Plymouth Gin

[CrispyCritter]

I just bought a bottle of this tonight, since my Bombay Sapphire is getting a bit low. I've been mixing Flying Fish cocktails with it (but I had a rye-based Red Hook as well).

Yes, I have the peach bitters. My first mix used orange bitters instead of peach, and that's actually quite good, but the peach bitters make it even better.

"Flying Fish" is a good name for this cocktail :drinking::fish2: - you'll drink like a fish, and you'll soon be flying! :slappin:

I'm going to have to try some Martin{i,ez} mixes with Plymouth - so far, I like it better than the Bombay Sapphire.

[barturtle]

I first tried Plymouth a few years back when I noticed it on tastings.com dream bar list. I too had been a Sapphire drinker, but quickly changed after trying Plymouth. I think it makes a great martini (about the only thing I ever use gin for). Shaken with a twist, please.

[ratcheer]

Is Plymouth a brand or a type of gin?

Tim

[barturtle]

Plymouth is a brand of gin. I checked the wholesale price list in Alabama, they show it as available (pg 22).

[cowdery]

Is Plymouth a brand or a type of gin?

Tim

It's actually both, and also a place name. It just so happens that it is only made today by one company, but that was not always the case.

[Gillman]

Plymouth gin was a cross between a Hollands gin and London Dry. Probably as taste for gin turned drier in England, in the far-flung port cities the older tastes held on and hence Plymouth gin having attributes of the old (original) zesty mashy Hollands gin and the newer, more neutral alcohol-based London Dry style.

Plymouth gin, as befits a drink named for a British port town, has naval associations. A Pink Gin was an officer's stand-by for years. Throw bitters in a glass, toss out the excess, pour in a tot of Plymouth gin. Ice? I say, sir!

Gary

[ratcheer]

I have always fondly remembered a very old WW II movie, something like "The Pursuit of the Graf Spee". A young Patrick MacNee was an assistant or something for a British admiral. After an intense session of planning and coordinating to solve the problem at hand, the admiral asked the MacNee character, "Where is the sun?" MacNee replied, "It just crossed the yardarm, Sir." To which the admiral responded, "Well then, open the gin."

Tim

[ratcheer]

Plymouth is a brand of gin. I checked the wholesale price list in Alabama, they show it as available (pg 22).

I have never seen it.

Tim

[CrispyCritter]

Well, the other night, when I was mixing that school of Flying Fish, I made one with Bombay Sapphire. Overall, I'd say I liked the Plymouth better - but I definitely wouldn't turn down one made with Sapphire.

[Mr. Smith]

Is Plymouth a brand or a type of gin?

Tim

plymouth gin is as far as i know the only gin in the world today that has an EU regulative protecting it's origins. plymouth gin has to come from the city of plymouth. it is also the gin that was drunk by the british navy, and the only "correct" gin to use in a classic pink gin. in the 'savoy book of cocktails' from the 1930's, it is also the only dry style gin used in cocktails (e.g. dry martini)

[Gillman]

In terms of palate (at least originally) it was mid-way between the drier, lighter London Dry style and the heavy, aromatic Dutch gin (the so-called Hollands or genever) which was the original gin of any type. Today much Dutch gin is fairly neutral although some hearkens back to the original taste (heavy on the rye, pot-stilled, often but not always flavored with juniper and other aromatics).

Plymouth gin is something I have never had but I hope to remedy this soon.

Gary

[Mr. Smith]

plymouth gin stands out from the more commercial (read: neutral) brands like bombay sapphire and is one of the best gins to use in all classic gin-cocktails. other gins in this category is tanqueray no 10, hendrick's and old raj. they're all worth a try!

[cowdery]

Plymouth gin is both a type and a brand. It is fruitier and more aromatic than London Dry. Only one firm, Coates & Co., still makes it and I believe they have it trademarked so that only they can make it now, but once there were many producers of the style, all in Plymouth and vicinity.

[Gillman]

I just bought this surviving brand. It states (in French only for some reason) that it is made by a process "discontinu" (discontinuous, i.e., pot still).

I have not tasted it yet but it smells fabulous.

Gary

[cowdery]

The statement about the process is somewhere between misleading and disingenuous. Gin, good gin that is, is made by taking grain neutral spirits (made in a column still), infusing it with juniper berry and other herbs, then redistilling that mixture in a pot still. Absinthe is made by an almost identical process, but with a different recipe of botanicals.

Cheap gin is made by taking grain neutral spirits, mixing in a liquid "gin essence" and bottling it.

[Gillman]

Re-examining the label, it states in a different part, "Batch Distilled in a Victorian Copper Still". This could be a reference to a second stage of distillation (the first being continuity distillation) but I don't know.

The taste is very good, rich, juniper-heavy, full of flowers and earth.

ABV: 41.2%.

Gary

[Gillman]

Some web research has revealed that Plymouth Gin is processed in a copper pot still, but in whole or in part I do not know. The term batch on the label could mean it is all-pot still production, as I understand, say, Tito's vodka is. This would mean the still is emptied and refilled numerous times to get the spirit to the required degree of purity. I think though it is more likely the process starts with pure spirit (made in a continuous still and probably brought in from elsewhere) and is finished in a pot still.

One of the functions of pot stilling, often forgotten today, is to aromatise a spirit with essences and not to (or not only to) further purify the spirit. Either the spirit is macerated in juniper and other flavorings and then distilled to achieve a flavored spirit (gin) or the GNS is distilled in a pot still which is fitted to a chamber in which juniper and the other flavorings (probably coriander or citrus peels and the other typical gin flavors) are placed so their flavors impart to the volatalised spirit. In either case it would be correct to say the gin is batch made since the gin itself was made that way (it became gin in one batch not through 100% continuous still production).

Plymouth Gin may be made in one of these two latter ways. Or maybe it is made in a pot still(s) starting from the first distillation of the wash, again I don't know. It is certainly a rich and good-tasting gin and it does strike me as what I always read about it, as half-way between Dutch genever (the original heavy type called moutwijn) and the modern London Dry style of gin.

Gary

[cowdery]

I agree that they probably acquire column-distilled GNS and use a pot still to make it gin, through the process you describe, as do the makers of the other UK-bottled gins sold in the USA, i.e., Beefeater, Bombay, etc.