At the heart of it, gin is basically neutral spirit flavoured with Juniper berries so it’s no wonder its so popular with distillers. The term ‘bathtub gin’ is often used when describing gins that originated during the Prohibition era. In the 1920’s, when the sale of alcohol was illegal, people would to go great lengths to mask the flavour over their cheap over-proof spirit by mixing up herbs and spices in their bathtubs to sell at speakeasy’s and holes in the wall. Lucky for us gin is far easier to get your hands on nowadays and with it recently overtaking whisky in terms of the amount of distilleries there are in Scotland it’s obvious that we love it. We’ve created a simple recipe for you to follow, most of these ingredients can be either bought, foraged or grown in your very own back garden!
Homemade Gin
Ingredients
750ml (1 bottle) good quality vodka
2tbsp juniper berries (minimum)
1 tsp coriander seeds
2 cardamon pods
2 peppercorns
1/2 cinnamon stick
lemon & orange peel (no pith)
Method
Sterilise a bottle & add vodka and all ingredients except from the lemon and orange peel.
Close and store in a cool, dark place for 24 hours.
Taste (determine if it needs anything else – makers discretion).
Add the citrus peels and store for another 24 hours.
Take it out and taste again, you don’t want to over brew it (think tea!).
Using a sieve filter out all the botanical’s, if you want a crystal clear gin, re-bottle & leave for a further 24 hours then filter with a muslin.
Bottle and enjoy!
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