Gin Tropez

Caraway is the botanical that does not belong here. It is a northern seed, the one that flavours rye bread and kümmel across central Europe, and finding it in a recipe otherwise made of Provençal herbs and Riviera citrus is the small surprise that stops this from being a predictable southern gin. Bottled at 40%, built around the aromatic landscape between Saint-Tropez and the hills behind it.

Citrus · Floral · Herbal

Everything else on the list belongs to the region and behaves accordingly. Lavender supplies the floral half, cool and unmistakable, and it is what places the gin geographically before anything else does. Rosemary and thyme give the resinousResinousAn aroma reminiscent of pine or fir resin. It is juniper's signature, due to compounds such as pinene.Glossary, scrubby green character of the hillsides, rosemary the more pine-like and thyme the drier and more savoury of the two. Lemon and orange peel hold the top bright, one sharp and one round. Then the caraway arrives underneath with its warm, faintly aniseed pungency, and it sits alongside coriander seed and angelica root in the structural layer where nobody looks. Juniper runs through the middle without ever raising its voice, and no single plant takes over the profile.

Balance of this kind rewards a simple glass. Take a neutral tonic, fill with ice, pour a standard measure, and add nothing more elaborate than a lemon twistTwistA strip of peel twisted over the glass to release its oils, then dropped into the drink.Glossary or a sprig of rosemary. It suits classic cocktails for the same reason: nothing in it fights a vermouthVermouthAn aromatised, fortified wine flavoured with herbs and barks; its name comes from the German Wermut, wormwood. Dry vermouth goes into a Martini, sweet red into a Negroni.Glossary or a citrus juice. A gin that names a resort town and then tastes of the countryside around it has its priorities in order. The caraway is the proof that somebody thought about the recipe instead of assembling the obvious list, and it is what remains once the lavender has faded. Nothing here is decorative. It closes herbal, citric and dry.