7 Dials London Dry Gin

Distilling under vacuumVacuum distillationLowering the pressure makes alcohol boil at around 30 to 50 °C instead of 78 °C, so delicate aromas are not cooked and stay fresher.Glossary lowers the boiling point, and that changes what survives the process. A rotary evaporator runs cold enough that nothing in the still is ever cooked, so the botanicals arrive in the bottle tasting the way they taste in the hand rather than the way they taste after an hour of heat. The London Gin Club makes 7 Dials this way, in small batchesSmall batchProduction in small quantities per distillation run, often in a small still. The term has no legal definition.Glossary, on seven botanicals.

Citrus · Organic · Woody · Dry · Spicy

Seven for the seven streets that meet at the junction the gin is named after, and one of them is genuinely unusual. Marshmallow root is mucilaginous, which is to say it thickens whatever it steeps in, and its contribution here is texture and a faint creamy sweetness rather than an aroma anyone could name. That is why the nose reads as juniperJuniperThe one compulsory botanical: gin must taste predominantly of juniper. Its "berry" is really a small conifer cone, resinous and peppery.Glossary mixed with double cream, a description that would make no sense for a conventionally distilled ginDistilled ginGin made by redistilling neutral spirit with juniper and other botanicals. Unlike London Dry, flavourings may be added after distillation.GlossarySee Distilled gin gins. Clementine peel gives the citrus, sweeter and gentler than an orange. Cardamom and angelica open the palate together, cool spice over dry root, before fresh juniper surges through the middle and earthy root notes settle underneath. Almond and tangy clementine zest close it out after a soft turn through coriander.

Cold distillation makes a delicate gin, and a delicate gin needs a mixer that will not shout. Neutral tonic, ice packed to the rim, and a measure poured with a steady hand; clementine peel where available, orange otherwise. It is worth tasting neat first, since the whole point of the method is the freshness that a long drink starts to dilute. Seven streets, seven plants, one still that never gets hot. Cold distillation is slower and more expensive than the ordinary kind, and the only thing it buys is freshness. It ends citric, spiced and fresh.