Gin, American style: Drink has strong tradition, with some new twists

Thursday, June 15, 2006

By Philip A. Stephenson, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Gin is a drink both of the best of times and the worst of times.


	Bluecoat American Dry Gin comes from Philadelphia Distilling, the first craft distillery in the state of Pennsylvania since Prohibition. Click photo for larger image.

On the one side, the spirit conjures images of gin blossom-flushed fat cats and the squalid streets of Victorian London -- to say nothing of bootleg bathtub gin run from state to state during Prohibition. On the other end of the spectrum, nothing seems as refined -- as delicately powerful in aroma, appearance and process -- as a quality gin.

But what does any of that mean, really?

Part of gin's refinement lies in the fact that it seems to be a very British drink, which also contributes to its split identity. It isn't like other liquors, which are mostly about age, nation of origin or purity. Instead, gin is about how it has been flavored. A good deal of the cachet of the drink, and what is so interesting about drinking it, is that, unlike tequila or whiskeys -- which are supposed to have character and a signature taste based on a sort of arcane selection of grain, distillation method, barrels and aging location and length of time -- premium gins are intentionally flavored with different spices, fruits, botanicals, and, in some cases, vegetables.

The more universal flavor and aging concepts applied to whiskeys and the like imbue distinctiveness; they are also occasionally mysterious or even unexplainable. While any whiskey/scotch/tequila/rum distiller will tell you sometimes a barrel is especially good or bad and they can't figure out why, no gin distiller would ever say that.

Whiskeys are art. Gin approaches science.

Much of the reason why such a specialized spirit -- a neutral grain spirit flavored at least in part by juniper berries -- is so well-known around the world is its association with the British empire. Yet it became such a popular drink in early- to mid-18th century Britain because it was a very Dutch thing to drink --the king at the close of the 17th century was William III, a Dutchman.

The Dutch "genever" invented earlier in the 17th century had a lot in common with whisky. It was often aged in wood, sweet and not at all clear, as our modern gins are, in the London dry tradition. It also was, like so many spirits, originally used as medicine.

After William was enthroned, he encouraged his subjects to join him in enjoying his favorite spirit by allowing unlicensed distilling in England and imposing heavy tariffs on imported brandy (the French weren't very popular at the time), which had been the drink of choice until then.

But the problem with letting people distill liquor without regulations or taxes in Britain in the 18th century was that everybody wanted in. There were a lot of hard lives being lived at the time and, given the widespread availability of gin within a few decades, it would be safe to say that gin was plaguing London.

Alcohol poisoning, blindness from bad batches and even riots occurred when the Crown tried taxation to cut down on gin's popularity.

Fortunately, with passage of new regulations limiting who could distill and sell gin, things were brought back in line and, over the years, the British empire took its adopted Dutch drink around the world.

Nowadays, the only real requirement is that gin be made of neutral spirits and flavored with juniper berries, so there is a world of possibilities for taste profiles. gin. (Although cheap gin can be made of harsh alcohol that uses artificial juniper flavor, or a simple steeping of the alcohol with the berries, to cover the bad flavor of the alcohol.)

For premium gins, made with aromatic essences and vapor infusion methods to distill the flavor directly into the liquid, almost anything goes. Bombay Sapphire has a list of ten ingredients: Spanish almonds, Spanish lemons, licorice, Italian juniper berries, orris and angelica root, coriander, cassia bark, cubeb pepper, and grains of paradise.

Beefeater has had the same brightly cutting juniper flavor since 1820. Hendrick's gained renown at its launch for a rather singular recipe prominently featuring cucumbers and rose petals in their formula.

But for Philadelphia Distilling, good gin is not necessarily about an unchanging approach to distilling, flavoring and old traditions that once were new methods.

"A lot of gin companies brag about using 100-year old stills and I'm always saying to myself, 'Yeah, but I don't drive a Model T anymore, either,' " said master distiller Robert Cassell at the Warhol Museum last week.

Mr. Cassell and partner Timothy Yarnall were in Pittsburgh for the official launch of Bluecoat, the American Dry Gin, from Philadelphia Distilling, the first craft distillery in the state of Pennsylvania since Prohibition. Bluecoat, named (somewhat ironically, considering gin's history) in honor of the first Americans who fought the British, was developed by Mr. Cassell to stand out among gins as "a smoother, more American-profile[d]" gin.

"We use nothing but 100 percent organic botanicals ... and for the juniper, I didn't want to go with the same piney sort of strong juniper you usually get, so we found this softer berry, not from Italy where most of the juniper you get comes from."

The softness of Bluecoat's Eastern European juniper, as well as the organic orange peels, gives it a soft citrus nose and a long, rather than sharp finish. Mr. Cassell, who got his start working at Victory Brewing in Downington after graduating from Wheeling Jesuit University, W.Va., went on to earn his master distiller certification in Scotland before pitching the idea of making American gin.

Pennsylvania turned out to be an ideal place for a new craft distillery. Craft distilling means smaller batches made with a distiller on hand, and no synthetic flavoring. Bluecoat's water is triple filtered and the grain alcohol distilled give times in a 22-foot hammered copper still outside of Philadelphia. They had the still shipped in from Scotland.

"When we tell people that, they think I'm just giving them the same old marketing thing, but no, we actually did," Mr. Cassell said.

For whatever gin you choose, there are some standard drinks. There's the gin and tonic, of course, which came out of trying to get British colonials to take their quinine -- the medicine for malaria -- and the gin martini, which was invented in the United States in the early 20th century.

But you might consider trying these less-common cocktails as well.

Gin Rickey