Tastes

This was the second zero proof 'gin' I purchased to tide me over for dry January. Unlike the Warner's Double Juniper this seems to be not primarily distilled rather 'concocted'. The smell reminds me of my University days when I drank something called 'Storm' an 8% abv alcoholic lemonade (sadly that was definitely not the worst of what I drank which included various spirits I distilled myself and flavored food grade ethanol). The taste is however probably the closest i've had to gin when mixed of all the zero alcohol spirits. Again citrus, lemon predominate flavors. It does however unlike Warner's version taste a bit artificial.. which isn't surprising given it mostly is. I think if you replicated the flavor profile through more natural extraction/ distillation methods it would be a very decent drop. Anyhow it doesn't and it isn't so 3 it is.

Well the dry run lasted 35 days until I had a nice lunch at a vineyard on holiday. The target was January so mission accomplished! Over the 35 days this drop was one of two zero alcohol 'gins' which I imported and kept me and my tonic bottles company. After a bit of hassle with the on forwarders and paying more in shipping than the bottle I managed to land this one. I went to the effort as I had heard good things and most importantly Warners had a good gin distilling pedigree. They did an interview with the distiller which was really interesting. He mentioned the wanted to use natural ingredients found on their farm - they got to 90% - and used a water distillation process plus a couple of other extraction steps including vegetable glycerin. They have to use loads more botanicals than an alcoholic based one as alcohol is a much more effective extractor of flavours. They did however already use the water distillation method in part for alcoholic drinks so they had a head start technique wise. It took them 3 years to refine. Interestingly issues like shelf life and length of time open popped up as under ~18% you no longer have alcohol as an effective inhibitor. They used citric acid, potassium sorbate and sodium benzoate to achieve this. Still once open it lasts for only 3 months. They use their own spring water, plus botanicals included lemon thyme, lemon verbena, raspberries, blackcurrant sage and lavender and interestingly myrrh and wormwood (I noticed no hallucinatory effects :-). I'm also assuming Juniper given it's in the name! Now in terms of taste it is very herbal. Not my usual cup of tea when i'm after gin flavors but I did with the help of my wife drink the bottle in a month! She liked it. I definitely warmed to it (mixed with tonic) however it's no gin in terms of flavour, mouth feel etc but then again they don't call it that. Would i buy it again? The price is very fair £18 for all the natural botanicals and effort however i ended up paying more like £60 by the time i got it here so value for $$....I wouldn't be rushing out to get it even if available in NZ however my wife would definitely go another round. It's hard to score as it's a quality product and done well just flavor wise not really in my wheelhouse so to speak. I'm giving this a 3.75 I think. Now this isn't equivalent to a 3.75 alcoholic gin rating but in terms of a zero alcohol drink. Definitely give it a go if you can get it for around the £18 mark.