Four citrus fruits go into this recipe and all of them arrive fresh rather than dried. Orange peel, lemon peel, lime and grapefruit each occupy a different position, and using four where most gins use one or two is the reason the aroma is as wide as it is. Buss Spirits works without machines or additives on pure grain alcohol, and bottles at 45%.

The four divide the citrus register cleanly. Fresh lemon peel is the loudest and it dominates the palate, sharp and oily in a way that dried peel never manages. Orange peel fills in beneath it, rounder and sweeter. Grapefruit contributes bitterness rather than fruit, a clean pith edge that keeps the whole from becoming a cordial, and lime supplies a harder, greener sharpness alongside. Underneath that citrus canopy the structure is classical and quiet. Juniper occupies a firm resinous centre. Coriander adds its warm spiced seed, cardamom a cooling lift, and angelica with orris root pins the base and binds the rest. Then vanilla and liquorice root soften the close, one creamy and one sweet without sugar, and they are what give a 45% spirit its gentle warmth rather than a burn.

A gin built for mixing should be mixed. A Tom Collins suits the lemon directly; a gin and tonic wants a neutral mixer, ice filling the glass and a firm pour, since 45% leaves margin. Grapefruit peel tracks the livelier half of this recipe, lemon the safer half. Nothing sweetened, which the vanilla already covers. Fresh fruit costs more and spoils faster, which is why most recipes dry it. Refusing machinery is a claim about labour rather than about flavour, but the fresh fruit is where it becomes audible. Four citrus fruits is one more than a recipe strictly needs, and the fourth is the one doing the argument. It ends citric, warm and clean.