What did you do before becoming a distiller and running Abingdon Distillery? I had my own events venue & restaurant business in central London for 10 years and I'm also a qualified ski instructor. What made you decide to become a distiller? After a decade in the hospitality trade I was looking for the quiet life outside of the city so moved to Abingdon and started up the distillery. My ethos is quite simple: top quality spirits handmade from start to finish. All our gins are inspired by the places I have travelled around the world. Our London Dry features far east Asian botanicals, our Grapefruit & Lime Gin is influenced by the Amalfi coast, and our unique cask aged gin is inspired by Speyside in Scotland.
Can you tell us more about the distillery and stills? The distillery is located in Abingdon town centre with a bar, shop and production all on site. Our gin recipes are distilled in our copper alembic pots, Jenny a 30L still and Angela a 60L still. They are beautiful handmade stills running on electric power, we don’t use any open flames at our distillery for safety purposes. We also have a 650L copper pot hybrid still with a 6-plate column which distils our rum and whisky. Can you tell us more about your distillation process? We macerate the botanicals for 24 hours prior to going in the still. Always a one-shot method and no artificial colours or flavourings at all. Making concentrates and diluting back isn’t part of our ethos - it sort of takes out the fun of craft distilling. We do distil quite gently on a medium heat as well, so it’s a little longer on the distillation run time (about 8 hours per run) which makes sure we get full extraction of flavours from the botanicals and really maximise the copper contact time.
What can visitors experience if they visit the distillery for a tour/tasting? Our new distillery site opened up last year and offers a Tour & Tasting experience every Saturday. We delve deeper into our gin production methods, our journey so far and taste some great drinks. It’s a fantastic day out. What is your ambition for your distillery and brand in years to come? We have now started rum production, fermenting from cane sugar for a British made rum, and our first cask of single malt whisky will be released end of summer 2026. Our barrel ageing programme is well under way with casks sourced from all over the world for our rum and whisky. We will also be dabbling in more cask ageing of gin.
What are your favourite ways to drink your gins? It has to be a classic Negroni with our Dry Gin or a G&T with our Grapefruit & Lime Gin - it is super crisp and refreshing. Desert Island Gins: Which 3 gins would you take with you and why? Tough question! Roku gin is one of my favourites for a G&T, Herno Old Tom, and then you cant beat a classic Sloe Gin, so I'm going for Sipsmith Sloe Gin if I cant take my own! What's next for you and Abingdon Gin - any exciting plans? We will be bringing a new experience to market in summer 2024, so watch this space and follow us on Instagram for further updates.
You Might Also Like...
Comments are closed.
|
RSS Feed
