Gin

The Australian section is the strongest part of this range. Four Pillars from the Yarra Valley, Never Never's Dark Series Oyster Shell from McLaren Vale, Nosferatu's Blood Orange, Giselle Pavlova, Mandrake and Bunyip Sticky, Three Foxes' organic Rosella, Brookies from the Byron hinterland, Antipodes, Ambrosia, Taylor & Smith and Hartshorn from Tasmania and Backwoods from Victoria.

Canberra Distillery deserves a mention on its own for range: Sloe, French Earl Grey, Summer, Winter, a bottled Negroni and the Canberra Fog.

From Sweden, Herno is the reference point for a modern craft distillery, with the Dry, the Old Tom, the Pink and the Juniper Cask aged version. Herno's Old Tom is a good entry into a style most people have read about and never tasted.

France contributes Gabriel Boudier's Saffron and Blackcurrant Bud gins and Audemus Umami, which is as unusual as it sounds. Japan brings Sakurao and Komasa Jyozo's Sakurajima Komikan mandarin gin. Hayman's covers classic London Dry, Eden Mill and Glasgow Gin cover Scotland, and Christian Drouin makes a gin in Normandy.

History

Gin began as genever, a Dutch malt spirit flavoured with juniper, and it arrived in England with returning soldiers in the seventeenth century. When William of Orange took the throne and taxes on French brandy rose, domestic distilling was encouraged and gin production exploded.

The result was the Gin Craze of the early eighteenth century, a genuine public health crisis in London that produced a series of Gin Acts and Hogarth's Gin Lane.

What rescued the category was technology. The continuous column still, patented by Aeneas Coffey in 1830, made a clean neutral base spirit possible, and London Dry emerged: unsweetened, juniper-led and redistilled with botanicals rather than flavoured after the fact. Old Tom, slightly sweetened, is the older style that sits between genever and London Dry.

The modern craft revival began in the 2000s and Australia joined it early and enthusiastically. Australian distillers had an advantage nobody else did: a native botanical set including lemon myrtle, pepperberry, finger lime, wattleseed and strawberry gum, none of which appears in the European tradition.

Legally, gin needs only a predominant juniper character. Everything else is open.

How to drink it

A gin and tonic is a serious drink badly made almost everywhere. One part gin to three parts tonic, plenty of ice so it does not dilute quickly, a large glass, and tonic poured down a bar spoon to keep the carbonation.

Match the garnish to the gin rather than defaulting to lime. A citrus-forward gin wants grapefruit. A floral one wants a slice of cucumber. A juniper-heavy London Dry is best with lemon peel expressed over the top.

For a Martini, use a London Dry or a juniper-led craft gin, keep it very cold, and stir rather than shake. Fifty millilitres of gin to 10ml of dry vermouth is a good starting ratio, and the vermouth must be fresh from the fridge.

A Negroni is equal parts gin, sweet vermouth and bitter aperitivo, stirred over ice with an orange peel.

Old Tom is the gin a Tom Collins and a Martinez were originally built on, and both taste noticeably better made properly.

Sloe gin is a liqueur rather than a gin. Serve it neat and cold, or with sparkling wine.

One classic this list leaves out is the Gin and Dubonnet, covered properly in our recipe and history of the drink, ratio and garnish included.