Pink Gin with heart-shaped rose petal Valentine’s Day
For some gin fans, pink gin is a serious alternative to regular gin. Others just love the eye-catching bottles and mixing up a delicate rose-coloured Gin & Tonic in summer. Then there are the gin purists who think pink gin is a step too far away from classic styles.
So who’s right and just what is pink gin anyway?
What is pink gin?
Originally the term Pink Gin referred to a cocktail: a simple mix of Plymouth Gin and Angostura Bitters. Its creation is commonly attributed to Henry Workshop, a ship’s surgeon in the British Royal Navy, serving on board HMS Hercules. The ship was in the Caribbean in 1826, patrolling the waves for slave trade vessels, when Workshop first discovered Angostura Bitters.
The bitters had been invented by a German doctor, Johann Gottlieb Benjamin Siegert, in 1824. Working in a military hospital in the town of Angostura in Venezuela, he created his bitters as a medicinal treatment to help patients with upset stomachs and indigestion. Word of this marvellous tonic soon spread – Angostura sits on the Orinoco River, which flows into the Caribbean basin – and sailors started using it to treat seasickness.
Workshop came up with the idea of combining a few drops of Angostura Bitters with the naval ration of Plymouth Gin. The dark red bitters gave the resulting concoction a pink hue – and Pink Gin was born. It had become a popular drink throughout England by the mid-19th century. If
