Today we’re going to explore Ran­som Old Tom Gin, a Pre-Pro­hi­bi­tion stye gin made by a mod­ern day arti­san pro­duc­er of small batch organ­ic wines and spir­its. This gin harkens back to a pop­u­lar style of gin from the mid 1800’s, an era that gave us the bulk of what we call clas­sic cock­tails today. What makes this style Old Tom Gin unique is that it was bar­rel aged, which prob­a­bly came about due to trans­port­ing the gin over great distances.

This spe­cif­ic Ran­som recipe was devel­oped in col­lab­o­ra­tion with his­to­ri­an, author, and mixol­o­gist David Won­drich. Ran­som’s web­site will tell you that the gin’s sub­tle malti­ness is the result of using a base wort of malt­ed bar­ley, com­bined with an infu­sion of botan­i­cals in high proof corn spir­its. Bar­rel aged… malt­ed bar­ley… high proof corn spir­its… this sounds more like a whiskey than a gin. Here comes the gin bits though. The botan­i­cals I men­tioned above are juniper, orange peel, lemon peel, corian­der seed, angel­i­ca root and car­damom pods. Now we’re start­ing to see the gin traits mak­ing their mark. Final­ly, the dis­til­la­tion is run through an alam­bic pot still that pre­serves the max­i­mum amount of aro­mat­ics, fla­vor and body. Only the “heart of the hearts” (the very best por­tion of dis­til­late) is retained for this spe­cial bottling.

I’ve nev­er expe­ri­enced any­thing like it. The sniff test reveals an obvi­ous whiff of juniper along with sub­tle flo­ral notes and car­damom. At first sip you’ll notice a pres­ence of car­damom. The mid palate reveals flo­ral tones and a hint of cit­rus that car­ries through to a malty fin­ish. The over­all tast­ing expe­ri­ence has a smooth round­ness from the bar­rel aging. This is a must have for seri­ous cock­tail nerds.

Around $37 a bottle.

Since this gin is based off a recipe from the gold­en era of clas­sic cock­tails nat­u­ral­ly it’s going to work in clas­sic cock­tails like the Martinez.

Martinez

• 2 oz Ran­som Old Tom Gin
• 1 oz Carpano Anti­ca Sweet Vermouth
• 1/4 oz Luxar­do Maraschi­no Liqueur
• Dash of Post Pro­hi­bi­tion Orange Bitters
• Gar­nish with a lemon twist

Stir all ingre­di­ents with ice except for the garnish.

Strain into a chilled cock­tail glass.

Gar­nish with a lemon twist.