Event: Glasgow Juniper Festival at SWG3

Celebrating World Gin Day with Juniper Events

Yesterday evening (World Gin Day) we decided to skip the Scotland v England football match and head along to SWG3 for a gin festival! We stopped in at Surfdogs first for some food then travelled West to SWG3.

With our Juniper Festival badges on we jumped into the world of gin. If you haven’t been before, here’s how it works. You buy a ticket and get a badge proving you are a bona fide attendee. Pick a stall and you will receive a sample of gin. You might think it’s a small sample but remember there are around 40 gins to try, so pace yourself! (She says!)

What I like here is that there’s no pressure to buy at each stall. If you like the gin, stalls will be able to sell you a G&T or cocktail, and if you want some for taking home head along to the Drinkmonger bottle shop to buy your spirits. This means more time to chat about the gin and get the stories behind each brand.

Even hardened gin lovers like me found a number of producers I hadn’t heard of before. I especially liked the raspberry-infused Manchester Gin with Mr Foodie picking Quince Gin from Whitley Neill as his favourite.

Whitley Neill also do an elderflower gin and nettle gin, the nettle was interesting – very grassy with a touch of earthiness. We’ll be featuring some of the newer gins we discovered and the stories behind them soon.

Avva gin have their own custom-made 250l copper still and hail from Speyside.

Canada’s only (as far as we’re aware) commercially available gin, Ungava, is bright yellow due to the macerated rose hips added for flavour – the colour disappears when you add tonic. Magic!

Ginerosity is a project supported by Pickering’s Gin in Edinburgh. Money from each bottle sold goes to projects in Scotland and in Africa.

If you’re a Star Wars fan then Ki No Bi might be a good one for your drinks cabinet. It isn’t named after Obi Wan of course, it actually means “The beauty of the seasons” in Japanese and is a rice-based spirit from Kyoto including botanicals such as yuzu, bamboo and gyokuro tea.