Developing a Gin Recipe: Grid, Botanicals, and Ratios

Gin is one of the most flexible spirit categories you can make because botanicals give you huge creative range. That freedom is also the trap: without a framework, you end up with a noisy recipe that isn’t repeatable.

Use this disciplined process: choose your base, decide what kind of gin you’re building on the tasting grid, then build a botanical bill with clear ratios so you can iterate fast without guessing.

The aim is not ‘more ingredients.’ The aim is a gin that tastes intentional.

Quick summary

Context: gin is a ‘design’ category

Gin is compared here to IPA in craft beer: you can create many different outcomes by changing the botanical ‘hop bill.’ That’s exactly why you need a design process.

The process starts with a base decision, then moves to a target flavor profile, then builds a botanical bill that matches that target.

Gin has taken the world by storm in the last centuries, and I think there's a parallel that we can draw from the craft beer brewing renaissance, where basically IPA became a very, and still is, and became a very hot topic. I think the reason is because you can play around and make so many different varieties of beer flavors by playing with certain hops. And in a way, if you just buy G&S, you can play around with a lot of herbs, as long as one of them is present and potently so, juniper, you can play around with it.

Choose your base path

You can make a thousand recipes that are all gin, but yet taste completely different. It's adventures like IPA in the brewing world. So gin, let's see how we're going to make it.

Well, you can start with your own vodka, right? We talked about the vodka production process. The problem is you start with zero, you have to ferment, you have to distill, you have to distill again.

Path A: make your own vodka first

If you start from zero, the process is labor-intensive: ferment a low-strength beer (roughly 2–8%), run a stripping run to concentrate, run a column run to make vodka with cuts, and then do a gin run by redistilling with botanicals.

The advice is practical: if you do this, you should charge a premium because it takes more work.

I don't think I mentioned that during the vodka series. Single run, first run to make sure that you get rid of a lot of flavor, concentrate the alcohol, and then the column run in order to make cuts. So you make your vodka, you do a redistillation with herbs.

Very labor intensive, so you better ask a premium price. Or you buy in neutral alcohol, grain neutral spirit, as it's called. Comes in at 96%, you dilute it, you add your herbs, you do a distillation run.

Path B: buy GNS and start at 35–40%

The alternative is buying grain neutral spirit (GNS) at about 96%, diluting it, adding botanicals, and doing a gin distillation run. A practical run strength for the boiler is around 35–40%.

Hey, you start with 35-40% in the boiler. It's different than when you start with 0% and have to ferment 2-8% beer, then concentrate it in a stripping run, then make vodka out of it in a column run, and then do your gin run. A really important question, what kind of flavor profile do you want?

I'm just going to use the grid again. The fun thing is that even though the gin, and I'm talking about gin from G&S from now onwards, not Geneva, not make your own vodka, just buy in G&S, follows the same rules from the Holy Trinity as whiskey or rum or fruit brandy does. So the first question I think you need to ask yourself is, where do I want my gin to sit?

Pick a target profile on the grid

Even though GNS is mostly ethanol and water (without heads/heavy alcohol fractions in the same way), the tasting approach is still Holy Trinity-like: you still get early, middle, and late impressions from botanical compounds.

Because gin very often is a mixer, especially with tonics, so it needs to stand up to that. Some fruit flavors at the beginning, at least over there, and most gins leave it at that. I'm not a tonic drinker, but maybe the tonic takes care of the third dimension.

Or if you want to make a nice cocktail from a two-dimensional gin, at least add something that puts flavor at the back, because that's where the gap is, guys. This is what you can fill up with your cocktail. Okay, what I like, but again I come from a Dutch gin background, a Geneva background, where the product, the base product we read is still is more akin whiskey than grain neutral spirit.

Two-dimensional mixer gin

A common target is a two-dimensional gin: strong enough to stand up in a mixer (for example with tonic), with citrus/fruity lift early and a solid juniper/coriander middle.

I like to have some third dimensionality. Not much, that's why I draw it a bit slow, a bit smaller, a bit lower, a bit to this direction. Do you want a two-dimensional gin, or do you want a two and a half dimensional gin?

You don't want to go full over third dimension on your gin, because those powers will overpower the lemon, the citrus at the beginning, which is essential to especially a good gin, and you don't want to do that. But a little bit of character at the end makes a gin interesting on itself, instead of a mixer. So if you want to make a sipper at the bar, say like, do you want to taste our gin?

2.5-dimensional sipping gin

A second target is a 2.5-dimensional gin: you keep the citrus and the core middle strong, but you add a small back-end note so the gin is interesting on its own and not only as a mixer.

The warning is clear: do not push the third dimension so hard that it overpowers the citrus lift that makes gin feel alive.

You'll get your gin tonic, sir, but would you do us the courtesy in our distilling hall here where you're visiting, just to sip a little bit of gin we made? And if it's a well-made product, especially when it's 2.5 in character, a little bit of backhand, they'll be blown away. They'll say, I thought I hated gin, but now all of a sudden I realize it's actually appreciatable on its own.

Build your botanical bill

Maybe they'll still drink the gin tonic, but for sure they'll come back to your bar. The Holy Trinity is something you can sell, use as a tool to sell your drink to other people once they understand it, and it's very intuitive, comes very easy. They're not going to stand crappy spirits anymore, and if you make correct ones, they'll be back at your place and they'll be customers for life.

Total loading: 25–30 g/L

A total botanical loading guideline is given: about 25–30 grams of herbs per liter of liquid you are redistilling in the boiler.

GNS or vodka, two-dimensionality or 2.5, and basically, for example you go for two-dimensional gin, why would you do all the earthy and rooty and nutty ingredients in there, right? Because nuts associate with the third dimension. If you want a two-dimensional gin only, you can add them, but you still need to cut them out, so you need to do an earlier hearts-to-tails cut.

Core flavors: juniper + coriander

Juniper is the defining botanical. Coriander seed (not leaves) is the key secondary flavor, supporting the middle and carrying practical digestion history.

Do we have heads, hearts, and tails in a gin? GNS is basically ethanol with a 4% water base, so 96% ethanol. There's not heavy molecules, alcohol molecules, light alcohol molecules, they're not there.

But still, the flavor profiles come over as the Holy Trinity said, so the fruity, the flowery flavors come over here, and the rooty, earthy, nutty flavors come over here. Well, you don't want a full swing third dimension, so the question becomes, why do you add these ingredients if you don't want them? Maybe you do want a 2.5 dimensional product where you can use some earthy, rooty, nutty flavors and hence ingredients, but you don't need to overdo it.

Supporting botanicals by ratio

A ratio framework is given for building the rest of the bill:.

Specific handling warnings are also included: licorice is hard to control because flavor intensity is concentrated in knots; clove is suggested as a more controllable replacement. Orris root is a binder used in perfume, valued for stability over time.

If they're not there, flavors won't be there. What you do need is lime, orange peel, citrus, peach, fruity flavors at the beginning to make sure that we hit this one very nicely. And one of the weird things that we see is that we've got one of those lime-forward, citrus-forward kind of gins, and then it gets served with a tonic, and then I put a piece of citrus fruit in there.

Why ‘47 botanicals’ is marketing

Most people can only distinguish about five or six different flavors in a gin. So ‘47 botanicals’ is a marketing story rather than a sensory advantage.

The recommendation is to limit yourself: juniper + coriander + one fruit is enough for a two-dimensional gin. If you want 2.5-dimensional, add one root note and (if needed) a binder like orris root.

If you want to put something in a mix, make sure it fills the gap to make the total drink more longer enjoyable. If you want fruity flavors, use fruit skins. If you want to look at the heart of the product, the substrate, please know that those flavors are made up by juniper primarily, and then they are made up, and secondary made up by coriander.

Key Takeaways