Tyree Gin, 70 cl

Product Information

With the distillery located on a rural estate, we have to rely on some private services such as water – this means that every summer we are watching the skies to see if it will rain, as we can often run dry, even in Kintyre! Just remember, today’s rain is tomorrow’s gin! Tiree Whisky Company is the producer of Tyree Gin and Hebridean Pink Gin, both of which are handcrafted and bottled on the Inner Hebridean Isle of Tiree. At the beginning of the pandemic, the distillery produced hand sanitiser free of charge for any companies or individuals on the island that required it. In December, they also helped to spread some festive cheer by giving a free miniature of Tyree Gin or Hebridean Pink Gin to every islander over the age of 18. Tyree (the old spelling of Tiree) Gin was created to celebrate the stunning landscape where it is distilled. Produced using Kelp harvested from the icy waters and a range of botanicals from the machair ground inland from the shore of the island combined with juniper, water-mint and angelica, this is a fresh, pure island spirit. Coming home

Working with specialist spirits branding agency, Stranger & Stranger, the ‘Social Distillery’ has created something which is the envy of many. They wanted to produce something which depicts the truly stunning scenery found on the island – and what a job they’ve done! Mixing a little bit of fun with a little bit of insight, we enjoy a second round of Scottish G&T’s with Scotland’s gin makers and brand owners as we let them ask their peers the questions in our ‘Talking Scottish Gin’ Q&A editorial feature. The gin embodies the very best in craft production, sourcing botanicals from across the island and nearby areas to create an exceptional gin that lends itself to life on the Scottish isles. Myself and my business partner are very into the local history - we love reading about the island’s written historical accounts and one of the things I discovered was that between 1790 and 1791 there were 157 people caught distilling illegally, and one in every ten was evicted from their croft or holding. We thought this history was fascinating - there were hundreds of years of history of whisky production on the island - and we thought, why has nobody tried to revive that?” Cairngorm Gin is a handcrafted premium distilled gin, produced in small batches of just 70 bottles in a traditional copper pot still, named Ginger, using a blend of nine botanicals including juniper, cloudberries, elderflower and Caledonian pine, partnered with coriander seed, orris root, sweet orange peel, angelica and kaffir lime, which are all distilled along with fresh water collected from the River Spey.We are very proud to have achieved one of our goals of establishing a distillery in Tiree, the first since 1801. On an island with a fragile economy, it is a great feeling to revive an industry that has been dormant for such a long time. We have no access to three phase power so our still had to be adapted accordingly. We also had to pay for the installation of a new electricity connection to allow us to utilise the power capabilities of the equipment, an additional cost that we hadn’t planned for. In the highly sought-after taste competition, 11 Gold Medals were presented with Edinburgh Gin collecting two gold medals.

Launching in stores from the 26 May, the Scottish gin festival features a range of twelve spirits, including four expertly mixed, ready-to-drink cans, that offer gin lovers floral and fruit drinks that are ideal for warmer weather. Tighter regulation, both from the estate and the government, also squeezed the industry. The minister's 1792 report went on: "The parish [of Tiree and Coll] [a few years ago] had upwards of thirty stills, but is now reduced to three small licensed one." Noted for its smoothness and strength (just like its namesake), Whitetail Gin sells to customers including Selfridges and British chef Marco Pierre White.

38. TARQUIN’S CORNISH GIN

Being neighbours and having played with Trail West at the Bruichladdich Distillery on a few occasions, Tyree Gin’s Ian Smith now asks The Botanist Gin… The brand is named after George Chinnery, the English painter, who began his career in Dublin, before travelling to China. The bottle is inspired by these two parts of his career – Georgian Dublin and Imperial China. The results are highly regarded as they are independently audited by a panel of experts and judged live in a rigorously assessed blind tasting event.

The distillery's flagship product is the world’s first Oyster Gin, a premium gin made by charging the still with the shells of fresh Scottish oysters. The waters of Scotland’s west coast are famous for their oyster beds and Isle of Bute Gin's come from the beautiful Loch Fyne. The oyster shells add a delicate maritime essence to the spirit – blended with citrus and other botanicals to create a savoury gin which is a perfect pair to seafood and the ideal base for a martini. Distillers from across Scotland have been selected, with those on the picturesque Hebridean island of Tiree offering up one of the festival’s most far flung gins. By 1801, the chamberlain still spoke of "spirits, to which the natives are much addicted." That same year, however, 157 islanders were found guilty of illegal distilling; in addition to a court fine, the new chamberlain, Dr McLaurin, was instructed to evict one in ten offenders as a warning. The Duke went further, demanding that all barley not needed for food should be sent directly to him at Inveraray Castle. Ten years after the legal distilleries had been set up, "none could be found on the island willing to undertake the distilling in a legal way" and by 1802 the duke pulled the plug completely: "The barley to be exported as last year, and no distilling permitted."

Why the whisky won’t be peaty

Having the gin produced elsewhere but using local ingredients helped fund the renovation of an industrial shed in West Hynish in the southwest of the island and in February 2019, after a break of 217 years, Tiree was once again home to an operational distillery.

Along with this historical knowledge, my business partner, Alain, is a local crofter and he and his family had a knowledge of various botanicals available on the island’s machair ground.

34. ABLEFORTH’S BATHTUB GIN

This was until island locals, Alian Campbell and Ian Smith formed the Tiree Whisky Company to preserve and promote the island’s whisky heritage. Following on from the success of their first spirit, The Cairnsmuir – a limited edition 19-Year-Old Highland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, Tyree Gin was launched in 2017. A gin to reflect the island Chair of the judging panel, Adam Hardie, Partner and Head of Food and Drink at Johnston Carmichael, said: “It continues to be a very tough and challenging year but many are not just surviving but excelling. As the first legal distillery on the island for over 200 years, and with so many links to the history of Tiree, what does the future hold? Known as Tyree and not Tiree is another nod to the island’s history, as Ian explains: “Tyree was a historical form of spelling for the island while the modern spelling of Tiree first appeared on a map of Scotland by John & Frederic Tallis in 1851.” Creating a whisky for Tiree Music Festival Almost 200 gins - all distilled in Scotland - were blind tasted this year and medals awarded in 11 categories.