June 10, 2023 is World Gin Day 2023. For gin lovers, this is cause for celebration. Hardly any party mixed drink is faster in the glass than the good old gin and tonic. A good sip of juniper schnapps, filled with fizzy tonic, a slice of lemon (or cucumber) and a handful of ice cubes. The hit at every party is ready. You don’t have to be a professional bartender to be able to serve your guests a refreshing “GT”. A standard gin from the supermarket and a few bottles of tonic are enough for a fun evening. The fine spirits among the fans of the schnapps with the distinctive, slightly needle-like juniper aroma, on the other hand, prefer to fiddle with the spirit itself. That this is not rocket science can be seen from the fact that the shelves in the supermarkets are bursting at the seams with so-called craft gins, the bottled in small distilleries from the Black Forest to the island of Rügen by amateur distillers.
In this article you will find out how to create your own juniper schnapps in a few days, which ingredients, tools and botanicals you need and what else you should consider when macerating. A gin test 2022 with eight different creations can be found here.
You don’t need a still or other professional equipment to make gin yourself. In contrast to fruit brandies, the alcohol in gin is not obtained through distillation, but is mixed in ready-made. Clear and tasteless spirits such as vodka or Korn are suitable for this. However, the gin can also be mixed with alcohol, also known as ethanol or primasprit. Weingeist usually has an alcohol content of at least 95 percent. Find out why this is important below.
1. The preparation
2. The approach
Instead of vodka, gin can also be mixed with pure alcohol (ethanol). However, this must be diluted in order to achieve an alcohol content of just over 40 percent by volume, which is typical for gin. Use one of the numerous alcohol calculators on the Internet. You feed them the alcohol value of the ethanol, the desired alcohol value of the gin and the amount of liquid before or after dilution. The calculator now determines the amount of water with which the ethanol must be diluted.
An example: Your ethanol has an alcohol content of 95% vol and the gin should have 43% vol after maceration. In total you want to make a liter of gin. The result: Measure out 450 milliliters of alcohol in a measuring cup and mix the ethanol with 550 milliliters of water. Your gin later has an alcohol content of 43% vol. Advantage of the somewhat more complex mixing: You can determine the alcohol content of your gin yourself. If you work with vodka, there is nothing wrong with that.
For everyone who finds the shopping list of ingredients for the “home-made” gin too long, we have good news. There are practical gin kits that contain everything a gin lover’s heart desires. From botanicals to bottles and a funnel to self-adhesive labels. All you have to do is get the alcohol yourself for the more convenient version of gin maceration.
Sources: Food
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