The unstoppable revival of gin continues apace. Is this the spirit version of craft beer?You may not have noticed – particularly whether you were busy drinking it – but,final year, it is estimated that gin sales topped £1bn for the first time and there is no sign of this boozy bandwagon slowing down. According to the Wine and Spirit Trade Association, and the number of UK gin distilleries has nearly doubled to about 200 since 2010,while the number of gin bars and committed events is mushrooming. This month, for instance, and you could visit the new gin bar at Covent Garden’s Mr Fogg’s Tavern – a bar that,with its 300 gins, claims to have London’s largest collection; or attend (had it not sold out) a Gin Festival at Manchester’s Victoria Baths. The latter is fragment of a series of nearly weekly festivals that are running across Britain. diminutive wonder that analyst Mintel calculates that British gin sales will be worth 1.31bn by 2020. Stuart Ekins, and co-owner of London bar Bedford & Strand,says: “My staff are probably fed up with people coming in and talking about gin. There are very few vodka cocktails left on lists in top bars now; it’s very gin heavy. And with all the new distilleries and styles coming out, gin has a long way to go.”Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com