When it comes to distilling gin, the world of botanicals becomes an unrestricted playground for imagination. There are literally thousands of potential ingredients. Tens of thousands of combinations…
While the use of juniper is a staple, the myriad other ingredients that dance their way into the distiller’s pot is bound only by their safety for consumption. That said, there are some timeless ingredients and combinations that have stood the test of time, earning their place in the gin lover’s heart and which feature in the majority of recipes.
It’s these classic botanicals that are worth noting and keeping in mind if you are just starting to learn about gin.
Traditional gin recipes often comprise of a combination of juniper, citrus peel, coriander seed and angelica root.
The bright zing of citrus peel, continued by the multidimensional nature of coriander seed (citrussy, floral, spiced) lend an aromatic lift to the gin, creating a pleasant contrast to the earthy, woody and drying notes notes of angelica root.
Juniper’s distinctive pine and resin aromas take centre stage while the others contribute their unique notes to create a harmonious ensemble.
This delightful interplay of botanicals creates a balanced spirit that you can find gracing classic London Dry Gin recipes like those of Gordon’s and Beefeater.
The secret to a successful recipe is creating a balanced blend of botanicals. From a drinker’s perspective – it’s important to understand that each ingredient doesn’t just have one flavour profile however. The compounds contained in each botanical are often also present in others.
Take coriander seed’s aroma for example, which comes from a number of compounds. The most important are linalool (floral, grassy, citrusy), α-pinene (piney, woody, spicy), geranyl acetate (roses, herbal), and terpineol (lilacs).
Juniper’s signature flavour is predominantly due to α-pinene, which makes an appearance in coriander seed, and helps to explain why they pair so well together. It also shows how botanicals can be used to accentuate each other through their shared compounds.
Savvy distillers know this. They look for the shared areas to calculate how well ingredients might marry up. They also use this cross over to play with intensity levels too.
To use coriander seed as an example again, linalool can be found in lavender and thyme. The latter, thyme, is often used but rarely palpable in its own right. Yet by allowing it to contribute its compounds to the spirit, it will have a profound effect to how much you might perceive the presence of coriander seed.
Why does any of this chemistry matter to drinkers? In simple terms, it helps you understand that no one ingredient lives in isolation of another. That gin, even when at it’s most basic – is a complex set of flavours.
The art of ingredient selection
While we will not cover them here – to find out more about how and why specific botanicals are selected and how that is done, head to these pages:
Understanding Juniper’s Role in the World of Gin
A Distiller’s Guide to Juniper
Dosing Gin botanicals
Crafting gin is a meticulous process, with distillers painstakingly weighing their botanicals to ensure a consistent flavour profile. A few grams out and it’s not the same gin. That’s all it takes.
Almost every gin pays homage to four core botanicals: juniper, coriander seed, angelica root, and a citrus peel of some kind. Juniper often constitutes 50% of the mix by weight, coriander seed 20-30%, and the rest take up the remaining 20%.
Weight isn’t flavour though, and anyone who’s put a single spoonful of Lapsang in a teapot will know – a few grams changes everything. Depending on the potency of the ingredient, it can dominate even if there are other flavours already there in much heavier doses. For example, Star anise weighs nothing by contributes a lot of flavour…
Why does this matter for us as drinkers? It shows why consistency is hard to achieve why you have to respect those who are able to deliver on spec each time.
Once a distiller has selected their botanicals, they have several decisions to make in order to hone their recipe. Dosage isn’t the only way to influence the flavours and balance the botanical profile.
To distil the botanicals together or individually?
Distillers traditionally add all the botanicals into their pot still at the same time, but there are a growing number who distil their botanicals separately and then blend the individually flavoured spirits to create their gin. Both have merits, it is a matter of style and preference.
See this article for further details: London Dry vs Blended Distillation
To macerate or not, and where to place them in the still?
Traditional methods to extract flavour from botanicals involve placing them in a pot still charged with neutral spirit.
But this isn’t the only way though. Namely, as it’s possible to let botanicals steep ahead of starting to distil, allowing more time for the spirit to extract the flavours and strip the botanicals of all these flavour compounds.
Another consideration is whether to use a vapour chamber or not.
In traditional pot distillation, botanicals are steeped in the raw spirit, like a robust tea brewing. In contrast, vapour infusion sees these botanicals suspended in a perforated basket within a chamber typically much higher up the still. As the spirit vapour rises, it permeates through botanicals, extracting the oils and flavours.
What does this mean for the botanicals? A vapour chamber offers a unique chance to include some of the more delicate ingredients that would not survive being heated in the pot.
See our full article explaining the Vapour Chamber here.
Cut points
We’ve explained that each botanical is made up of compounds. Take the closer look at the chemistry one step further and you’ll understand another tool in the gin distiller’s arsenal. The volatility of each botanical is also different.
As a result, flavours will come off the still in a sequence during distillation, rather than all at once.
Though making a hearts cut, distillers choose when to start and end the collection of liquid flowing from a still. This allows them to collect and concentrate different parts of the distillate.
Based on a classic gin recipe, the first compounds to come across tend to be those from citrus peels. As they start to fade, juniper and coriander come to the fore, followed by the earthy notes of angelica and other spices.
By controlling the heart’s cut (the desirable middle part), a distiller can choose which flavours to keep and discard, meaning they can further influence the recipe even at the point of collection.
See Distilling Gin: Charge, Recipe and Hearts Cut Yield Decoded for more on this.
A complex equation, more than a simple recipe
And there you have it – an introduction to botanicals in gin. There are many points for further reading already mentioned in this article, but the key take away is simple.
Botanical selection is far more than just choosing a few ingredients to surround juniper. Each ingredient is a myriad of flavours and compounds in it’s own right. Getting the selection right is about shared compounds and how they balance across the board. It’s really hard to do this consistently.
Even when you have, through how and where you place them in a still and how you make cut points, you can further influence the flavours being distilled. Most of the recipe work is in the way the botanicals are processed.
There are many factors to consider when working with botanicals. Even with a top line overview, you can appreciate the art of a gin making all the more!
