Monkey 47 Schwarzwald Dry Gin, 50 cl

Product Information

As to how it’s made? The ingredients are steeped in French made molasses alcohol 36 hours prior to distillation. For the first five years the distilling happens in what can only be described as a beautiful old Arnold Holstein still. The team combine traditional maceration and distillation techniques with vapour infusion to gather precise amounts of the more volatile botanicals and accentuate certain flavours. Over the duration of 2015, the duo worked with Arnold Holstein, developing a new one-of-a-kind distillery. The first thing that caught my eye was Scarlet Beebalm. I know it as an ornamental plant from gardens [and it attracts butterflies and hummingbirgs by the way]. The Oswego peoples of upstate New York taught Europeans a couple of uses for the plant. Resin from the plant is a natural soothing agent, often used for bee stings and the like. A tea can also be made from the plants leaves. For those of you curious about what it tastes like, it’s worth nothing that it’s also called bergamont by gardeners because its aroma is similar to that of the orange [and other common gin botanical] of the same name. Roberta F. 27. svibnja 2008.

Monkey 47 Schwarzwald Dry Gin | Expert Gin Review Monkey 47 Schwarzwald Dry Gin | Expert Gin Review

The story of Monkey 47 begins in the 1940s. In July 1945, to be precise! Wing Commander Montgomery “Monty” Collins of the Royal Air Force was posted to the British sector of divided Berlin. Having arrived in Berlin after the end of the war and taken up his post in the administration of the British sector, Commander Collins was profoundly affected by the extent of the destruction of the capital and so resolved to support the reconstruction of Germany in his free time. Henceforth he became devoted to the rebuilding of the Berlin Zoo, through which he came to sponsor an egret monkey by the name of Max. Stein describes lingonberries as being the ideal botanical in gin, as it inherently has a combination of the flavours that have always defined the spirit, namely a refreshing acidity, lasting bitterness and slight sweetness. Second, we mixed it with an Elderflower Lemonade. This was a pre-bottled, carbonated soda. Rose and Elderflower came on strong at first, with lemon dominating the mids. The gin shone in the lower noes as lavender, rosemary, sweet orange and birch came through. It was a tough task, the lemonade remained the star, but overall, the gin offered enough to decide this mixed drink was not without merit. And that’s what I’m really looking for in a gin. This gin is certainly beautiful; it’s really the cognac of gins. But I’m looking more for something like Tanqueray, which gets by on just four botanicals (as far as we know). Or even The Botanist from Islay, with 22 different ingredients. But there’s just not enough juniper in this for me.Remembering the innovation behind and early days of Monkey 47 Gin, Stein recalls “We didn’t want to create a “brand,” but rather the best gin possible. We set out to produce aromas, not alcohol. For that reason, we shouldn’t be mistaken for typical “spirits producers” or “liquor entrepreneurs”; we are schnapps distillers to the core and, like a perfumer, constantly on the hunt for aromas and fragrances. Simply put the plan was and is quality!” So I’ll just offer a very personal view. For the past four or five years, I’ve been trying the many new gins coming on the market, at various price levels. It’s been a very fun and interesting experience to try to get an education in gin, which I hadn’t studied much before, being mainly a single malt scotch and bourbon fan. But at this point I estimate I’ve tried maybe 70 or so gins, including old standbys as well as contemporary craft gins. The Negroni was nice as well, with herbal, spice notes at first, setting the stage for an unctuous, fruity finish. Nice, though not as complex as I might have hoped. You see, this Commander also helped rebuild the world-famous Berlin zoo, and during the course of this he came to support Max, an egret monkey, who lived in the zoo. So it might seem natural that years after the fact in retirement, he retained an affection for the monkey he sponsored, and when he made his gin, he named it after him. We feel it’s at its best in a dry Martini (4 to 1). It is also worth noting that due to the unfiltered, concentrated nature of the gin, it louches in a G&T so if that is happening for you – don’t fret, that’s normal, just enjoy it!

Black Forest Distillers Monkey 47 Schwarzwald Dry Gin

Southern Germany may seem like a strange place to have a wealth of distilling expertise, but with a history of creating fruit liqueurs and brandies as well as being the home of many coppersmiths experienced in building stills, it remains (despite a now more global craft distilling revolution) probably one of the best places to create a new spirit. Each year, the distillery also releases a limited edition Distiller’s Cut bottling. The idea behind the D istillers Cut is to harness the inherent Monkey 47 flavour profile and accentuate a certain aspect of it by adding a signature (more dominant) new botanical to the line up, which they refer to as their “species rara”. In 2015, the duo used Spignel to create one of our favourite releases of the year, having been introduced to it at a wedding of their friend, a certain Mr Hardy Happle. On botanicals alone, boasting an ostentatious 47, it might be the most complicated gin on the market, but to throw you one more curveball, it’s also built on a base spirit of molasses. Tasting Notes

So I guess what I’m saying is that this is too sophisticated a gin for my primitive palate. 😉 But I like it nevertheless as it represents a rarified standard (and with a rarified price) that most gins don’t approach. Fresh and fruity, with a lot of complicated nuance. There’s two levels on which you can enjoy this spirit: firstly, you can just appreciate the way it blends together to create a single powerful presence. Secondly, you can sit down as if to study it and probe the way this myriad of botanicals unravel on your palate. I think it’s rewarding for both kinds of drinkers, and it gets high marks in my book for the complexity and balance. Talking to Gin Foundry for the 2016 Gin Annual, Monkey 47 Founder Alex Stein explained this moment of enlightenment: “I can remember the moment quite distinctly: I was sitting at my desk on a rainy day in Detroit when an old friend from Germany called me up and told me a story that would change my life in a fundamental way. This was, namely, the life story of the young officer and bon-vivant Montgomery Collins, the great-grandfather of our little Monkey.

Monkey 47 | Pernod Ricard Monkey 47 | Pernod Ricard

Mixed with Hansen’s Tonic in a Gin and Tonic, sweet pomelo at first with exotic herb garden notes on the after taste. Lemon verbena, lavender, garden mint, lead into a citrus-dominated finish with grapefruit and lemon zest. Quite nice. The zingy citrus is assertive to taste upfront, but gives way to a rich bouquet of flavours including herbal juniper, juicy lingonberries, sweet liquorice, cardamom and hibiscus-like floral touches. Can you taste all 47 botanicals? No. Are they all doing something in there? Definitely! It’s a hugely complex, rich (and as an aside very smooth) gin and very difficult to pigeonhole into a brief tasting note. The task when recreating a gin is trying to find information about the original product. With only rudimental records and no original recipe, just descriptions of eyewitnesses and a few key facts such as the use of spruce fruits, classical gin ingredients and lingonberries, the pair decided to recreate the gin as best they could. On the nose, there are numerous aromas and this fact alone makes Monkey 47 a great gin to keep returning to, as depending on your mood it’s easy to find a new facet that you may have previously overlooked. There are prevalent aromas of lime, fleshy berries and a woody forest floor undertone that give the gin both levity and depth. It’s very evocative.Which this is definitely not. As a whisky drinker, I find it quite complex, very floral, and almost perfumy on the nose and palate. It is truly an elegant and certainly a connoisseur’s gin. There’s so much going on that I have trouble pulling out the individual essences, and I’m considered to have a pretty discerning palate. The nose is mentholated juniper, pineapple sage, lemon verbena, lavender, rose, hibiscus and lime. (!) This encyclopedic list merely reflects how incredibly complex and brightly aromatic this gin is. Your mileage might vary. There’s a lot in here, and I’m not sure any experts are going to agree on the exact list you get here on the nose. It’s nicely blended with a lot of hints of clues; rabbit holes of aroma that can be explored only to come up empty with a vague “floral” or “fruity” admission.