Discover everything you need to know about In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin!
Apr 5, 2022
Allow us to introduce you to In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin, Craft Gin Club’s fabulous April 2022 Gin of the Month and the amazing distillery behind it.
In this feature, we’ll be discovering how and where In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin is made, what inspired the In the Welsh Wind Distillery team, and we’ll be taking a look at the other gorgeous craft gin in their collection. Scroll down to reveal all!
A Craft Gin Club special edition distilled in Ceredigion and delivered to Craft Gin Club members in their April 2022 Gin of the Month box
43% ABV
In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin is made by distillers Ellen Wakelam and Alex Jungmayr at the In the Welsh Wind Distillery. The gin is made using botanicals inspired by the local history, heritage, culture and community of Wale’s west coast.
The distillers introduced tea notes into the gin by soaking currants in tea (an ingredient commonly used in Welsh baking) to unlock deliciously rich and aromatic notes in both botanicals. To balance the flavours they also use lots of oils from citrus botanicals. These heighten the zesty, fruity flavours, while also creating a full mouthfeel.
In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin is made using thirteen botanicals, including juniper, sweet orange ribbon, bitter orange ribbon, lemon ribbon, coriander seed, Earl Grey tea, bay leaf, cassia bark, orris root, nutmeg, clove, galangal and currants.
These botanicals are distilled in a pot still called Meredith.
This unique bit of kit allows the distillers to create a liquid that is high in citrus oils without compromising on purity. Leaving them with a final liquid that is incredibly evocative – the blend of botanicals and the techniques used to distil them each pay homage to the west Wales coast, creating a unique sensory experience.
What inspired the name of the distillery and the gin? Before becoming distillers, Ellen and Alex undertook a 1000-mile trek around Wales as a way to challenge and reinvigorate themselves after leaving past careers and surviving a serious car crash. They began to name their adventure “in the Welsh wind”.
The couple later adopted that name for their gin.
In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin is distilled in Ceredigion, on the west coast of Wales, at the In The Welsh Wind Distillery.
In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin has a delicious mix of spice and citrus flavours.
On the nose and palate, a balanced blend of spice, tea and citrus creates a medley of fragrances and flavours evocative of bara brith (a traditional Welsh fruit cake) and Welsh cakes.
The rich, flavourful oils from the citrus fruits make for an exceptionally mouth-filling, smooth texture that leads to a finish that is complex and crisp, and which lingers long on the palate.
We recommend serving In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin in a gin and tonic with Llanllyr Source Tonic Water, garnished with lemon slices and cardamom pods. You can find Craft Gin Club’s In the Welsh Signature Style Gin perfect serve recipe here!
In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin is also fantastic for using in gin cocktails like Craft Gin Club’s Gin Daffodil. This beautiful cocktail recipe mixes In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin with Heartsease Farm Traditional Lemonade and our bespoke Gin Daffodil cocktail syrup to mouth-watering effect. Find the recipe here!
Most gins are unaged but some cutting-edge distillers, like the team at In the Welsh Wind Distillery, have been breaking with tradition and ageing their gins in casks, which impart new flavours and colours to the gin.
In the Welsh Wind Limited Edition Palo Cortado Cask Aged Gin is a wonderful example of this technique.
In the Welsh Wind Limited Edition Palo Cortado Cask Aged Gin has notes of almond, dried stone fruits and wood spice, all of which are complemented by the orange and Welsh baking spice flavours of the original gin.
In the Welsh Wind Limited Edition Palo Cortado Cask Aged Gin is made by ageing In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin in Palo Cortado sherry barrels for five to six months. Palo Cortado sherry barrels are also used to age some exceptional Scotch whiskies.
A beautiful Swedish whisky finished in a Banyuls fortified wine cask and independently bottled by the In the Welsh Wind Distillery at 48% ABV.
This gorgeous whisky has a rich mix of caramel, bergamot, pine tar, silver birch bark and Banyuls wine tones.
Both In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin and In the Welsh Wind Limited Edition Palo Cortado Cask Aged Gin are available to buy on the Craft Gin Club online shop here and on the In the Welsh Wind Distillery website.
Mackmyra 8 yr old Single Malt is available to buy on the In the Welsh Wind Distillery website.
In the Welsh Wind Signature Style Gin is also available as part of Craft Gin Club’s April 2022 Gin of the Month box. Find out more about this amazing box of ginny goodies here!
This area [Ceredigion, Wales] has a rich maritime past, with a history of building ships from Welsh oak, that would sail around the coasts of Portugal and Spain and bring back spices, teas and fruits. These would end up in Welsh kitchens, inspiring classic recipes like bara brith and Welsh cakes. I have a background in baking so I was very familiar with these ingredients, and it felt like using them would be a special way to express what this stretch of coastline is all about.
— In the Welsh Wind Distillery co-founder, Alex Jungmayr
There is a thumper keg in the middle of the still, which helps to remove a lot of impurities.
— Alex Jungmayr
It comes from watching Spooks [a BBC spy drama] on telly. One character says, “Where’s that person gone?” and another responds, “oh, he’s in the wind”. I said to Ellen, “I love that – how can we make it more Welsh?”. And for the very first time she said “Ah, how about… in the Welsh wind?”. I got chills – I just knew that would mean something special to us. We made these little embroidered badges saying ‘In the Welsh Wind’ to go on our packs.
— Alex Jungmayr
