News — Gin

Ginger, which is included in our Gin standards set, adds a spicy and, at higher concentrations, even hot note to gins. But researchers at the University of British Columbia have published a study demonstrating that ginger suppresses feelings of disgust. In a series of double-blind studies, volunteers were given either a ginger capsule or a placebo pill. For the first study, 242 participants were asked to rate how disgusted they felt when presented with a sequence of objectively disgusting photos, from rotten meat (moderately disgusting) to a man vomiting in a toilet (highly disgusting)…The results show that when a participant...

Few people know the aroma of Cassia Bark, an increasingly popular gin botanical. The cassia tree is an evergreen found in east Asia. There is a distinct overlap in the aroma profiles of the oils from cassia and cinnamon. When you smell it, the ravishing, hot, spicy, and distinguishable “cinnamon-like, but heavier” aroma is very evident. This is the archetypal hot, spicy smell. It conjures feelings of being in markets in far-off Asia or Africa. The major molecule with the characteristic cassia aroma is cinnamic aldehyde. It’s a powerful odorant that makes up between 70% and 90% of cassia oils — a greater...