written by Jordan Fyfe

I just have to start by admitting to you all that I hate wine, even though we serve it at almost all our workshops. But don't judge me too harshly, I'm just not a drink-loving person. As a child I never drank soft drink, I don't drink coffee and I even though I like it I don't think I've ever finished a cup of tea (I'm looking at you 3/4 cup of cold tea on my desk that Morgan made me this morning). But I love Gin and Tonic.

So, when we decided that we were going to do a Gin and Tonic workshop I was so excited, surely other people love Gin as much as I do. My first thought was that we had to find someone local because there are so many good Distilleries popping up. One day I was at the Manning Markets and happened across Mark from Sin Gins doing a tasting, we were in a rush, so I didn't end up trying them all. Not long after, Morgan and I set up a tasting at the very cute Murray Hotel in West Perth with Mark and Kate. We fell in love with their story and their Gins.

The seven deadly sins. Photo by: Taylor Mitchell Photography

Sin Gins is one of those great local stories about how something wonderful can come from a vague idea and good timing. Mark and Kate had been running The Murray Hotel for 10 years and a friend approached them in 2016 to ask if he could open a brewery in their extra space, so they called the council to ask for the licence and they said, well you already have that licence as part of the hotel, therefore you can distil. So they thought; bugger beer, let's open a Gin Distillery instead! The name came about during a brainstorming session with some friends because Kate's last name is Sinfield, Hence Sin Gins. And from there it only seemed logical to create the 7 deadly Sin Gins. Being a very small batch distillery, it allows them to do a range of exciting gins, each with a different balance of flavours with very little waste. They took their very first bottles back to Kate's mum in England for Christmas that year. It took another year or so of learning, experimenting and testing on friends at parties before all 7 (+1 special Australian Dry Gin) were ready.

Mark tells me that making gin is all about balance and that the wonderful relationship between ethanol and water is what makes gin possible. The two main ingredients are Juniper, which is piney and Coriander seeds, which are citrusy and it's the balance between these that create different kinds of gin. But Mark isn't limited to those two botanicals, one of his favourite ingredients is Cardamon which features heavily in his Pride Gin. He also features a lot of Native Australian botanicals which he sources from a lady in Denmark, WA. Sourcing straight from a small farmer means that his botanicals are always fresh and the miles and wastage are reduced.

Jordan making gin + tonics at our workshop. Photo by: Taylor Mitchell Photography

Each of their gins is amazing and individual. Our favourite two are Wrath and Envy.

Envy has 6 native Australian Ingredients; mountain pepper berries, wattle seed, aniseed myrtle, lemon myrtle, peppermint gum and Quandong. It's a beautiful citrus gin with a really aromatic flavour, it barely needs anything other than tonic but pairs well with lemon myrtle, finger limes or any other cirtus.

Wrath is a gin not for the faint hearted; it has stinging nettles, devils claw, skullcap and native mountain pepper berries. It has a spicy-savoury flavour to it and goes amazingly with some capsicum and fresh black pepper.

The gin menu at our workshop. Photo by: Taylor Mitchell Photography

For us, the seven deadly Gins were exactly that, deadly to our workday. We hadn't really thought about the consequences of organising a "meeting" (Gin tasting) at 1pm on a Thursday. We headed back to the office at 2pm, after trying all 8 Gins heavily considering a nap. We were so seduced by Pride, Greed, Lust, Gluttony, Sloth, Wrath, Envy and the story of this local small business that we decided to share them with you all at our new Gin and Tonic Drawing workshop.

Upcoming workshop

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Venue: Feld

All photos by: Taylor Mitchell Photography