Tasting Notes: Audemus Pink Pepper Gin (August 2022 subscription)

Your gin this month is Audemus Pink Pepper Gin! Audemus is distilled in the village of Cognac. Picture, if you will, the enormous distilleries of Cognac, supplying the region’s famous brandy to the world, vast warehouses of copper stills churning out hundreds of litres a day. Now delete that image. True to the spirit of craft gin, Audemus gin is made in the living room of the distiller himself. Pink Pepper gin is their flagship concoction and it’s wonderful.

So, my crew, pour yourself a neat splash and lift the glass for one last time together.

On the nose, there’s quite a lot going on - there’s the familiar juniper hit, a touch of cardamom, a hint of vanilla and of course that mix of peppery and sweet that is really unique to the pink peppercorn (aside: while pink and black peppercorns are both dried flowers, they are not actually related). On the palate, the pink pepper really takes centre stage with a spice heat that develops and then dies away again on the finish to be replaced by vanilla and the almond-like taste of tonka bean.

To accompany this beauty are plain tonics and an aromatic tonic. The angostura bark in the aromatic tonic, in particular, complements Audemus’s profile and tastes divine.

I’ve also included some pink peppercorns and juniper berries to garnish.For the final cargo, I’ve included not one, but two mystery miniatures. The first is Mermaid Pink Gin (38%), distilled in the Isle of Wight and a superb summer gin, the second is Kilbroney Premium Irish Gin dry gin (42%) from Northern Ireland’s Mourne Dew distillery - a wonderful citrus forward dry gin. I’ve mentioned the ABV so you can work out which is which.

Adieu my loyal and beautiful crew,

Your Captain