Since “Grandma” boils at a lower distilling strength than a continuous still, she gently extracts the aromatic and flavoring oils and compounds from the juniper berries and botanicals to produce a gin with a noticeable degree of smoothness and complexity.

Following distillation, most London dry gins are blended with British spring waters. But Miller wanted a better experience. The distillate then takes a 3,000 mile round-trip to Iceland to make it the best product it can be.

In Iceland, the gin is blended with glacial lava-filtered waters, among the purest water on earth (up to 10 times more pure than Evian and Perrier). Martin Miller’s feels that the Icelandic water provides a soft, almost sweet mouthfeel to the finished product, and makes the journey worthwhile. In the small village of Borganes on Iceland’s remote west coast, a final “mystery” ingredient—unknown even to the master distiller—is also added. You’d have to kidnap Miller and deprive him of gin for a long time to get an inkling of what it might be.

The Components Of Gin

The botanicals to make gin come from around the globe: after acquiring them, the master distiller has to decide how to vary them to get the exact right mix. The key ingredient in gin is juniper, which provides the distinctive flavor and aroma. In fact, while gin is the quintessential British spirit, it was developed in the 17th century in the Netherlands as a medication: Juniper berries are a diuretic and were also thought to be an appetite stimulant and a remedy for rheumatism and arthritis. The name “gin” is derived from either the French genièvre or the Dutch jenever, words for “juniper”.

But juniper is just one of hundreds of berries, herbs, roots and spices that can be used to make the spirit. That’s why each brand of gin has its unique flavor. Martin Miller’s recipe uses eight ingredients: juniper berries from Tuscany, plus angelica, cassia bark, cinnamon bark, coriander, Florentine orris, lemon peel, licorice root, nutmeg and Seville orange peel.

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