- In this video I'm gonna be talking about Citadelle Gin,
I'm gonna be telling you what it tastes like,
how it's made, what botanicals are in there,
how much it costs, but more importantly,
what you guys wanna know,
I'm gonna tell you my preferred tonic water serve
right at the end of this video.
So if you like the sound of that, then stay tuned.
I've got some really cool exciting news.
This, my YouTube channel,
is now in association with drinkstuff.com.
They are my favourite out and out,
not drink suppliers, but online retailers.
Everything I get from, whether it's cocktail glasses,
cocktail shakers, bar equipment,
my purees, my syrups, all that kind of stuff
for my business, I've been trading with them since 2001.
But more recently, in my business, obviously,
in the last six and a half, seven years,
they are my go to guys for everything like that.
So really happy to announce that sort of partnership,
that's gonna be cool.
If you're running pubs, bars, hotels, restaurants,
go check them out, anything from glassware,
crockery, bartending care, anything like that,
go check 'em out, your purees to make cool drinks,
and if you're at home and you want birthday present ideas,
they've got some phenomenal stuff.
So go check them out,
we're gonna be lining up product reviews,
inspiration, their motto is serving inspiration,
my motto is drinks inspiration,
so combined, we are gonna be doing some great stuff
coming up in the next few weeks.
So stay tuned for that.
Right, question of the video.
Today's question, we've just come
from January into February 2019.
I wanna know what the most recent gin you tried is,
brand new gin, what's the most recent one you tried,
and did you like it, yes or no,
hit me up in the comments below.
Right, today's gin.
We are talking about Citadelle Gin,
and if you're looking at these little tiny bottles
thinking what the hell's all that about,
that was a few videos ago,
this is Drinks By The Dram,
I'll stick a link up the top there
so you can go and watch that,
but it's basically a really cool way of getting,
trying loads of new spirits on the cheap,
so that's what that's all about.
So, Citadelle Gin.
French gin owned by Alexandre Gabriel,
he's the proud owner of Maison Ferrand,
a cognac house in France.
He's also the very proud owner of my favourite rum brand,
Plantation Rums, absolutely love Plantation Rums.
So he's the brainchild and the owner of all that.
Citadelle Gin is one of his babies as well,
it's been around since 1995 officially,
there is a lot more history to it than that,
but it'll become apparent
why it was officially launched in 95 in a minute.
It's a 44% ABV gin, a lot of botanicals native to France.
They've just planted some juniper trees as well,
so they can grow their own juniper in there,
so kind of their eco footprint,
they're trying to keep it as small as possible,
which I absolutely love.
Retails about 30 pound-ish a bottle,
I'll pop a link at the end where you can get that from.
But as I say, it's a really, really lovely gin.
19 botanicals in total.
I've listed 'em there, juniper, coriander,
cardamom, angelica, cumin, cinnamon,
nutmeg, almond, grains of paradise, lemon and orange zest.
And then we get into slightly crazy ones,
fennel, licorice, cubeb berries,
that's in a few different gins.
Savoury, which is kind of a herb, may be a perennial?
Dunno, horticulturalists, let me know.
It's a plant, anyway.
And then we've got star anise, blackcurrant,
iris, not orris, iris, and violet.
So that's the 19 botanicals.
Now how this is made is really cool, really quirky,
and I believe they patented it how they make it.
So, how they make it,
they've got their neutral spirit
which is distilled from French wheat,
and they distil that to different ABVs.
And then they will infuse the botanicals separately,
so they've got 19 different infusions going on.
The different infusions will be at different ABVs,
so you've got things like juniper,
which is a bit more robust
and takes a bit more time to come out.
Will be in a higher ABV alcohol, maybe for the four days,
compared to things like star anise and a blackcurrant,
it'll be a lower ABV maybe for a day, day and a half.
So once they've done their infusions
and they're happy with the flavours,
they bring 'em all together,
they blend it together in their ratio that they know,
and then they distil that again
in their copper stills over open flames
right there in their cognac house.
Now, for those of you know a little bit about cognac,
you can only legally distil cognac 5, 6 months of the year.
So I think it's November through to March every year.
So that means for six months of the year,
these stills are going unused,
and that's where Alexandre Gabriel
likes to push the boundaries, because he obviously lobbied,
I think this gin sort of came to life in the 80s,
but obviously didn't get launched officially 'til 95,
it took that long for permission to be granted
to use these cognac stills.
So that's kind of the cool story behind that.
As I say, it's a lovely gin.
Now I've just, I've tried it,
I've had a little play with it.
It is a lovely, lovely gin.
On the aroma, you get the juniper obviously,
it's quite a juniper-forward gin.
You get a little bit of the star anise.
I get a little bit of, I guess this'll be the violets
and the iris, I get a little bit of sort of flowers
coming through there, really, really nice.
Then on the taste, juniper first.
Then quickly followed by a bit of spice,
probably the cubeb berries coming through there.
I get just a hint, me, of nutmeg.
I'm not sure I get too much cinnamon.
I know people get a bit of cinnamon from this.
I get a little bit of nutmeg on there.
But then also just that slight little twang of star anise,
and I think that is such a lovely gin.
Quite happy to drink that neat, no bite to it,
no vicious bite, perfect,
might be a cracking martini gin, that one.
But you guys wanna know, perfect serve,
preferred serve, tonic waters.
Obviously it's gonna work really well
with your plain sort of Indian tonic waters,
whether it's Fever-Tree, Schweppes, Tesco's own,
whatever your preferred is,
I know it works very well with Fever-Tree Mediterranean,
but my two preferred serves.
We're gonna start off with this one.
Merchant's Heart owned by Suntory,
I've got a lot of love for these tonic waters at the moment,
especially their floral one
which will probably work quite well with this as well.
But I think that's an absolute cracking,
Suntory, global brand,
so if you're not watching this in the UK,
it should be getting out there around the world now,
US, Japan, should be out there.
But UK, Ocado, probably Amazon actually, to be fair,
and Sainsbury's, 'bout one twenty a bottle, brilliant,
absolutely banging tonic water, love that.
But, here's a crazy for you.
Brand new to me, I did try these
about six to eight months ago,
I've just physically got them in.
New tonic water brand, Lixir, L-I-X-I-R.
They've got five different tonic waters,
a plain and a light one and then three different flavours.
I'm rocking out this one.
Elderflower and lemon tonic water,
I think that works magically well with that,
garnished out with a couple of star anise
and maybe a lemon peel or dehydrated lemon.
I think that is a really quirky gin and tonic.
I was gonna go Fever-Tree Elderflower,
and then I thought, let's try it with that
little bit of lemon in there.
Got a lot of love for these guys, they're up in Newcastle.
Brilliant, rhubarb and ginger, blood orange and cinnamon's
their other two flavours, cracking.
So that's my preferred serve, either of those two.
Go and check them out.
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That's been this video, that's been Citadelle Gin,
I'll see you next time.