Ginning it up

Quite a few summers ago, when visiting New York, the husband of my father's cousin offered to make a gin-and-lime-juice drink that he said will be refreshing.  I have never been tempted by anything alcoholic, and I politely turned it down.  Had he suggested a cold, chilly "ice coffee" that we used to have during the hot summers of my childhood, now that would have been refreshing.

Gin and the Subcontinent has an interesting medical history as well; recall this post from a while ago about how gin helped the colonizing bastards fight malaria with quinine?

Quinine powder quickly became critical to the health of the empire. By the 1840s British citizens and soldiers in India were using 700 tons of cinchona bark annually for their protective doses of quinine. Quinine powder kept the troops alive, allowed officials to survive in low-lying and wet regions of India, and ultimately permitted a stable (though surprisingly small) British population to prosper in Britain’s tropical colonies. Quinine was so bitter, though, that British officials stationed in India and other tropical posts took to mixing the powder with soda and sugar. “Tonic water,” of a sort, was born. ...
It was only natural that at some point during this time an enterprising colonial official combined his (or her) daily dose of protective quinine tonic with a shot (or two) of gin. Rather than knock back a bitter glass of tonic in the morning, why not enjoy it in the afternoon with a healthy gin ration? The gin and tonic was born—and the cool, crisp concoction could, as Churchill observed, start saving all those English lives.

Gin has, of course, become a huge part of the cocktail culture throughout the world, far above and beyond the gimlet or gin-and-tonic.  And that is the world that Anthony Lane--yes, that same awesome movie critic--writes about in The New Yorker.

I have no idea about the details of gin that Lane describes, but boy is his writing hysterical.  Like this one about the "botanicals" that are often touted in marketing the gin brands:

In most gins, the number of botanicals tends to stay in the single figures, or to hover just above. Not in Monkey 47, though, whose name is a statistical boast. Add three more (bubble gum, manure, and Marlboro Lights, say), and you’d have a nice round number. Personally, I can’t even think of forty-seven botanicals, and, unless the company is selling directly to neurasthenic beagles, I can’t conceive of any customer who will sniff out every aroma. Do some flavors not cancel one another out in the blending?

And, if that does not knock you out, Lane follows up with this:

Often, for reasons of practicality and pride, botanicals are selected with a nod to local produce. Take Calamity Gin, from Texas. Well-trained taste buds, given a slosh, will detect traces of juniper, lavender, bergamot, rose, and cardamom, plus zest of grapefruit, orange, and lime. But those are standard elements, found in varying ratios in innumerable gins. What makes this one special is its secret weapon, bluebonnets. And why? Because the bluebonnet is the state flower of Texas. As yet, nobody in New Hampshire has had the guts to brew a granite gin, with a delicate bouquet of damp stone, but these are early days.

"But these are early days" ;)

The botanicals that are unique to the Philippines are also the marketing angle that Matthew Westfall employs.

Who is Westfall, you ask?

A few days ago, when we were talking about the Philippines because of this talk that we attended, I wondered what ever became of a graduate school mate, Matthew Westfall, who had served in the Peace Corps.  In graduate school, he made a documentary project on Manila's slums--a documentary that was funded by Oliver Stone, among others.

I google his name. Voila!

Matthew founded and operates a gin distillery in the Philippines!  His artisanal gin has "unique range of Philippine botanicals like pomelo, dalandan, calamansi, dayap- the Benguet kind, and the mango."

ARC Botanical Gin and its sister spirits have already garnered international accolades, including two gold medals at the prestigious World Gin Awards in London, two gold medals at the SIP Awards in California, and two silvers at the World Spirits Awards in Austria, the first Philippine entrant in the event’s history.
These accolades come hot on the heels of Full Circle being recognized as “Philippine Distillery of the Year” at the Hong Kong International Spirits Competition in 2018 among other prestigious recognitions in Asia.

What a story!

What's so special about the Filipino botanicals that Matthew uses?

Our flagship ARC Botanical Gin draws on lots of fresh citrus: Davao pomelo, Sagada oranges, Baguio lemons, dalandan and calamansi, and nothing goes to waste—the peels go into the vapor basket and the pulp goes into the pot. We also use fresh Benguet pine buds, handpicked in Sagada, Mountain Province in northern Luzon, which adds a nice piney bit, and organic lemongrass, which is grown on a family farm in the province of Rizal. Lastly, we use fresh mangoes from our family farm in Dasol, Pangasinan, which by every report are the most delicious mangoes on the planet (pardon our bias).

It is a fascinating world that I get to learn about every single day, while always ginned up with coffee ;)

Matthew at his gin distillery
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