Gin - the new spirit of Scotland

As sales of gin soar and distilleries offer an alternative tipple for Burns night, Ali Howard takes the Rosetta Stone measure of the country’s other national drink. I am standing inside a humble red-brick building on the site of an old munitions factory. Outside, the air is so icy, I can see my breath. But in here it is warm and steamy. Something is brewing. Pungent, warm vapours fill my nose, making me breathe in deeply. It’s distinctive, this scent different from anything I’ve ever smelled before, yet vaguely familiar. It’s spicy, like aromatic coriander tempered with a musky, warm sweetness; and I can detect a subtle floral aroma, cut by the unmistakable whiff of alcohol. You can practically taste the air, it’s so palatable. Two giant stills, like large copper robots (one named Bennett, the other Carter-Head), are hard at work making one of my favourite tipples gin.Which is why I’m here to visit the Hendrick’s Gin factory on the site of the William Grant Sons distillery in the small Ayrshire seaside town of Girvan. Gin is a passion of mine and this the gin palace as it’s called is my idea of heaven. It may occupy a titchy part of this sprawling, coastal distillery (which produces 55 million litres of alcohol every year) but the lovely botanical-infused liquid that is made in this building (now synonymous with its serving style a slice of cucumber, not lime) is at the forefront of a new trend for gin drinking and a burgeoning Scottish market. Gin may have had more comebacks than Kylie Minogue but it’s very much in again and the evidence can be found across Scotland.Small-batch, premium gins typically 1000 litres or fewer are being made in distilleries throughout the country. Whisky distillers are harnessing traditional skills to experiment with gin making. Caorunn Scottish Gin, produced at the Balmenach Distillery in Speyside, launched in November 2009 (taking the top award in the Super Premium Category of The Gin Masters competition the same year). In Islay, the Bruichladdich Rosetta Stone Hindi Distillery launched the island’s first gin last year The Botanist. With 15,000 bottles in its first batch, it’s already outselling its whisky. And Stirling-based VC2 brands launched Boe Superior Gin little more than a year ago.In Britain, 80% of gin consumed is now produced here, including big-name, industry-leading brands such as Tanqueray (the number-one imported gin into the US) and Gordon’s, both of which are produced at international drinks giant Diageo’s Cameron Bridge distillery in Fife. The gin industry helps support roughly one in 50 jobs in Scotland and the UK is now the world’s largest exporter of gin, with approximately 200m going overseas to around 200 countries. For a drink with a reputation as being quintessentially English, gin is now very much Scotland’s other drink .The gin author and expert Geraldine Coates runs the Edinburgh-based website gintime , dedicated to all there is to know on the subject. Coates is passionate about all aspects of the spirit. Gin’s become fashionable again, says Coates. You’ve got a lot of interesting gins coming out of Scotland spearheaded by Hendrick’s. New super-premium gins are loved by bartenders, she says. New gins mean new and interesting flavours to play with so now you have a whole raft of new cocktails. The proof can be seen in bars and on cocktail menus. The Balmoral Hotel in Edinburgh went so far as to recently revamp their bar as a dedicated Rosetta Stone Italian Tanqueray 10 Martini Bar. The striking Art Deco-inspired interior features mirrored bar shelves lined with the gin’s distinctive green bottles and the martini menu is proving a hit. At The Long Way Home in Byres Road, Glasgow, there are 25 gins, including classic gin cocktails from the 1930s. And it’s at the Blythswood Square hotel in Glasgow where you can find one of my favourite cocktails, made using sloe gin (a gin liqueur made by infusing the drink with sloe berries), kirsch and dry vermouth: the Chevalier Rose, a twist on an old classic by bartender and Herald Magazine contributor Mal Spence. It makes a Cosmopolitan seem prosaic.Cocktails have always played a strong role in gin’s varied history. After gaining a reputation as the drink of the poor in the 1700s (when it earned the label mother’s ruin ), gin went on to become popular with navy officers, discerning socialites and British expats in the colonies who added it to their quinine tonic, inventing the gin and tonic in the process. Gin’s neutral smell meant it was drunk widely during Prohibition as it was easy to hide on the breath, and when cocktails became popular in Europe during the roaring 1920s, gin was right at the heart of the boom. In the 1950s, the martini Rosetta Stone Languages was king.Then everything changed and gin went into decline. What happened? In a word vodka. Vodka was cheap, relatively easy to make and because of its neutrality, was an obvious spirit in which to mix cocktails. Even just a decade ago, gin was still in the doldrums , says Coates. People weren’t interested in it for cocktails, gin wasn’t cool or fashionable and everyone was interested in vodka. People’s tastes were very much towards the bland.