibleLAMPLIGHTER plans to revive DRY GIN the 1960s recipe for Nicholson Lamplighter Dry Gin, the future is burning bright for the brand.
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be made. The hard thing is what are you going to do to make sure people buy? With 700 to 800 gins in the market, what are you going to do to cut through?”
A HIGHLY PERSONAL PROJECT It’s a question Charles has considered himself, as he ponders the possibility of creating his own recipe. “What I’m looking to do is create something that has definite
history – it must have a genuine reason behind it, not just because you could use a botanical that no one else is using.” He reels off
unique selling points and marketing success stories of big brands, hyperaware of the need to come up with a spirit that really grabs attention. What made Bombay Sapphire successful? It distracted people from vodka and had an attractive, slightly sweet floral taste due to the botanicals that had been placed in the still’s copper baskets. Add to that the fact they worked with a glass company that had just developed the ability to spray the glass blue. And then there’s Hendrick’s. “This is why I need to think carefully,” says Charles. “When that came out, I thought, no one buys gin in a brown bottle.
WHAT’S WITH THE CUCUMBER & ROSE THING?
Shows how much I know. It worked though, and they changed people’s perception of gin.”
the
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He declines to answer my questions about what the future might hold for this highly personal project, simply saying: “I have ideas squirrelling around in my head, but they are not allowed out yet.” We can only imagine it will be something special.
JUST THE TONIC
What happens when an award-winning bartender helps create mixers that are made to mingle with today’s diverse and delicious craft gins? Artisan Drinks, that’s what. Mikey Enright from Sydney’s celebrated The Barber Shop explains.
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Mikey Enright
“
BACK IN THE DAY, PEOPLE USED TO RETIRE AND OPEN A B&B,
now they retire and build a distillery,” says Mikey, and we can’t help but agree that the Australian craft gin market is booming. But what about tonics? “The premium mixer market was stagnant so long, and while cocktails were booming, no one was really thinking about tonics.” Of course, Fever-Tree has enjoyed considerable
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success is this space over recent years, and Artisan Drinks creator Steve Cooper felt it was only right to give consumers more choice. “We’ve tried to keep our tonics relatively traditional while tailoring them to Australian gins that don’t tend to use much juniper, even for a dry style gin,” says Mikey. “The gins here often have a much more native botanical focus, with 100% natural ingredients like lemon myrtle, river mint, Dorrigo pepper, strawberry gum.” That said, taste tests have revealed the Classic London Tonic is a perfect partner to Londondistilled Jensen’s. “With a dry tonic, you can’t have too many flavours – you have the citrus balance, the cinchona bark and the quinine – but most importantly you have to ensure that it can cater to a lot of those different gins out there.”
SYDNEYSIDERS FLOCK TO THE BARBER SHOP TO SAMPLE MIKEY’S AWARD-WINNING COCKTAILS
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CLASSIC LONDON TONIC
The perfect partner to a London Dry Gin, this is a classic tonic that features natural citrus flavours and subtle botanical notes of cinchona bark – a traditional source of quinine.
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SKINNY LONDON TONIC
Aromatic botanicals combine with orange and lemon essences in this tonic that has lower levels of naturally occurring sugar than most while still providing the perfect balance to the quinine’s crispness and dry finish.
VIOLET BLOSSOM TONIC
The lilac hue of this full-flavour tonic is just as memorable as its vibrant bouquet of violet, elderflower and apple blossom. It can be enjoyed as a standalone soft drink or used to add a delicately perfumed complexity to a craft gin.
BARREL SMOKED COLA
Delicious with rum or whiskey – whether it’s Scottish, Irish or American – this cola is aged in barrique barrels in order to add a smoky side to the distinctive bitterness of the cola nut.
JENSEN’S AT THE BARBER SHOP
Jensen’s Old Tom features in the Old Tom & Sloe Gin Cocktails section of The Barber Shop’s drinks menu. Try it for yourself in a T O M C A T G I M L E T that’s mixed with passionfruit, lime cordial, maraschino and Angostura bitters. The menu allows for plenty of exploration with London Dry Cocktails, New Western Dry Cocktails and Genever Cocktails sections too.
RETHINKING THE CLASSIC G&T With three tonics and a barrelsmoked cola to play with, and a few more creations in the pipeline, Mikey’s been busy concocting cocktails to complement the Artisan Drinks range. That includes playing around with gin and tonic combinations, a simple drink he believes we should be all be embracing. “For a long time, vodka and soda was a really popular drink because it is sugarless and there’s a portion of people here in Sydney who are very health-conscious.” In a bid to get people drinking more gin and tonics, The Barber Shop team decided to put their house gin on tap at the speakeasy-style York Street bar. It’s certainly a talking point and, to further aid education, bartenders come up with special recipes to showcase their ‘gin of the month’ while the newly released menu features The Gin Tonica section.
“It’s inspired by the Spanish approach to the gin and tonic, and served in an oversize wine glass called a copa glass. We add 150 to 200mL of tonic and have an array of different garnishes. It’s all about introducing people to the idea of having the spirit and the tonic served together in one large glass.” The choice ranges from Brookie’s Gin, served with strawberry, black pepper, thyme, lime and Artisan Classic London Tonic, to the nonalcoholic Seedlip 94 that’s made with orange, coffee beans, lemon and Artisan Skinny London Tonic. With stylish labels specially created by graphic artist Alan Walsh, Mikey says the mixers are intended to attract and inspire amateur cocktail makers too. “People are getting much more adventurous and experimenting with new flavours – the G&T is the simplest kind of cocktail you can make at home.” 35
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Alessandro Palazzi
M I X I N G T H I N G S U P Order a martini at Dukes Bar and you might just enjoy the pleasure of long-time bar manager Alessandro Palazzi serving you from his tableside trolley.
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ALESSANDRO MIXES A COCKTAIL ON ONE OF HIS FAMOUS TABLESIDE TROLLIES
“A visit to Dukes is like living and breathing old England,” says Alessandro. And having worked here for 12 years, he knows the hotel better than anyone. Situated on a quiet Mayfair street, surrounded by handsome red-brick buildings, Dukes Bar immediately impresses guests with its intimate atmosphere and stellar service. There’s no music and no food, ¬apart from little bowls of olives and salted nuts – after all, something has to soak up the spirited concoctions. Absolutely nothing distracts from the main attraction: the expertly crafted cocktails.
GETTING BEHIND THE BAR Born in Italy in 1958, Alessandro’s first taste of the hospitality industry came at just 14 years old, having landed a job as a
waiter. “I didn’t know which way to put the knife and the fork,” he remembers. A stint at a second restaurant in Loreto wasn’t any more successful. Home to a shrine dedicated to the Virgin Mary, the hill town in Le Marche attracts pilgrims from all over the world. When a young Alessandro had a minor altercation with one of his customers, he was quickly whisked away from the restaurant floor and installed behind the bar – let’s just say there was no room for slang amid the intensely religious atmosphere. And while the devout onlookers might not have approved, the experience quickly turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened to him. “I wasn’t old enough to serve alcohol, but I quickly realised how differently I was being treated. When you work at a bar, people want to know about you, to find out who you are,” he says.
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Dukes Bar
This set him on the path to attending catering college, and he later hitchhiked his way to London in 1975, working as a kitchen porter or making coffee – anything to get him closer to his calling. Meeting Alessandro today, it’s hard to imagine he’s capable of uttering a crass word. Dressed in his smart white jacket, his professional yet friendly manner infuses Dukes with a sense of calm even when the place is packed. He is constantly on the move – grabbing an ice-cold bottle of gin from the freezer, welcoming familiar faces, consulting the jam-packed reservations book and switching to Italian as
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he quietly instructs his second-in-command.
CHAMPIONING PASSIONATE PRODUCERS A member of The Gin Guild, which was incorporated by Royal Charter in 1638 by London’s Worshipful Company of Distillers, Alessandro is always enthusiastic to support smaller brands who are passionate about what they do. While we are talking, he proudly produces a bottle of his latest discovery – a gin made with potatoes in Norway. He shows off a photo on his phone in which he is dwarfed by the
bearded distiller. “It doesn’t matter where a gin is from, so long as the people making it have passion,” he says. Alessandro himself finds it impossible to conceal his own enthusiasm. “I knew gin would come back into fashion, and I was right.” He also predicted the popularity of vermouth. It was a desire to have two specially created versions of the fortified wine that led him to Sacred Spirits and the vermouths on which he collaborated with Ian Hart, English Dry and English Spiced. WE CHAT WITH IAN HART OF SACRED GIN IN SCIENCE MEETS SPIRITS ON P44
GINS TO WATCH You don’t need a room at the hotel to secure a table at the bar. But when guests are staying for a few nights, Alessandro makes it his mission to take them on a tasting tour of the world’s best gins. He is currently excited about three gins from three very different parts of the world.
ORTODOXY DICTADOR DISTILLERY COLOMBIA From one of the finest rum producers in the world, this offering is aged in rum barrels. Aromas of mint, lemon and pepper give way to cinnamon, blueberry and ginger in a SouthAmerica-meets-theCaribbean creation.
PROCERA GIN KENYA It’s juniper, but not as we know it. This is the first and only gin to be crafted using African juniper (juniperus procera). It’s grown at high altitude and distilled fresh, as opposed to European juniper that is distilled dried. It’s beautifully presented in a bottle that’s been made by a celebrated glass-blowing artist in East Africa.
BAREKSTEN OSS CRAFT DISTILLERY NORWAY Inspired by local legends featuring forest spirits, this gin’s base spirit is made with potatoes and flavoured with berry botanicals and caraway – the result is an earthy and oaky flavour. The distillery also makes an aquavit and blueberry liqueur.
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THE MAKING OF A MARTINI “A martini is so simple, so it’s horrible when it’s not made well.” No worries about that here. To say there’s a touch of theatre to the proceedings is a serious understatement. Alessandro pushes over one of the worn wooden trolleys that have become beloved members of the bar team. This one has a plaque with ‘1908’ on it. A splash of English Dry Vermouth is quickly swirled around a chilled glass – “it must be a small martini glass” – and then poured onto the carpeted floor with a flourish. A coating of the bone-dry liquid is all that’s required.
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Next, a generous slug of ice-cold, viscous gin is added before the final ingredient – the zest of an organic lemon from Amalfi or a Seville orange. “The citrus is the third ingredient,” he says. “As the oil sinks it changes the flavour.” At the equivalent of five shots, it’s no wonder Alessandro has a twomartini maximum rule. As always, his cocktailmaking skills are in high demand the evening we visit, but he’s characteristically humble: “There’s no secret. Anyone can make this drink. My mission is simply to serve something beautiful.”
TO MAKE THE PERFECT MARTINI, ALESSANDRO ‘RINSES’ THE MARTINI GLASS WITH DRY VERMOUTH BEFORE ADDING GIN AND CITRUS ZEST
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SCIENCE MEETS SPIRITS
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IAN HART ADDS ORGANIC BOTANICALS DURING THE VACUUM DISTILLATION PROCESS
WHAT DO CHEMISTRY AND COCKTAILS HAVE IN COMMON? QUITE A LOT, IF SACRED SPIRITS ARE ANYTHING TO GO BY. WE CAUGHT UP WITH IAN HART, OWNER OF THE SACRED MICRODISTILLERY, TO TALK ABOUT HOW HE AND HIS PARTNER HILARY WHITNEY CAME UP WITH THE FORMULA FOR AN AWARD-WINNING GIN. The bottle wears a black collar with a bell on it. The label features a foureyed cat. Take a look at the metal name tag and you’ll see you are holding Old Tom. It’s the perfect present for feline fanatics, but it’s what’s inside the bottle that really gets people excited. Having won its category at the World Gin Awards, it’s a stunning example of Ian’s ability to bring out the best of whatever botanical he is working with. In the case of Old Tom, that’s a high proportion of juniper root along with mint, fennel, aniseed and caraway, while orange peel adds a literal twist.
A CURIOUS MIND Armed with a degree in natural sciences from Cambridge
University, Ian took a winding route to his Highgate distillery – via training to be a doctor and a stint as a Wall Street trader. But it was his passion for re-engineering fine Bordeaux wines that ultimately led him to set up Sacred Spirits in 2009. “You might smell a wine and say something reminds you of orange blossom, cherry, vanilla, tobacco, coffee, cedar, spice box, fresh squeezed orange peel and so on,” says Ian. “What fascinated me was the idea that you could capture the bouquet of wine.” It was his curiosity that led Ian to vacuum distillation. “I realised you could blend the top notes of a white burgundy with the bottom notes of a red and vice versa. I had succeeded in what I wanted 45
to do, but it wasn’t really my product so I turned my attention to gin.” Ian started experimenting, developing recipes and recording the outcome of various techniques using traditional, organically sourced botanicals, as well as more exotic varieties.
A LIBRARY OF BOTANICALS “If you think about the 500,000 known varieties of plants, shrubs and spices, they are much more varied than grapes. Yes, you have red or white grapes – Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Malbec and so on. But the difference between pink grapefruit and cinnamon bark or coriander and pine resin is much more diverse. Vacuum distillation is a much broader tool if you open it up to the complete known range of botanicals, rather than just grapes.” Having developed a London Dry Gin, Ian started selling bottles to his local pub, The Wrestlers. True to his experimental nature, the gin featured an unusual botanical – frankincense, which has the Latin title Boswellia sacra. And so it was these early bottlings that gave the distillery its name. Ian remembers a lot of education was needed in the beginning, compared with today when discerning drinkers actively search out artisan brands. “People used to look at our bottle and think it was either poisonous or illegal, or both! All because it didn’t have a name they recognised on the label.”
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Gin-blending sessions helped spread the word while revealing to Ian that some
people really like certain botanicals. As a result, a number of standalone Sacred gins now feature 90% of a particular botanical – from pink grapefruit to cardamom. Recipes have hailed from several sources over the years. In the past, Ian has replicated a gin based on the archives of F Scott Fitzgerald, while spice specimens recorded during the Dutch East India
MAKE YOUR OWN MARTINEZ
AS SERVED BY ALESSANDRO PALAZZI AT DUKES BAR IN MAYFAIR
Add two drops of orange bitters and two drops of maraschino liqueur to a chilled martini glass. Pour in a halfshot of Sacred English Spiced Vermouth and two shots of Sacred Old Tom directly from the freezer. Garnish with a pared orange zest. Company’s global explorations have provided aromatic and flavourful inspiration. However, the majority of Sacred gins are the result of Ian’s experimentation, and each and every one starts life as organic botanicals that are macerated in English wheat spirit for four to six weeks to release maximum flavour and aroma. These rich extracts are then distilled separately, allowing Ian to try out multiple flavour combinations before blending them together. Add bespoke hand-blown glass apparatus that provides Ian with control over the production process and the Sacred science experiment is complete.
THE PERFECT PARTNERSHIP While Ian’s current laboratory is the family home – where distilling
The Martinez
takes place in earnest while the team searches for a second site – his quest for creating new spirits shows no sign of slowing down. “I’ve been studying the genetics behind grapefruit,” says Ian. “We all love lemons, oranges and limes, but there’s something different about grapefruit.”
He goes on to talk about compounds and interactions, and it’s this painstaking attention to how things work together – or don’t work together – that led him to expand the Sacred Spirits family to include vermouth. After all, you can’t make a martini without it. A collaboration with Alessandro Palazzi at Dukes Bar resulted in the development of two varieties. The first is an English Dry, which is in fact so dry it’s almost undrinkable, according to Ian, who admits: “When we were coming up with it I wasn’t brave enough to put in no sugar at all. But when Alessandro tried the sample, he noticed immediately and was adamant that no sugar should be added.” With three entries in cocktail-maker’s bible The Waldorf Astoria Bar Book, it’s clearly made its mark. And at 21.8% ABV, it’s about as strong as a fortified wine can get before it’s a spirit. Ian
and Alessandro’s focus then turned to the fictional Vesper Martini, popularised in the film Casino Royale. Here, Sacred English Amber Vermouth takes the place of Kina Lillet in Bond’s original recipe. “I managed to buy two bottles – one from 1964 and one from 1969,” says Ian, who used his vintage vermouths to come up with a Sacred version. “It’s a completely different style of vermouth. It’s got sweet orange peel and orris.” A third vermouth, English Spiced, is best suited to Martinez – and that brings us full circle and back to Old Tom. “It’s a historic gin, and the Martinez is a classic use of it,” says Ian who, not surprisingly, spent serious time perfecting his version. Naturally sweetened with liquorice root in the traditional manner, this 18th-century tipple has been given a new lease of life – it seems this oldmeets-new approach truly is the perfect partnership. 47
THE REVIEW: JENSEN’S BERMONDSEY DRY GIN
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Each month, a Gin Society expert reviews our featured tipple of the month before concocting a special recipe for our members. April’s mixologist extraordinaire is Mikey Enright, proprietor of The Barber Shop in Sydney. Here’s his take on Jensen’s Bermondsey Dry Gin.
GIN REVIEW
4.6 5 MIKEY’S TASTING NOTES
Jensen’s Bermondsey Dry Gin is a classic London dry style gin, and this is evident from the nose forward. I find the aroma has subtle notes of pine, eucalyptus and juniper, but it’s almost slightly soapy, too. It’s certainly well rounded. The botanical make-up of this gin is a closely guarded secret. I taste a mix of juniper, obviously, but not overwhelming, nice earthy tones, perfect amount of spice ‘liquorice’, floral and potentially lemon citrus, and coriander. It most definitely has all the usual suspects in terms of botanicals that you find in a London dry gin. It’s got a slight warmth from the 43% ABV, but all the flavours bind together like magic. The final part is the aftertaste, which has enough lingering on the mouthfeel and it dissipates at a perfect rate. It leaves you wanting more, that’s for sure. The packaging represents what the gin is in my opinion – simple, smooth and not overcomplicated. As for classic gin cocktail recipes, I thought it made a beautiful martini – a small portion of dry vermouth stirred down with cubed ice and served in a frozen martini glass with sprayed lemon zest. As for the G&T, I served it with 1 part gin, 3 parts Artisan Classic London Tonic. Filled to the rim with ice cubes and garnished with native Australian eucalyptus leaves and lemon zest.
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GIN SOCIETY EXPERT
NAME: MIKEY ENRIGHT OWNER OF: THE BARBER SHOP, SYDNEY
Originally from the UK, Mikey trained in London as a cocktail bartender before moving to Sydney in 1999 where he opened some of the most successful cocktail bars in the city, including The Loft and Zeta Bar, before venturing out on his own as the proprietor of The Barber Shop in 2013. He has consulted on prestigious bars across Asia and locally set up the Hotel Palisade in the Rocks, Sydney in 2015. He has been awarded Bar Manager of the Year twice by Bartender Magazine.
FLAVOUR PROFILE Profiled by Mikey Enright exclusively for Gin Society.
JUNIPER
95
CITRUS
93
FLORAL
95
HEAT
88
HERBAL
75
SPICE
90
Graded out of 100
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COCKTAIL RECIPE: SKINNY GIMLET
This month’s resident expert Mikey Enright of Sydney’s The Barber Shop shares his favourite cocktail recipe to make with Jensen’s Bermondsey Dry Gin.
50ML JENSEN’S BERMONDSEY DRY GIN 15ML OF HOMEMADE LIME CORDIAL 5 M L O F S A G E D I S T I L L AT E 30ML OF ARTISAN SKINNY LONDON TONIC Combine all the ingredients in a shaker with cubed ice then shake and strain into a frozen glass. Garnish with sage leaf and chipped ice.
To make the lime cordial, sous-vide 1L water and 3 whole limes (peeled) at 40 degrees Celsius for 1 hour. Add 3g citric acid and 30g white sugar, stir, strain and allow to cool before using.
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A B O U T The Gin Society strives to indulge its members with rare, premium gins that you won’t find at your average local bottle shop. Instead, we look to innovative Aussie makers and intriguing overseas distilleries. We at the Gin Society fell in love not only with the exquisite taste of gin, but also with the stories that surround the distilling and making of this delicious, versatile spirit. It’s what’s driven us to explore and learn more about the fascinating world of gin. Creating gin is both a science and an art form, and we want to share the spirit and its stories with our membership. As keen gin-thusiasts ourselves, we’ve travelled the globe, learning, experiencing and, yes, tasting what’s available for keen gin lovers worldwide. We want to help cultivate gin’s rapidly growing market as well
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U S as showcase inventive ways for drinkers to enjoy it that extend well beyond the classic G&T. Whether you’re in it for the cocktails, the events or just the relaxing release of a crisp, classic gin at the end of a long day, the Gin Society is here for you.
SPECIAL WELCOME GIFT FOR NEW MEMBERS To say thanks for joining the Gin Society, we’re giving all our new members a special gift set – a Spiegelau perfect serve large crystal mixing glass, a copper bar spoon, a copper Hawthorne strainer and a copper bell jigger. It’s the perfect kit for making cocktails with each of the special gins heading your way!
JOIN US AT GINSOCIETY.COM For $95 every two months members receive a full size bottle of rare premium gin, an accompanying Gin Journal as well as a free gift set for all new members.
SPIEGELAU PERFECT SERVE LARGE CRYSTAL MIXING GLASS
NEW
MB
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$161 COPPER BELL JIGGER
ER GIFT
WORT
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COPPER HAWTHORNE STRAINER
COPPER BAR SPOON 53
THE GIN SOCIETY PROUDLY BRINGS YOU THE GIN JOURNAL.
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