What was gin?

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What was gin?

Unread postby cowdery » Sat Mar 03, 2007 9:05 am

I believe gin was originally an attempt to flavor a neutral spirit so that it would taste like a very well made new (that is, green, un-aged) whiskey or brandy. I say this because the flavors in gin are earthy, vegetal flavors, as you get in a low proof distillate, but one that is made so skillfully that only the most pleasant of those flavors are preserved. A less skillful distiller has to keep redistilling to achieve a spirit that is palatable, but then it is so neutral it needs to be flavored. It can be flavored with anything, of course, and the use of botanicals such as caraway seed or anise seed are examples of distillers using something simply because it tasted good. But I think the particular botanicals selected for gin, beginning with the juniper berry, were intended to duplicate flavors I also associate with young or even un-aged whiskey and brandy.

Even with the still technology of the 16th century, it was possible to achieve a very neutral spirit, though perhaps not as neutral as today's GNS. You just had to keep redistilling it. The best, most skillful distillers were able to produce, in fewer passes, a distillate that tasted good, and it was that distillate, that taste, that consumers wanted. But making that product took skill, while making a neutral spirit and flavoring it merely took perseverance, good equipment and a good recipe.

Gin got popular because it was cheap but tasted kind of like the rarer and more expensive low proof un-aged spirits that were the precursors of today's whiskey and brandy.

Another way of looking at it is rather than doing the delicate dance that distillers do, to preserve "good" congeners while eliminating "bad" ones, you can simply take them all out and put in flavorings that resemble the "good" congeners.
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Unread postby gillmang » Sat Mar 03, 2007 11:02 am

Interesting theory. I have always wondered at the seeming close connection between some types of traditional whisky (especially rye-based whiskey) and gin especially the original form of gin, genever gin.

Genever gin was originally a low-proof cereals-only distillate in which rye grains formed a large or predominant part. Early on it became flavoured with juniper but other plants and spices were also used and sometimes no juniper was used (Byrn states this writing in the 1860's). Maybe if the distillate was particularly well-made and naturally earthy/aromatic there was no need to add or supplement this character.

Later, it must have been seen that it was cheaper and reliable to make clean alcohol in continuous stills but no natural flavors remained. Therefore, recourse to the old habit of adding juniper was adopted. This would (per Chuck's theory) "copy" the originally Dutch habit of adding juniper to lesser-quality cereals spirit to make it palatable. So, when Byrn says sometimes juniper was not added to traditional genever, he might have been referring to this best quality genever which in essence was a new whisky.

The whole idea of flavouring alcohol with plants and earth (e.g. peat with malt whisky), and Chuck's earlier suggestion that oak-aged liquor is a way of flavouring it with plants, is very interesting. I wonder if, since alcohol is in distilled form anyway a kind of invented, transgressive product (seeing especially what it can do to people), the idea formed that it should be modified by something real, of the earth, natural - and what is more natural than something like plants and trees and spices which come from the ageless natural soils? Was it a way of taking vitamins with your modern industrial diet as it were..?

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Unread postby cowdery » Sat Mar 03, 2007 1:18 pm

This is based on observation, as I have been tasting gins straight and at room temperature for an article I'm doing, and I'm struck by how much they resemble new make bourbon, rye and even brandy. Why? Unless they were trying through flavoring to duplicate an ideal that had been achieved by natural, but very skillful, distillation.
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Unread postby gillmang » Sat Mar 03, 2007 2:09 pm

Recently I bought a bottle of de Kuyper, the famous Ducth genever gin. This version is made under license in Quebec, the bottle does not say where. It is made by adding juniper to high-proof spirit but some "moutwijn" is added. This is the classic original form of genever, distilled low in which rye makes a telling appearance. For all I know, the product might be made at Schenley in Valleyfield and be essentially a blended at birth Canadian-style whisky except unaged and to which juniper is added. Even if it isn't that, it is, if you see what I mean..

When I nosed it, it reminded me of Isaha Morgan rye whiskey. Really. Also, it reminded me of the new make character of some bourbons that isn't wiped out by excessive aging. E.g., both in Weller 107 and OF 100 I can detect that new make quality and in Jim Beam White too. In those cases it is modified by wood aging, but it is still there. In the Isaiha Morgan that key note it is unmodified by wood aging. The de Kuyper had a round, fruity smell, sort of decayed fruits and earth (in a good way :)). The common element (I assume) is unaged rye. It would be interesting to try this de Kuyper before the juniper is added since I am not sure if the rye element is the common one or the new make whiskey character and the juniper. Maybe it is both.

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Unread postby cowdery » Sat Mar 03, 2007 10:56 pm

Does the de Kuyper seem to contain sweetener?
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Unread postby gillmang » Sun Mar 04, 2007 1:41 am

Yes, I think it does. The effect, together with the juniper and other flavours, is to give the drink a light "spearmint gum" taste. It is funny you ask because just today I had some and was thinking it seems less sweet than a few years ago.

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