I made a gin!
And I dont mean in my shed, or in the bath, or at the kitchen sink, I mean an actual real, legal, professionally done, gin.
Blogger Gin has been a year in the planning. I cannot begin to tell you how complicated it has been but this week it finally happened!
Bloggers spend an awful lot of time talking about gin, so I thought it would be appropriate to have one named after us. And since I spend an awful lot of time talking about gin and have recently finished curating my very own A to Z of gin at home, it seemed like the logical next step to take
I was introduced to Bottomley Distillers by the co-founder of The Gin Parlour, Adam, as he thought that Alan and Amy at Bottomley would be the perfect couple to help my gin become a reality.
Which is then were the coincidences then kicked in. They are based in Lincolnshire, near where I grew up. And where I learned to drive. Going up to see them on Tuesday this week was like a trip through my childhood and stirred all kinds of memories up. I was on the road trip with my lovely friend Alice who had offered to put me up in her holiday cottage for the night, as it was only 20 minutes from the distillery.
Yet another coincidence.
Making gin is a relatively quick process, you can drink it 24 hours after making it, but this had taken slightly longer for me.
Not only had I had to find Amy and Alan, but organise funding, get a bar code, get labels designed and then come up with the recipe. Thankfully Alan was amazing and knew exactly what to do when I said I wanted a gin that tasted good with lemonade. We only had to try three samples to get our finished recipe.
A wonderful mix of juniper from Croatia, cardamon seeds, pink and black peppercorns, cinnamon and fresh lemons that all went in the still with alcohol ready to be boiled and distilled for 12 hours
Before then being mixed with water, bottled, and shipped to the warehouse for sale.
Cheers!