Bareksten Navy Strength Gin

Dilute it firmly. At 58% every botanical arrives compressed, and a navy strengthNavy StrengthGin bottled at 57% ABV or more. Royal Navy lore holds that at this strength, gunpowder soaked in gin would still ignite.GlossarySee Navy Strength gins gin poured like an ordinary one buries its own detail under alcohol; give it a heavily iced glass and a full measure of premium Indian tonicIndian tonicThe classic tonic: sparkling water, bitter quinine and sugar. The name recalls colonial India, where quinine warded off malaria.Glossary and the whole recipe opens out. Bareksten works in Norway, and the strength carries a forest and berry identity rather than a citrus one.

Citrus · Spicy · Floral · Herbal · Navy Strength

The berries are what make it Norwegian. Lingonberries bring a sharp, acidic red fruit with genuine bitterness behind it, blueberries a rounder and softer sweetness, and elderberries a darker, more tannic depth. Rhubarb runs alongside them with a green sourness nearer a stalk than a fruit, and without it the berry half would sit heavy. Elderflower lifts the top with a honeyed floral note that its own berry does not share. Mint and chamomile then cool the middle, one sharply and one softly, and various Norwegian herbs fill in behind. Underneath it all, coriander, angelica and liquorice roots hold the classical structure, and juniper stays firmly at the centre.

The nose is juniper, wild berries, elderflower, herbs, rhubarb and a warming spice.

The palate is intense but genuinely aromatic rather than merely strong, berries, mint, chamomile and spice arranged around a juniper core that never lets go, and the alcohol reads as warmth rather than as heat once the ice has done its work. Fifty-eight percent was originally a shipboard specification rather than a flavour one, and it survives because the extra proof carries aroma that forty would leave behind.

A berry, or a length of rhubarb, repeats a note the recipe already contains, which is the only job a garnish has. Nothing sweetened: at this strength a sugary mixer turns the lingonberry into jam and wastes the point of the bottle, which was to carry a whole forest at full volume, and at this proof it can.