September 21, 2006

Bluecoat Gin: Ready for the Top Shelf?

We've been hearing more and more lately that gin is making a comeback on the lips of discerning martini drinkers who are sick of vodka getting all the good press. One up and coming contender in the growing gin market is Bluecoat, an American gin that doesn't even try for all that London Dry BS.

In fact, they're swathing themselves in Revolutionary American terms to discern themselves, taking their name from people who fought the Londoners in that war way back when:

Its claim to fame - besides its Philadelphia (rather than London) pedigree - is that its botanicals are organically sourced and that, while the flavors of premium gins tend to emphasize the crisp juniper end of the spectrum, Bluecoat moves toward the kinder, gentler citrus end. In that pursuit, a sweet orange peel is in the recipe, rather than the traditional bitter orange or rind of lemon.

Bluecoat is so named to associate it with the home-grown colonists who battled the redcoats hereabouts. It comes in a square, cobalt-blue bottle ($25 a fifth) and, I'm assured, is craft-distilled in the only legally operating pot still in Pennsylvania, a rotund, onion-shaped copper rig tucked in an anonymous warehouse behind the National Guard Armory on the far-northeastern reaches of Roosevelt Boulevard.

via Philly.com

What do you think is next, Brown Coat gin? Anyway, check them out at BluecoatGin.com, and we're definitely going to have to get our hands on a sample bottle.