Yesterday afternoon I found myself at the Isle of Skye Distillers Gin School
here in Portree. You can find the Gin School and Shop tucked away in a bijou whitewashed building on Bayfield Lane. What a fun afternoon learning about my favourite tipple and making a bottle to take home.
Isle of Skye Distillers
I bought my first bottle of the iconic Misty Isle Gin shortly after the distillery first opened and started producing Gin in 2017. Each time I came back to Skye on holiday I would buy another bottle. Now I live on Skye I have no excuse to ever not have a bottle of Misty Isle in my drinks cupboard.
The Isle of Skye Distillers is a family run business and the brain child of brothers Alistair and Thomas Wilson. Their gin still is the first on Skye and uses the waters of Storr Lochs located just a few miles away from Portree. This water I can vouch for myself as it is the same water which runs from my taps at home. It is so clean and fresh, some of the best water in Scotland if not the UK. Some of the other botanicals in their Gins and used at the Gin School are found here on the Isle of Skye. You get a real taste of Skye in each bottle.
Isle of Skye Distillers Gin School
It was Alistair who ran the class I took a part in yesterday .The Gin School courses at the Isle of Skye Distillers are currently £85 per person for a 3 hour experience. During these three hours you learn a lot about the brothers, how they came about the idea for the business and where they are heading. You also hear about other Scottish Distillers and how their Gins are made or influenced. Therefore understanding how and why Gins can differ so much in taste and appearance.
Alistair then spent quite some time talking us through his wall of botanicals which would add flavour to our Gin. There are too many to mention here but lets says lemon, orange, rosemary, rowan, blaeberry, hawberry, blackcurrant to keep it simple. Then a little more complex with coriander, cassia bark, orris root and black cubeb to name just a few. We discussed what each of these botanicals would add to a gin if used correctly. Or alternatively, how they could infringe other flavours if they became over powering.
We crushed our junipers, added them to our stills and began to create our own
bespoke gins. With Alistair’s advice of at least 6 botanicals ringing in my ears I headed off to create my “top secret” new recipe! I was looking for a berry rather than spiced flavour so opted for Rowan, Blaeberry, Lemon, Cassia Bark, Black Cubeb and Carob. When crushed and added to a small amount of the Heads the flavour was nice but slightly lacking in something. Alistair suggested adding some Orange and Licorice Root, so off I went & got creative. This time when we tasted it the Licorice Root was over powering the berries. We chopped up one fresh blackberry, added it in and let it marinate! Perfection was found, the flavour was spot on.
I loved this part of the process as it took me back to long hours in my old jam kitchen. I used to spent hours trying out new recipes for my jam, marmalade and chutneys. There were always lots of herbs, spices and flavour combinations going on to create the perfect preserve.
My very own Gin!
Next stop, lets make some gin. I drained the liquid from my botanicals and
popped them into a hessian sack. This little sack of goodness goes into the top of your still. As the gin distils & condenses it extracts the flavours from your botanicals. The little copper stills sat chugging away whilst we tested the alcohol levels and chatted all things gin. And, of course, a little bit of Gin tasting! We had samples of the three Gins made by Isle of Skye Distillers: Misty Isle, Tommy’s Gin and the Mulled Christmas Gin. Next came a wee nip of a gin creation Alistair had been playing around with and finally a drop of Avva Gin from Elgin.
As the still was finishing we prepared our labels. The school has a fab range of pre-prepared labels but you can always create your own. Modern technology as it is today allows you to transfer a photo off your mobile phone & onto your own label.
An easy decision for me. A photo of Ripley and Jasper my two Border Collies in
one of their favourite spots on Skye became my label. It’s a lovely photo as it looks over the water to our home on the lower slopes of Ben Tianavaig. So when it came to choosing the name of my Gin it was easy – Tianavaig Tipple! With your Gin bottled, sealed and labelled you are good to go! My Gin will be perfect in a day or so when it has infused in the bottle.
These three hours were absolutely brilliant – a must for any Gin Lover out there. You learn loads about Gin, the Isle of Skye, the Isle of Skye Distillers. But most of all and most importantly you have fun. If you’ve made a good gin it won’t last you very long. So make sure you buy more supplies in the shop on your way out, there’s a very generous 10% off for course goers.
Thanks to Alistair for a great afternoon – Slàinte mhath!