This Product of Your Environment tea set is supercute, right? You can pick one up here.
Readers of this blog should know by now that gin was my first love and remains my favorite base spirit. Gin has character and complexity. Working with different botanicals yields a wide range of shadings and flavors so that each gin is distinct and has its own personality. That’s why I’m super-excited that today is World Gin Day. I’m often asked to pick a favorite gin brand, and truth be told, I can’t do it. Just when I am about to declare for Hendrick‘s or Tanqueray No. 10 or Bombay Sapphire East or Bulldog or Brooklyn or…well, you get the picture… I taste another one that moves to the top of the list.
How much do I love gin? I spent this past Christmas visiting family in England and made sure to leave enough room in my bag to bring home two bottles of Sacred Gin, including the seasonal Christmas Pudding expression, made with distilled actual Christmas puddings (that’s British for holiday fruit cake) that themselves are made from the recipe of a great aunt of Sacred Gin’s owner Ian Hart. It is spectacular.
To celebrate this year, I’ve been making my favorite gin cocktails with Caorunn, a Scottish gin that’s a combines the traditional gin elements: juniper, orange and lemon peel, angelica root and cassia bark, with five locally sourced botanicals: Rowan berry, dandelion, could blush apple, bog myrtle and Scottish heather. The result is dry and crisp London-style gin that’ has notes of fruit and florals. It makes a great Negroni and G&T and a stellar Gin Rickey.
I made this one at my desk as part of my cubicle cocktail series.It’s just muddled blackberry and blueberry, 1/2 ounce fresh lime juice, 2 ounces of gin, and a club soda topper.
No matter which brand you choose, make your weekend cocktail with gin.
Cheers!
