The following is an extended version of the piece that appears in our April 2020 issue, heading to newsstands soon.
Virago Spirits makes a rosemary G&T with its oolong tea gin. (Photo courtesy Virago Spirits)
What can be said about the gin and tonic that hasn’t already been said?
Every bar with liquor can make a G&T. Some even have it on a soda gun (ick!) or house-made on draft (yum!). Technically, gin and tonic is a highball — but it’s so iconic, it should really stand on its own.
Like many classic drinks and ingredients, the gin and tonic started as medicine. Quinine, the ingredient that gives tonic its cutting bitterness and lingering flavor, has been used for centuries to treat and prevent malaria.
Derived from the bark of a South American tree called a cinchona, quinine spread to Europe during the age of exploration and became a vital import for empires hoping to expand and colonize the tropics.
Until 1820, it came in the form of dried cinchona bark, ground fine and mixed with liquid, but isolating the extract made it employable intravenously for emergency treatment, and it was also easier to digest for more effective prophylaxis.
However, quinine is intensely bitter, so clever British expeditionary forces cut it with gin and sugar and topped it with soda water to help it go down with ease in the tropical heat. Why shouldn’t medicine be a treat?
And while they were at it, since they had to eat all those limes to stave off scurvy, why not squeeze one or two in the mix as well? Hence the origin of the British nickname “Limey.”
Where to get your medicine once social distancing ends:
Modern Gin with Oolong Tea is the first entry in Virago Spirits’ Experimental Series of spirits. Head Bartender Raine Castle serves it with locally made Navy Hill tonic, garnishing with rosemary and sage to match the spice and earthiness of the oolong-laced gin, which is distilled in Scott’s Addition by brothers Barry and Brad Haneberg.
Belly up and sip the fragrant G&T, gazing through the window behind the bar as the next batch cooks up in the big candy-apple-red Cognac pot — one of only five like it operating in the U.S. Direct fire heats spots on the copper belly to deliver a Maillard reaction to the distillate, giving the gin a crisp mouthfeel that goes great with the smooth, mild tonic.
Set in an imagined turn-of-the-last-century hotel in eastern Europe, Hotel Greene has a bar to match. In the quirky corner across from the large muntined picture windows, Bar Manager Phil Boyle batches his house-made tonic with macerated cinchona bark, lemongrass and other botanicals, rounding it off with Demerara sugar and orange peel.
The hearty amber tonic goes best with citrus-ready London dry gins — of which Boyle has a few. As Hotel Greene’s bar program approaches its first birthday, he’s imagining ways to tweak recipe variations to pair with specific gins, and he hopes to offer a unique G&T flight in the future. For now, we’ll have to be content with his G&T cart service in the exquisitely rendered hotel lobby, which serves as an antechamber to Hotel Greene’s whimsical mini golf course. Welcome to the 1920s.
On the other side of space and time, Brian Artis, wine director at Can Can, taps into the floral side of G&T with this jazzy variation he calls the Cactus Blossom, an ode to his daughter who frequently travels to Japan — where Roku gin is made.
Artis splits the gin with Caperitif — a South African aromatized wine bittered with cinchona — and highlights the tonic with grapefruit juice, cut with tangy bright pomegranate. The result is a dusky pink concoction served in a tall frosty glass topped with an electric-green lime twist. Floral and refreshing but rich and light, it’s an endearing ode to spring and daughterly spirit.
Cactus Blossom
1 ounce Roku gin
1 ounce Caperitif
1 ounce grapefruit juice
1/2 ounce pomegranate juice
Tonic water
Lime peel
Directions: Mix gin, Caperitif and juices in a Collins glass. Add ice. Top with tonic. Garnish with lime peel.
