A pointlessly exclusive bespoke gin...
For National Gin Day which – according to Steve Dobkins of drinkdays.com – was April 9, the 4717 offers a highly exclusive gin. We have one of about four bottles produced, none of which are for sale. Bunty St. Christmas’s Gin is the first gin offering from the same bespoke craftsman who brought you Grandy's Bogalusa Sippin' Whiskey. He was kind enough to name the expression after my wife.
For the record, Mrs. M’s name is not Bunty, nor was her maiden name St. Christmas. The was a nom de guerre I came up with because I didn’t want my sales assistant at the bank to get too snoopy about my personal life. While I was introducing her to the concept of the nom de guerre, she introduced me to the Gin & Soda, which is a little less sweet that the traditional G&T and over an afternoon, a little less cloying as well.
When presented with the bottle, I remember asking, “Why is it pink?” Thinking that my brother Larry (the aforementioned bespoke craftsman) had broken the habit of a lifetime and done something trendy like produce one of those pale colored gins you see these days.
“You call that pink?”
“Ok. Why does it look like a urine sample?”
“The patient seems dehydrated.”
“As you say.”
“I think I just screwed up.” He said. And proceeded to tell me how, exactly he’d screwed up. Something to do with the cucumbers. I’ve never actually distilled liquor so it was all black magic to me. More important, to me at any rate, is that a simple trial and error mistake is forgivable, it’s just part of the process if you are ever going to learn anything new. Being terminally hip, on the other hand, is just pathetic.
To be fair, our daughter Littlebit did introduce me to a purple gin at Sewanee grad week, and it was pretty good. Sadly, Bunty St. Christmas Gin doesn’t lend itself to the Gin & Soda – Mrs. M’s favorite cocktail – and it is suboptimal for a martini. The trick is another gin variation that Littlebit introduced me too since she moved to DC – the elderflower tonic. It sounds so precious my kneejerk reaction is to file it under Bubble Tea some such foolishness, but it’s like more like Avocado Toast – regrettably delicious for a man my age.
So the 4717 choice for Gin and Tonic day: Bunty St. Christmas Gin with elderflower tonic. It tastes almost…trendy.