Chapter 7. Recent Experiments On Dry Gin Recipes

GIN WINES

I am especially glad to be able to pass on the results of my most recent experiments. The dry gin recipes here were evolved from a single idea. I wanted to make a wine as near as possible in taste to commercial gin, and because gin has no colour worth mentioning my first thoughts were to ferment sugar and water and flavour the resulting 'wine'. But I was aware that yeast produces more alcohol when the fermenting liquor contains the essentials of yeast reproduction that is, in addition to sugar and nutrient, it needs also a vegetable matter such as fruit pulp. But all fruits and most vegetables give colour to wine and my aim was to produce a strong wine with little or no colour at all. Potato wine always turns out a good strong wine and since this has no colour I decided to carry out trials with potatoes, and made my first potato-gin wine.

During these experiments I evolved complete recipe ; however, there is no need to put them here because replicas of them appear in other parts of this book. All you need to know is how to get the gin flavour in the various wines to which this addition is specially suitable.

In case you feel like experimenting on your own here, I had better mention that it is useless to add the oil of juniper to a fermenting 'must' because it will separate from the rest and be lost during one of the various operations. Even when this is added to the finished wines it will separate because there is not enough alcohol to keep it in solution. But this does not matter all that much because we are still able to get the fragrant gin flavour we are after.

Mind you, we shall not be able to make wines identical to dry gin because gin is a spirit and we cannot produce that amount of alcohol. The only way we could do this would be to add gin to these special wines and since I am concerned in giving you wines costing only a few shillings a gallon, I would prefer that you forget the idea of adding gin unless you really do feel it worth while. Some of you will, of course, and if you do it should be added to the clear finished wines. The amount you add will depend only on the depth of your pocket.

The orange and lemon gin wines here will be stronger than the popular dry gin and orange served over the bar. This is because a single gin is usually diluted with twice its amount of orange or lemon cordial. Therefore, the 70° proof of the gin is diluted to about 23° proof. Ours will be a bit stronger than this; about 30° proof provided we use a good yeast and nutrient and get the maximum alcohol. But whereas the orange or lemon gin served over the bar is clouded by the cordial ours will be clear wine.

Now, the whole point is this: we add the oil of juniper to get the flavour of gin in a finished wine and, because it separates to form a fine film on the surface, the bottle must be shaken a little before the wine is served. Therefore, the oil of juniper must not be added until the wine is perfectly clear and when there is no suggestion of a deposit in the bottles which, of course, would be disturbed by the shaking.

Finally, don't add oil of juniper for the sake of novelty to any wine; make sure first that you will like the result.

As much or as little of the oil may be added according to taste, and it is better to experiment with one bottle of the chosen wine rather than the gallon; in this way only one bottle is involved if you decide after all that one particular type of gin wine is not to your liking.

Sufficient oil of juniper to flavor several gallons of wine may be had from any chemist for about two shillings. Use an eye-drop dispenser, adding the oil drop by drop, sampling after each addition until you get the strength of flavor you like. I find five drops to the gallon about right, or one to the bottle, but your preference may be very different from mine.

Suitable recipes to be made into dry gin wines are: the potato wine recipe on page 55; the orange wine recipe on page 88; the lemon wine recipe on page 89; the damson wine recipe on page 45; the sloe wine recipe on page 50.

This makes a very good imitation of the popular 'gin and pep’ Make the potato wine on page 55. When it is finally a clear, finished wine, flavor with peppermint essence and oil of juniper. Do this carefully otherwise the effect will be ruined.