What is gin made of + 5 types
What is gin made of?
Grain alcohol serves as the liquid base for the future gin. It is mainly wheat distillate, but some types of the drink use barley distillate: both pure and with the addition of rye and corn.
An integral ingredient of high-quality gin is juniper berries, which give the drink incomparable freshness, species individuality, taste and aroma.
In addition to juniper, the plant base for gin can consist of various components that are added in different combinations and proportions.
Among them: lemon and orange peel, almonds, nutmeg, iris, angelica or violet root, anise, angelica, liquorice, cardamom, coriander root and seeds, cinnamon, cassia bark, etc.
There is also a gin that contains kava kava leaves and tea tree berries.
Types of gin
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Janiver (juniper berry)
Dutch gin is still produced in the Netherlands and neighboring Belgium by distilling barley malt mixed with juniper berries and then aging the resulting product in oak barrels.
In fact, this specific 35-degree drink has little in common with classic gin. Therefore, it is not surprising that gin is often considered as a separate representative of the alcoholic world.
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Old Tom Gin
A kind of intermediate link between gin and modern modifications of the juniper drink was the English gin Old Tom, which was extremely popular in the XVIII century.
It was made without the use of a vertical distillation unit, which was unknown at the time, which negatively affected the strength and taste of the drink.
To somehow refine this very low-quality alcohol, Old Tom gin was usually flavored with sugar.
Nowadays, the revived drink is made using modern methods of alcohol purification, but with the use of interesting technologies, proportions and techniques derived from ancient recipes; and, of course, with unchanged sugar.
London dry gin
With the invention of the vertical distillation cube, the most popular London dry gin (also known as dry gin) appeared today.
Its distinctive features are: the complete absence of sugar and the use of technologies introduced in the century before last by London gin makers.
Hence the famous cold, "metallic" taste of the drink produced all over the world, and a more prominent manifestation of herbal additives in it.
Plymouth gin
The production technology is in many ways similar to its London counterpart.
But unlike the latter, this drink can be produced only in the port city of the same name in Devonshire.
This drink is usually milder, and its flavor has characteristic floral notes.
At the same time, there is a strict maritime version of Plymouth gin, whose 57-degree strength does not prevent gunpowder from igniting if it accidentally gets on it.
Yellow gin
A very rare, one might say, semi-mythical yellow gin.
It is made according to the classic gin technology, after which, like a jenever, it is aged for some time in oak barrels; however, not ordinary ones, but from of sherry.
As a result, the drink acquires a yellowish color and a completely unique taste.
Popular brands of gin
Among modern gin brands, it is worth highlighting:
Update: 18.02.2016
Category: Gin