Amass Los Angeles Dry Gin
When we say that gin is exciting right now, were talking about brands like AMASS Los Angeles. The inspiration is in the name, as the gin sources botanicals that reflect Southern Californias diverse agricultural offerings. A hefty 29 botanicals make up the gin, and some of them are quite unexpected, such as California Bay, Hibiscus and two kinds of mushrooms. The flavor is primarily earthy and herbal, with strong ingredients namely cardamom and coriander giving the juniper some competition. Overall, its an exciting, complex gin that every connoisseur needs to try.
Courtesy Drizly.com
Mcqueen And The Violet Fog
This small-batch gin tastes like a cocktail straight out of the bottle. With 21 botanicals from across the world, each sip of McQueen and the Violet Fog Gin has a vibrant story to tell. From sweetness to heat to herbaceous notes that veer towards culinary savoriness , this flavor profile will turn you into a gin lover.
Gordons Sicilian Lemon Distilled Gin
Just in time for summer, the UK’s bestselling gin brand has introduced this zesty and vibrant Sicilian lemon version to kick-start the garden party season. The perfect complement to the Gordon’s flavoured gin range , this is totally natural, is full of juniper flavour and packs a fresh and feisty Mediterranean punch. Zing when you’re winning. £14. At
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Brockmans: Best Gin For Cocktail
Brockmans is nothing if not a modern gin. With its sleek, black bottle, its a brand thats not afraid to stand out behind the bar with premium branding that gives a taste as to whats inside.
The goal behind the spirit was to create a gin quite unlike anything else available on the market. The distillery combined knowledge and ideas to forge a bottle with an intricate balance of botanicals with a complex flavour.
Brockmans gin is smooth enough to enjoy straight, but the real secret comes from mixing it into a cocktail. The unique flavour profile makes it the perfect base for a huge variety of different long drinks, particularly those emphasising fruity and berry flavours.
It uses Bulgarian coriander, blueberries and blackberries and dry, bittersweet Valencian orange peel alongside Tuscan juniper berries to create a distinctive, smooth gin: perfect for cocktails.
Best Gin for a cocktail: Brockmans Gin
How Is Gin Made
Contrary to what most Phish fans may believe, there are more ways to create gin than just in a bathtub. The two most popular ways are steeping and infusion.
The steeping method is what it sounds like the base spirit is placed in a pot along with juniper berries and other flavor profiles to steep. There isnt an exact amount of time which the botanicals need to be steeped in the base spirit some distillers let botanicals steep for a few days while others distill it within hours. After the distilling process is completed, water is added to reduce the alcoholic content and flavor profile. Beefeater has used this process of distilling for roughly 200 years.
In a vapor infusion distilling process, the botanicals dont actually come in direct contact with the base spirit. Instead, the botanicals are suspended in a basket in the still, above the base. When the base spirit is heated, the vapors rise through the basket. When the steam cools down and condenses back into a liquid, the flavor profiles from the basket are infused in the alcohol. This provides the gin with a more subtle and mild flavor. Bombay Sapphire is famously known for using the infusion method of distillation.
Steeping and infusion are the two most popular ways, but they arent the only ways to make gin. Hendricks gin and SipSmith V.J.O.P gin use a unique combination of both to reach their respective unique flavor profiles.
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The 12 Best Gins For Gin And Tonics
Gin & Tonics are the coffee of the cocktail world difficult to fully appreciate at first but once you jump on board, you wonder how you ever lived without them.
Served over ice with a citrus garnish, G& Ts deliver all the refreshment of simpler highballs but dial up the complexity with an array of botanicals from the base spirit and the challenging bittersweet profile of tonic water.
With just two components, theres nowhere for the ingredients to hide, and its impossible to overstate the importance of reaching for a high-quality bottle when mixing G& Ts. The following 12 bottles not only deliver that quality, but jive with their slightly awkward dance partner to serve the most impressive versions of the cocktail. Here are the best gins for gin and tonics.
Gordon’s Special Dry London Gin
£15.50 for a 700ml bottle
This gin from Gordon’s is centred around juniper berries. It’s distilled using a secret recipe, but were our experts impressed when it came to the taste test?
To see if you should pick out this gin on your next trip to the supermarket, log in now or join Which? to unlock our test results.
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Top 5 Of The Best Gins You Can Buy In 2019
You prepare your shopping list for your home bar, but what gin are you going to buy? We bring you five brands of the best gins of 2019 that you should buy right now!
Enjoying an extreme boom, both new and classic gin continues to be timeless and versatile. Prepare your best cocktails with these top 5 of the best gins you can buy in 2019.
5. Plymouth Gin
This gin remained the only gin with a geographical indication for two decades. Plymouth Dry gin is less strong on the palate in juniper and quite tangy. Its finish is smooth and soft. Available from $20,00.
4. Corgi Earl Grey Gin
Tea fan? Corgi Earl Grey Gin is an excellent gin produced in Jersey City, New Jersey by a small distillery. The Earl Grey version of Corgis extensive variety provides black tea flavors where bergamot dominates. Very smooth and easy to taste, it is perfect to combine with soft mixers. Plus, its gluten-free! Available from $29.00.
3. Roku Gin
Known for their excellent whisky, Suntory also decided to embark on the adventure of producing gin starting with Roku Gin. The Japanese gin contains 6 botanicals. Sakura flower, yuzu peel and sansho pepper give Roku its unique flavor profile. In addition, a touch of green tea and bitter, to stand out from the other gins. Available from $29,00.
2. Sipsmith Lemon Drizzle Gin
1. Drumshanbo Gunpowder Gin
An Dlamn Irish Maritime Gin
A truly original drink, the list ingredients are somewhat lengthy so here goes. Firstly, the oceanic stuff: kelp from Donegal, moss , two types of dulse and channel wrack. Then the regular stuff, which includes juniper, coriander and orange/lemon. Hailing from the windswept Irish coast, this is not one for steamy summer afternoons but for wild autumn and winter nights. Add plenty of lemon for a G& T. Theres a lot going on with this already, so keep it simple. £29.95. Atthewhiskeyexchange.com
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More Martin Miller’s Gins
will be the next step in your exploration of this brand. This bottle is a little stronger at 45 percent ABV , which makes it a fantastic option for any gin cocktail you want to pour it in. You will not lose any of that signature gin flavor with this option!
You can also explore the effects of aging on ginsomething most gin is not subjected towith Martin Miller’s 9 Moons. This bottling rests the gin in previously used bourbon barrels for nine months to give it a fascinating sweetness of vanilla and oak.
Roku: Best Bottle Design
Roku is the gin you want proudly displayed in the centre of your cabinet. Not only does it look stylish, but whats on the inside follows through too. Created by the House of Suntory in Osaka, Japan, Rokus history of gin distillery dates back almost 100 years.
Roku means six in Japanese: named as such because there are six very important botanicals in the gin. All sourced from Japan, the bottle offers a unique flavour on the market when mixed with another eight more traditional gin botanicals: juniper berry, coriander seed, angelica root, angelica seed, cardamom seed, cinnamon, bitter orange peel, and lemon peel.
This overarching combination results in a successful taste thats both unique and delicious. The bottle design, inscribed with a floral design, adds to the appeal.
Best bottle design: Roku Japanese Gin
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Greysons London Dry Gin At Aldi
Yes, the worst kept secret in bargain food-shopping is also home to, officially, one of the worlds best gins. Formerly the Oliver Cromwell London Dry Gin, and now Greyson’s London Dry Gin, it won a gold medal at the International Wine and Spirits Competition and its hard to argue with its bone dry and straight-forward flavouring, this gin is unfussy and versatile with notes of juniper, lemon, and orange peel before fading to reveal hints of hot wax. Your booze cupboard deserves this bargain.
Four Pillars Navy Strength Gin
Sailors created Navy Strength booze as a way to get drunk without taking up too much space on their ships. Its the strongest of the strong when it comes to ABV %. And this gin by Four Pillars certainly lives up to the Navy Strength label. Its a boozy 58.8% alcohol that is only released once a year. This high-strength gin is made in Australia and made from oranges, limes, turmeric and coriander. This powerful gin has been awarded the Master status at the Global Gin Masters the last five years. Its powerful, delicious and highly sought after.
Four Pillars Navy Strength Gin
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The Best Flavoured Gin
I’ve included both these flavours of Aber Falls Welsh gin because they’re both delicious and I can’t choose between them. If you need warming up, try the marmalade – it’s surprisingly wonderful. It’s a bit more orange jelly than marmalade, but that’s not a bad thing. Feeling more summery? Try the rhubarb & ginger flavour – the rhubarb is that perfect combination of sweet and sour then the ginger hits you round the back of the head and wakes you up. I also love the brand as I’ve been on holiday close to where the gin is distilled and that makes me happy.
A sunset in a bottle, this special edition gin from Bombay Sapphire brings summer evening spice in the form of golden turmeric, Indian white cardamom, and Spanish mandarin. Of all the flavoured gins on this list it is perhaps the most subtle, but therein lies the appeal. The additional flavours bring an earthy, savoury character, but what’s really impressive is that despite those spicy notes, which you would normally associate with autumn, this gin remains quite bright and zesty. So it’s definitely more at home as a summer time drink. Delicious with tonic, but we also tried it with apple juice and found it to be even more complex and satisfying. Perfect if you want to try something a little different, without completely leaving your comfort zone.
What Are The Different Types Of Gin
As mentioned, gin making is quite a lawless endeavor. However, most gins can be classified into four categories: London Dry, Plymouth, Old Tom or Navy Strength. Heres what each of those mean.
London Dry: London dry is the most classic and most popular type of gin. Despite the name, London drys dont need to be made in Britain and are distilled all over the world. These traditional gins are characterized by a crisp, clear taste that puts the juniper front-and-center and foregoes most sweetness. Flavor notes are therefore very woodsy something like how you wish a Christmas tree would taste. The vast majority of gins fall into the London dry category, so they should take up the majority of your gin tastings.
Plymouth: Plymouth gin is the only regionally-restricted type of gin, and must be made in Plymouth, England. However, there is only one gin distillery and one brand left in the Plymouth region: the simply-named Plymouth gin. This gin variant uses slightly more botanicals than traditional London dry gins, giving Plymouth a sweeter, more earthy flavor.
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Reisetbauer Blue Gin *
While better known for making world class eau de vie, Hans Reisetbauer distills one of the cleanest, most focused gins on the market. Characterized by vegetal notes and savory spices, Blue Gin has a concentrated flavor profile and a lithe, crisp mouthfeel. It cries out for a splash of vermouth and the expression of a lemon twist in a classic dry Martini. Average price: $47.
Caledonia Spirits Barr Hill Gin
This gin is an outlier in many respects. Its distilled with raw honey, which dominates the nose and palate it smells waxy and honeyed, and both profiles continue onto the palate where theyre joined by juniper and black pepper. This gin is very pleasant, if non-traditional. Sample with lemon and soda over ice, or mix in a Ramos Gin Fizz if youre feeling adventurous. Average price: $39.
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The Best Gins To Drink In : 30 Great Gin Brands Tested
If you are looking for the best gin, then you have come to the right place. ShortList has a gaggle of experts on hand to taste test great gins all to let you know which gin is the best for you.
We know that trying to choose the bet gin isn’t the easiest thing to do. There are hundreds of gin varieties out there, and that’s before you even start on the flavoured gins. Then there’s the tricky task of figuring out how to best pair your gin – the right gin and tonic combination is one of the best drinks of all time.
UPDATE: There are now 30 fantastic gins in our best gin list. So, if you want to know what the top gins of all time are, then head to the list below. The good news is that unlike many other gin lists, everything here has been taste tested by the gin experts at ShortList to make sure that you know exactly which gin you should buy for the next time you want a tipple. Once you have chosen your gin, we have also added a guide on hot to make the best gin and tonic, as well everything you need to know about the different varieties of gin that are on offer. Cheers!
There is a reason that finding the best gin is harder than ever. It’s because the alcohol category has seen a veritable explosion of new gins arrive. This is all thanks to the relaxation of the gin producing rules around a decade ago, has meant that small batch gin makers have cropped up everywhere – and there are plenty of small batch gin makers on this list.
Muff Liquor Potato Craft Gin
Named after a village in Donegal, this is not the radioactive poitín of Irish legend but is nonetheless based around Irish potatoes and includes a rather sophisticated mix of botanicals such as rosemary and elderflower followed by mandarin. These flavours can be turbocharged by serving with elderflower syrup, mint, lime and fresh rosemary. £41. At
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Opihr Oriental Spiced London Dry Gin
We’ve been sitting on this one for a while, not quite sure if the taste was for us. It’s usually our rum that we like spiced but then we paired Opihr with a ginger ale and were blown away. This is a bit like the Thomas Dakin on this list, which uses horseradish, it’s not for everyone but if you want a kick with your G& T then Opihr offers that and more, with hints of cardamon and black pepper.
Best London Dry Gin: Sipsmith London Dry Gin
- Like a roller coaster of flavors
- More pleasant to drink than mass-produced gins
Craft gin owes its existence to Sipsmith, which started in 2007 in London. Because of a British excise act from 1823 that banned distillers from obtaining a license for a still under 1,800 liters, the brand’s founders couldn’t license their 300-liter capacity still. Sipsmith’s founders led Britain to change its law, and now the world has Sipsmith gin and a variety of other craft gin distillers. Its London Dry Gin is the apex of the style. Expect juniper on the forefront, which leads the way to citrus notes finished by warm baking spices.
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Best Overall: Gordons London Dry Gin
Gordon’s is a go-to value gin. It’s available in nearly every liquor store and supermarket , and it makes an excellent mixed drink. The 80-proof libation has a strong juniper basethe mark of a good London dry ginand a selection of other botanicals that blend well with nearly any mixer your heart desires. The average gin highballs, such as the gin sling and gin rickey, are excellent uses for this inexpensive gin. It can also hold its own in drinks with strong mixers and juices, like the paradise cocktail.