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Discover, Sip, Repeat: Your Adventure Begins Here
There is a long history of pairing food with drink and this mostly comes with the history of evolution. Mark Forsyth in A Short History of Drunkenness (2017) states “Alcohol triggers a particular neuron in the brain that makes you terribly hungry.” Since then, pairing food and drink has become ingrained in our culture. People often turn to a certain wine with food, such as a Malbec with steak or Chianti with pizza. But here at SplitsDrinks we are obsessed with gin!
Therefore in this week’s blog we shall be looking at a range of gin pairings that will rival the wine world for deliciousness. Perfect if you are throwing a dinner party and want to impress your friends.
As you are about to eat your fish and chips you squeeze some lemon juice onto it. Those salty oysters are also further enhanced by the zesty lemon. I assume you are noticing a theme here. Citrus fruits such as lemon and orange are always forerunners when it comes to botanicals used in gin production. Think of those rich fatty flavours of fish and chips paired with a citrus forward gin. You get intense umami from seafood such as oysters and the citrus flavours of gin will help to balance the savoury notes out.
The perfect gin to pair with your seafood dishes is Edinburgh Distillery Seaside Gin. Made with a range of botanicals sourced from the Scottish shores such as bladderwrack and scurvy grass, it will transport any Midlanders to the seaside in just a sip.
When it comes to pairing gin with cheese you can’t really go wrong. Again you have those strong umami elements with flavour enhancing saltiness. The rich pungent flavours of blue cheese such as Stilton work well with sweet notes, think Port. And I will never forget eating creamy fresh ricotta smothered in honey in Rome.
In terms of replicating that experience in Rome; I believe that you will love the flavour combination when paired with The Apiarist Honey Gin. The team behind this gin have blended honey produced in their apiaries with a citrus forward gin and black tea. The perfect accompaniment to any cheese board.
Lamb is perfectly paired with fruity flavours, think traditional flavour combinations such as lamb braised in red currants and red wine. Or maybe the sweet dried fruit elements of a Tagine. But when you think juniper blended with sweet and rich sloe berries, it is crying out for lamb! Sweet but slightly tart sloe gin helps to cut through the richness of the fatty lamb creating a taste sensation.
Jarrolds Sloe Gin will be the tipple you turn to with your lamb Sunday Roast. Sloe Berries are blended with their juniper forward London Dry and left to infuse intense flavours into the spirit. After months of the fruit being steeped, the gin is bottled at 32%, this leaves room for flavours of the juniper rich gin to shine through.
When it comes to drink pairings it's hard to look beyond the classic curry and a beer. But what if you aren't a beer fan, what do you go for? Gin is a great option as it also has those palate cleansing and refreshing elements that you would associate with a beer. The history of gin and tonic is also interlinked with India, with the troops turning to it during colonial rule.
You may think that the spice gin is the correct route to go down, but sometimes the amount of spice can be overbearing. That’s why 6 O’Clock Mango, Ginger and Lime is the perfect choice. Created in collaboration with celebrity chef Romy Gill, it replicates flavours you would associate with a mango chutney. It adds a cooling effect to those hotter curries giving your taste buds a soothing rest.
Moving on to those with a sweeter tooth. You may have recently seen that we teamed up with Wnder Chocolate to host a gin tasting. From that we can verify that gin and chocolate make a very naughty treat. The flavour profile of chocolate lends itself to a range of flavours.
When it comes to fruity gin and chocolate the world is your oyster. We may be biassed but we believe our own Luxury Pink Gin is a match made in heaven. It has the right balance of juniper and citrus notes to compliment and cut the richness of the chocolate. The raspberry and rose elements help to build the crescendo of flavour.
There are so many food and gin pairings to play with, so why not get experimenting and let us know your favourite!
