Christian Drouin Le Gin Calvados Cask Finish

Volume: 0.7 litres | Alcohol content: 42% | Chill filtration: Yes | Colouring: No

Special Features:

Ageing in former Calvados casks connects this gin with the speciality of the house of Christian Drouin. Nine casks, each around ten years old and holding 225 litres, are selected for this purpose. The gin spends more than a year in them, developing a rounder character with more pronounced apple aromas and subtle woody notes. Each batch yields 2,850 bottles.

The base is Le Gin de Christian Drouin, which combines neutral alcohol, cider spirit made from more than 30 apple varieties and eight botanicals. Alongside juniper, the recipe includes ginger, vanilla, lemon, cardamom, cinnamon, almonds and rose. The botanicals are macerated and distilled separately; only then are the distillates blended. This allows their proportions to be adjusted precisely for each small batch.

The gin is bottled at 42% in a 0.7-litre bottle. It can be enjoyed neat and also works in a Gin & Tonic or a Dry Martini. The cask-aged edition won a gold medal at the World Gin Awards 2019.

Tasting Notes:

• Nose: On the nose, apple and juniper mingle with citrus notes and spices.
• Palate: The gin is rounded on the palate, with candied apple, honey and vanilla.
• Finish: The finish combines an impression of sweetness with spicy notes.

Distillery/Bottler:

The gin comes from the Drouin family of Calvados producers in Normandy. Guillaume Drouin represents its third generation. A trained oenologist and agronomist, he brought experience in wine and rum production when he joined the family business in 2004. He worked alongside his father on ageing and blending Calvados. Exploring these different aromas eventually led him to develop his gin recipe.

The apple connection begins with the cider spirit, made using bitter, bittersweet, sweet and sharp cider apples. After the apples are milled and pressed in autumn, the juice ferments slowly through the cold winter months. The following year, the cider is distilled twice in small copper pot stills. This spirit brings Normandy's orchards into the gin recipe.

Facts: