Gin Definitions
August 27, 2009
A few months back I attended a seminar hosted by Plymouth and Beefeater gins. This was held on the same day the new EU definition of London gin became law.
The law sets down three categories of gin by production method- not by flavor. They are:
Gin- Can be basically vodka with flavors added at bottling time.
Distilled Gin - Flavors are distilled with the neutral spirit, then additional flavors may be added after distillation.
London Gin - Flavors (must be natural, not artificial) are distilled with the neutral spirit, then nothing may be added after distillation except more neutral spirit and water and a tiny amount of sweetener. You will notice that it does not need to be distilled in London.
The full definitions are here.
I was confused about one point after the seminar so I thought I'd clear it up here. Gins like Hendrick's and Martin Miller's are not London gins because they add flavors after distillation (so they are distilled gins). Gins like Bombay Sapphire that are made in Carterhead stills (and meeting all the other requirements) are London gins, though they are made a little differently than gins like Beefeater and Plymouth.
In the Carterhead still, botanicals can be placed in the vapor stream of the still instead of (or in addition to) putting them in the pot and infusing them in the neutral spirit. This adds a lighter touch of the botanicals to the gin. Initially I thought this disqualified gins distilled in this method from being labeled London gins. (I was thinking that if the botanicals were not in the pot, it was considered post-distillation.) But that's not true. I guess if it's all contained within the still set-up it's not considered post-distillation.
In the end, there are good and interesting gins in each category, and the categories don't account for flavor. Increasingly people are referring to gins as traditional vs. "new west" in style; boldly juniper-forward in flavor versus lighter in style with non-traditional flavorings and usually less dominated by juniper. So perhaps a gin officially labeled as a London gin can also be "new west" in flavor.
Hi Camper - I took a seminar at ES w/ Jackson C. and learned of 4 categories based on flavor (I *think* these are the right ones): London, Dutch (a.k.a., Genever), Plymouth, and Old Tom. Not sure how the categories overlap with what you describe (if at all); maybe just a different naming system? It's all rather confusing to me ;)
Posted by: Tina Starr | August 28, 2009 at 12:45 PM
Tina- Good call, I should have included those in the round-up to make it more clear. Genever and Plymouth gins are geographically defined and are also legal definitions. Old Tom is a flavor category and I don't believe is legally defined anywhere. London gin is (as of recently) not geographically defined but defined by production process.
If we look at flavor categories, we could say genever, old tom, (sorta not really Plymouth,) new west, and classic juniper-forward.
So we can categorize gins by production, geography, and/or by flavor.
Then when you have gins like Anchor's Genevieve we can say it's made in the USA but like a Dutch gin, in a genever flavor style, in an all-pot still production process.
Posted by: Camper English | August 28, 2009 at 12:59 PM
So short answer in re: gin categorization: there's more than one way to skin this cat... ;) Thanks for your reply!
Posted by: Tina Starr | October 21, 2009 at 06:48 AM
Hi Camper
What is the significance of the term conventional (ethanol) stills. The term pot or patent stills do not feature in the EU explanation of distilled or London Dry Gins. Can you please throw some light on this?
Thanks
Posted by: Sanjit Keskar | March 23, 2016 at 11:18 PM
I do not know if by "traditional" stills in the EU regulation if they mean pot stills only, or if column/patent stills would qualify. So I guess I can't be helpful, sorry.
Posted by: Camper English | March 28, 2016 at 07:12 PM