Gyokuro is not ordinary green tea. It is grown under shade for weeks before picking, which raises its amino acids and gives it a sweet, deep, almost broth-like character that a sun-grown leaf never develops. The Kyoto Distillery builds this gin on it, with tencha alongside, both supplied by Hori-Shichimeien, an Uji tea house founded in 1879. Bottled at 45.1%. Hori-Shichimeien has been growing and blending tea at Uji since the Meiji era, and that collaboration is what gives the recipe access to leaf of this grade at all.

Two high-grade teas at the centre of a gin is a demanding idea, because tea is easily cooked and easily buried. Here it survives and leads. Gyokuro gives depth and a shaded vegetal softness; tencha reinforces the core with a more savoury, umami-driven weight. Around them the Kyoto grammar is intact: juniper, orris root and akamatsu form the base, the red pine adding a dry coniferous floor. Yuzu and lemon peel keep the opening bright. Ginger, sansho pepper, kinome, red shiso and bamboo leaves fill in the spice and the green, faintly fruity-floral layers.

The palate is slower than most gins. A soft sweetness arrives first, close to white chocolate, before juniper steps forward clearly. Ginger brings a sharp juicy warmth, then sansho and kinome close on a citrus-pepper note that tingles. The tea holds the middle and the finish, long and clean, ending on something like roasted green tea.

Serve it mizuwari, with chilled water, if you want the gyokuro and tencha where they belong. In a gin and tonic, a neutral or barely floral mixer is essential and a sweet one ruins it. Keep the garnish almost absent: a thin cucumber slice or a simple twist. Burying two Uji teas under sugar would be an expensive mistake.