gin no. 093 – GinRaw

I’m closing in on my 100th bottle, and although GinRaw is entered into The Collection as no. 093, I’ve had it for a while. My dad and Elias gave it to me and I misplaced it, only to remember it recently as I was reorganizing the collection.

I remember once reading about lost library books, not books that were borrowed and lost, but ones lost in the library. I think it was the New York Public Library. If books we misshelved, the collection was so big they might never be found again. I’m trying to avoid that with my gin collection. It’s big enough now that it is hard to keep track of where everything is, and even though I have 93 in my collection, (actually 94 there’s one more I just haven’t entered yet.) this is just the 39th one to get an entry.

I opened this bottle with Michael on January 15, 2024. We tried it neat and in a gin and tonic and found it to be a pretty ordinary gin. There is nothing bad about it, but not too much that was exciting either.

GinRaw is a Spanish gin, distilled in Barcelona. They use a cold distilling process called Rotoval, which they claim preserves the flavors of the botanicals. Those boatnicals include, lemon, cedrat (citron), laurel, kaffir lime leaves, black cardamom seeds, and coriander. 

According to GinRaw, their creation “was born from the madness for perfection of four experts. Thanks to the exclusive selection of its botanicals and its clearly differentiated distillation process, the result is a unique and incomparable product.” The four experts are a chef, a sommelier, a mixologist, and a master parfumeur. Despite this desire for greatness, nothing in particular stands out other than the citrus. It has clear lemon notes and muted juniper. As a result, it would make a great cocktail gin, but it just didn’t differentiate itself enough to excite us.

The bottle is bottle is attractive and it’s batch and bottle numbered. Ours is Batch 01-20 and Bottle 0619. It’s a light 42.3 ABV. Although I got it as a gift, it looks like it runs about $40 which seems a steep price. GinRaw is a nice gin, and the average gin drinker would certainly enjoy it. It just isn’t exciting enough to justify the price.