The Fleet's In!

What does the over-saturated American spirits market need? Navy Strength Gin, of course. 

No, seriously, we do. Bartenders have been asking for this quintessentially British, overproof product for years. Drinkers, too, like me. But if you wanted it, you had to smuggle in a bottle of Plymouth. No longer. New York Distilling Company's Perry's Tot is already here. And Plymouth and Hayman's versions will be here by the end of summer. (Also, I've been informed, there is a Colorado-produced navy strength gin available. But it's sold only in some western and southern states.)

Here's my New York Times Diner's Journal story:

Gin Ahoy! A Navy-Strength Fleet Arrives

By ROBERT SIMONSON

As this year marks the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812, perhaps its appropriate that it be the annum when America becomes awash in navy strength gin.

As the name hints, navy strength gin is a powerfully alcoholic expression of the juniper-informed spirit, typically clocking in at 57 percent alcohol by volume. (Regular London dry style gin typically ranges between 40 percent and 45 percent.) Beginning in the early 19th century, it was supplied to the British Royal Navy by distillers such asPlymouth. The declared reason for the high alcohol content was that that was the proof level at which the ship’s gunpowder could still be fired should it accidentally get soaked with booze.

Today’s mixologists aren’t so worried about their gunpowder. They do, however love overproof spirits, leading for a call in recent years for navy strength gin to breach America’s shores. That cry has been answered in triplicate. By the end of 2012, three versions of the hearty gin will be available. The first out of the gate is, in a twist, an American product: Perry’s Tot, released last December by the New York Distilling Company, of Brooklyn. Royal Dock Gin, made by the same British company that produces Hayman’s Old Tom Gin, is expected to arrive in April. And Plymouth, arguably the most famous of the navy strength gins, is set for a late summer launch.

Allen Katz, one of the founders of New York Distilling, remembers his first sip of navy strength. “My first introduction was a trip to Plymouth about six years ago. I was familiar with the name but not its history. I thought, for 57 percent alcohol, this is very drinkable. I remember the pleasantness of the spiciness.”

Both Plymouth and Royal Dock claim a long history with wetting the whistles of the British admiralty. However, official ties with the Royal Navy ended shortly after World War II. For a time afterward, Plymouth would provide “commissioning kits” to new ships. According to Simon Ford, director of trade outreach and brand education at Pernod Ricard USA (Pernod owns Plymouth), the kits “were a wooden chest that held gin, tonic and bitters.

“There were glasses, a ‘glug glug jug,’ used for mixing the drinks, and a pennant that the captain would fly to let visitors know they could join for drinks.”

“If they started commissioning new ships,” Mr. Ford added, “we would probably make commissioning kits for them again.”

Plymouth Gin Get New/Old Look

In recent years, I grew to love a Plymouth gin that looked like this, all tall, sleek and Art Deco. 

But come this spring, the Plymouth found on your liquor store shelves will look like the bottles below. The redesign is really a return to the centuries-old brand's roots. The Are Deco look was introduced only five years ago, in 2006. The original Plymouth bottles and labels once looked very much as the new specimens do. 

Rest assured, the stuff inside will remain the same.

Damson Gin Coming to U.S.

England likes gin. They have London Dry Gin, Plymouth Gin, Sloe Gin, Damson Gin.

Wait. What was that last one? Damson Gin. It's similar to Sloe Gin, only it's made with damson plums, not sloe berries. Damsons are smaller, tarter and more acidic than regular plums. On this side of the pond, we all know damsons from the higher-priced, imported jellies and jams we see lining the shelves of our local boutique food purveyors. But in England, Damsons are also used to make a sweetened, gin-based liqueur. Plymouth used to make a Damson Gin.

There is currently no Damson Gin in the U.S., but that will change in the next few months. Scott S. Krahn, who represents Eric Seed's Haus Alpenz catalog of unique liquors, has been toying with a recipe for the stuff in upstate New York, where damsons are grown. The fruit comes from a farm in Geneva, NY, and he enlisted Finger Lakes Distilling to execute his formula, which he expects to release commercially in July.

The Damson gin is lighter, tarter and has more of an alcoholic bite that Sloe Gin. (Krahn bottles it at 33% alcohol; Plymouth Sloe Gin, by contrast, is 26%.) I cautiously predict that it will quickly become the cocktail mixer of the moment soon after it hits the shelves. It delivers a flavor profile unlike no other currently available liqueur.

The product currently has no name. (See the bottle with the blank label above.) It will be priced at $25.

And speaking of Sloe Gins, Hayman, of Old Tom Gin fame, has a fine Sloe Gin, but at present it's only available in the UK. It's lighter, less viscous than the Plymouth version. Worth bringing in one of these days.

Hold the Mayo!

Sometimes I think today's ambitious mixologists are too much Mr. Hyde and not enough Dr. Jekyll in their strivings for something new. There are a lot of kooky drinks out there. But, then again, who can say with any sureness from which corner that critical "Eureka!" will come.

With that in mind, and without comment, I submit for your consideration the P.B.L.T. (Plymouth gin, Bacon, Lettuce, Tomato), the creation of D.C. mixologist Gina Chersevani. I have never tasted one. But if you have a free afternoon, and feel like drinking your lunch, give it a go. Or, better yet, visit Gina and have her make you one.

P.B.L.T.

1 oz Plymouth™ Gin
1 cube of lettuce water
1 cube of tomato water
Spray vinegar on one side of glass and stick dehydrated bacon dust on side.

First spray vinegar on a glass and dip in dehydrated bacon dust, then place a lettuce water cube, tomato cube, then pour the Plymouth Gin over top.

Tomato Cubes

16 oz of fresh tomato juice (either in a juicer or done in a blender and then strained)
1 teaspoon of white pepper
1 pinch of fleur de sel
4 oz of fresh lemon juice
4 dashes of Tabasco

Combine all ingredients together and fill ice trays. Makes about 24-30 cubes

Lettuce Cubes

14 oz of lettuce water (2 large heads of iceberg lettuce, that has been juiced in a juicer)
1 teaspoon of white pepper
1 pinch of fleur de sel
4 oz of lemon juice

Combine all ingredients together and fill ice trays. Makes about 20-24 cubes

Taking It Sloe

I tastes Plymouth's great Sloe Gin for the first time along with a lot of other journalists and bloggers, at this year's Tales of the Cocktail, and was blown away by its flavor and quality.

Time Out New York gave me the chance to write at length (well, not at length—nothing at TONY is at length) about the liqueur, which was finally introduced by Plymouth to the U.S. market last May. Here's the item:

Sloe and steady

Scan the back shelves of old New York dives and you might spot a dusty bottle of something called sloe gin. The liqueur, given its tart, plummy flavor and vibrant ruby hue by an infusion of sloe berries (a wild fruit native to England), was a popular cocktail component in the early 20th century. But in recent decades, the only varieties found on the U.S. market were wretched, no-name swills full of artificial flavor and coloring. Playing starring roles in fratboy drinks (like the Alabama Slammer and the Sloe Comfortable Screw) only hastened sloe gin’s exit from respectable cocktail lists. But earlier this summer, the Plymouth distillery—which previously doled out a benchmark variety of the ancient spirit in the U.K. and Australia only—began shipping the nectar to the U.S. Plymouth has released a mere 1,000 cases for 2008, and due to high demand at bars and restaurants, they are fast disappearing from liquor store shelves. Your best chance at a sip may be the city’s tonier bars. Clover Club (210 Smith St between Baltic and Butler Sts, Cobble Hill, Brooklyn; 718-855-7939) is boasting a sloe-gin-and-rum-based punch; and Death & Company (433 E 6th St between First Ave and Ave A, 212-388-0882) has a few sloe-gin cocktails on the menu, including the dangerously drinkable, blackberry-topped Electric Kool Aid Acid Test. Just don’t order a Panty Dropper, or you’ll be shown the door.
— Robert Simonson

Gin & Tonic Taste Test

As many I encountered at "Tales of the Cocktail" already know, the New York Sun charged me to put together a Gin & Tonic blind tasting, to take place at The Clover Club the day after the convention. Much to my surprise, the guest tasters David Wondrich, St. John Frizell and Julie Reiner—all presenters at TOTC—managed to drag themselves to the tasting the afternoon after flying back to NYC. Not just drag themselves, actually. They look fresh as daisies.

Anyway, the piece ran a couple weeks back. Here it is, with the results.

The Best Gin for a Summer Elixer

By Robert Simonson

Before the mojito, before the caipirinha, the gin and tonic reigned supreme as a hot-weather drink, quenching summertime thirsts at taverns and backyard parties the world over. Born of practicality — the quinine in the tonic once helped combat malaria in the British Empire, while the gin made it easier for authorities to throw the bitter elixir down people's throats — it survived simply as a delectable liquid marriage.

Although more complicated drinks might be the tipples of choice for today's drinkers, the seemingly elementary G&T is enough of a classic to provoke debate on how best to serve it up. Favored gin-to-tonic ratios vary from 1-to-1 to 1-to-4. Britishers prefer lemon as a garnish, while Americans go for the more familiar lime wedge, which some simply shove into the glass, while others squeeze it over the drink. And then there's the question of tonic choice.

In testing how six gins (three classics, three newer brands) performed in a gin and tonic, a recent tasting panel opted for one part gin to two parts tonic, poured into a glass filled to the brim with ice and topped with a squeezed lime wedge. While new boutique tonics such as Q and Fever-Tree are preferred by many professionals in lieu of mass-market items such as Canada Dry, they're not always readily available to the average consumer, who might not live or work near a Whole Foods (but they could be worth a trip, as Charlotte Cowles writes today). Our control tonic: small, individual bottles of Schweppes, to ensure a fresh pour.

On the panel were myself; a cocktail historian and author of "Imbibe!" (Penguin), David Wondrich; a former bartender at Pegu Club and a spirits journalist, St. John Frizell, and mixologist and bar owner Julie Reiner, whose new Brooklyn saloon, the Clover Club, provided the setting for the tasting.

#1 (tie)
TANQUERAY
Profile: One of the classic exemplars of the London Dry Gin style, a Tanqueray Gin & Tonic is considered by many the benchmark for the drink. If you got through college without hearing someone pompously order a "Tanq & Tonic," you went to a dry school.
Comments: Panelists liked this one at first sip, finding it "balanced, fresh and tasty," with a "sharp cleanness" (Wondrich), and a palate not "overly juniper"-oriented (Reiner) with "a lot of lime rind" (Frizell). Said Wondrich, simply, "It's a very good Gin & Tonic."

#1 (tie)
PLYMOUTH
Profile: This two-century-old spirit, produced in its namesake British port town and long associated with the British Navy, has recently made a comeback. Possessing a "Protected Designation of Origin" all its own, it is prized by spirit pros for its complexity of flavor.
Comments: As Plymouth is not usually a go-to gin for G&Ts, the panel was slightly surprised by the spirit's strong showing. But the words said it all. It was "perfectly right. A little bit a pepper and spicy citrus," (Frizell) with a "long, long finish. It keeps going and going." Just "very nice" (Simonson).

#3 (tie)
BEEFEATER
Profile: Bottled in London since 1820, Beefeater stands alongside Tanqueray as another standard-bearer of the London Dry style, a habitual choice for many Martini and Gin & Tonic drinkers.
Comments: Though not coming out on top, Beefeater did respectably with the panel, making a Gin & Tonic that was "nice and bright" (Frizell), "clean" and "appealing" (Wondrich) and "refreshing" (Reiner). Added Julie: "Mmm."

#3 (tie)
JUNIPERO
Profile: Junipero, which debuted in the 1990s, comes from the Anchor Distillery in San Francisco, the same folks who make Anchor Steam Beer. Made in small batches, it has won some converts, even among traditionalists.
Comments: Of the younster gins sampled, Junipero performed the best with the tasters. It was deemed "juicy, citrusy," though "not as clean and cutting," (Wondrich), while all noticed the "good deal of juniper in it" (Frizell). All in all, though, the Junipero Gin & Tonic was "pretty well-balanced," even if the finish lasted "the least amount of time." (Frizell)

#5
NEW AMSTERDAM
Profile: This recently rolled-out gin has an unusual source: the giant E.&J. Gallo Winery. Softer, fuller and less dry than classic gins, the company has emphasized its shying away from what they call gin's "harsh" taste profile.
Comments: The remaining new gins—often called "botanical gins" because they play a bit fast and loose with their flavoring ingredients—took a drubbing from the panel. New Amsterdam reminded tasters of "hair tonic," (Simonson) "Fruit Loops" (Wondrich) and "something like violet" (Reiner). Frizell was more forgiving, saying "I don't dislike it. It kind of smells like a cheap Gin & Tonic."

#6
AVIATION
Profile: This contemporary invention out of Portland, OR, has captured a won a lot of attention for its atypical cocktail of botanicals emphasizing lavender and anise seed, as well as its round, smooth delivery. The makers purport to have been influenced by the heavier (and older), Dutch style of gin.
Comments: There was no love in the room for the young gin from the Pacific Northwest. "This is just weird," was the first remark, with taste notes of "some flavor like mugwort," "swampy, musty, Grandma's attic" following (Wondrich). "It grabs you by the throat" (Reiner) and was "aggressive," (Frizell) and "the finish it bitter" (Reiner). In short, an Aviation Gin & Tonic didn't fly.