While gin tends to be thought of as a transparent spirit similar in appearance to vodka or white rum, the reality is that the appearance of gin is just as variable as its many flavor profiles. From transparent, translucent and opaque all the way through to cloudy, gin is an incredibly varied spirit, something that’s a testament to its enduring popularity.
What is the perfect hue of a Gin & Tonic?
Translucent, Opaque or a blue hue. Not clear, not cloudy or milky.
When gin is distilled it captures the oils from five up to fifty or more different botanicals. As a result, the ideal product is one that contains a balanced blend of each botanical oil, creating a harmonious flavor profile that is both bold and stable. A good way to judge whether this is the case is to check if gin is opaque without being cloudy.
Essentially, the more opaque a gin, the more flavorful. The key, however, lies in ensuring that the gin does not turn cloudy or remain clear when mixed with tonic water, which is a surefire indicator of there being too much of one botanical in the mix or not enough to provide flavor.
Although some brands try to market their attempts of ‘cloudy gin’, the reality is that no gin should ever possess this undesirable characteristic. Others filter their gin to remove the cloudiness yet this only results in a final product reduced in botanical oils and therefore reduced in flavor.
The key, of course, is to create a perfectly balanced gin whose botanical oils sit in perfect harmony with one another. This is certainly the case with COIT’s American Distilled Earl Grey Gin, which boasts a flavor profile redolent with black tea and bergamot notes without anyone aroma being overly dominant. It took 12 months of extensive recipe `testing with around 600 meticulous reiterations in the trial recipe stage to perfect the formula of10 botanicals, with this unique product created with tea in the still.
You have to get the recipe correct in the trial stage before you upscale to production. This requires that the trial still and its differences to the commercial still be fully understood and accounted for in the trial recipe to have a faithful replication and upscale of the formula. The result is a clear liquid with a smooth, harmonious flavor profile that’s quite unlike anything else around.
Put together a Gin and Tonic, Gin Negroni or Brit 75 with COIT’s unique Early Grey Gin and it is easy to see why this spirit is seen as one of the most expertly-crafted on the market. Balance and harmony in both flavor and aroma are fundamental elements of gin making that have been forgotten by many modern distillers.
Without a doubt, with the Early Grey Gin, COIT Spirits have created a product that pays homage to classical techniques while proving to be entirely unique and bold in execution.