BLOG TOUR: Rebellious Spirits - Ruth Ball

I reviewed the beautiful hardback of Rebellious Spirits in 2016 and you can read my review here.  I'm absolutely over the moon to open the paperback blog tour with an extract on how to make your own bootleg gin and a fabulous giveaway (UK only) to win your own copy of this excellent book.  I'd love to have a go at distilling my own alcohol although 20 gallons (just shy of an eye-watering 91 litres!!!) is a bit too much for me so I think I'll stick to the pre-bottled version of mother's ruin.

Bootleg Gin Extract – taken from Rebellious Spirits by Ruth Ball

With illegal gin sold from under a stranger’s skirt, you couldn’t be sure what you were getting. Gins had fancy names like White Satin, Blue Ruin, Cuckold’s Delight, King Theodore of Corsica, Flashes of Lightning or The Cure for the Blue Devils, but they were usually more turpentine than juniper. Even the less dodgy recipes for gin – those involving real juniper – were full of toxic ingredients. They were used in all kinds of food and drink at the time because their toxic properties just weren’t known. It wouldn’t be safe to try a truly authentic recipe for bootleg gin, but I have managed to put together a cocktail that should give you some idea of the taste without any of the nasty side effects.

BOOTLEG GIN: THE ORIGINAL

For twenty gallons of gin

Seventeen gallons of spirits one to five under proof. Take one penny-weight and three quarters of the oil of vitriol, one penny-weight and three quarters of the oil of almonds, half a penny-weight of the oil of turpentine, two penny-weights of the oil of juniper berries, mixed with lump sugar and spirits of wine, as before; add to it one pint of lime-water, and one pint of rose-water; use the whole. After you dissolve five pounds of lump sugar, in two gallons and a half of water that was boiled, as before directed, fine it down with the proportioned quantity of allum and salt of tartar.

P. Boyle, The Publican and Spirit Dealer’s Daily Companion (Sixth Edition, c. 1800)

THE ALCHEMIST’S VERSION

1 part vodka

½ part retsina

¼ part amaretto

¼ part neat sugar syrup

⅛ part rosewater

½ part water

1–2 drops of juniper oil

Simply mix and serve. But how? With tonic? While this gin would be really lovely with tonic, that wouldn’t be authentic. Tonic wouldn’t be introduced to Britain for more than another hundred years; so while you could drink it with tonic, it would be a little like going to a re-enactment wearing a digital watch. Chilled or with ice? Although this gin would also be excellent shaken over ice with a splash of vermouth and served in a well-chilled Martini glass, historical authenticity will not allow.

Drink it the authentic way. Just add a little water and drink at room/street temperature. If possible, try to throw some mud at an MP, or anyone who looks like they might be rich or important, at the same time. That’s the eighteenth-century way!

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If you like the sound of this book (and who wouldn't?), you can click HERE to buy a copy from Amazon or enter my giveaway to be in with the chance of winning a copy - you've got to be in it to win it!

GIVEAWAY

Win a paperback copy of Rebellious Spirits by Ruth Ball courtesy of Elliott & Thompson.  The giveaway is open to entrants in the UK only and is open for 3 days from 19th April 2018 to midnight on 21st April 2018.  One winner will be chosen at random and contacted via email on 22nd April 2018.  If the prize is not claimed within 48 hours, another winner will be chosen.  GOOD LUCK!

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Rebellious Spirits - Ruth Ball

A delicious history of the secret, exciting and often dangerous world of illicit spirits

For as long as spirits have existed, there has been someone doing something really naughty with them: selling gin through pipes in a London back alley; standing guard on a Cornish clifftop waiting for a smuggler's signal; or dodging bombs and shrapnel running whisky in the Blitz. It is a history that is thrilling, utterly fascinating and uniquely British.

Packed full of historical recipes, from Milk Punch to a Wartime Martini, along with cocktails from contemporary bartenders, Rebellious Spirits is a treasure trove for the curious drinker.

From the gin dispensed from a cat's paw at the Puss and Mew shop which could have been the world's first vending machine, to whole funeral corteges staged just to move a coffin filled with whisky, the stories show off all the wonderful wit and ingenuity required to stay one drink ahead of the law. The accompanying recipes are just as intriguing: How did we drink gin before tonic? Was punch really made with curdled milk? Or breakfast served with brandy porridge, and gin mixed into hot ale? What did the past really taste like?

What did I think?

Although it took me a while to read it, this book was really interesting.  It is so full of information that I could only read one chapter at a time so I could fully digest what I had read, and spend some time sampling the alcohol I had just read about, of course.

I absolutely loved the recipes, both original and alchemist versions, although I have yet to try them out.  It will be really interesting to try some authentic versions of drinks our ancestors will have supped.  I'll start off with some easier ones like Egg Flip, Gimlet or Bobby Burns as some of them are really adventurous like the Blue Blazer whereby a stream of liquid fire is passed between two containers - with the author pointing out that you should make sure you have a helper to put you out if it goes wrong.

The book starts with a chapter on the origins of alcohol, but also has excellent sections on whisky, gin and poitin.  I had many laugh out loud moments at the hilarity of hiding whisky from the excise officials - from whisky babies to innovative seating arrangements.  I have taken great delight in telling my friends the story of the Puss and Mew shop, although having read later chapters whereby people were paralysed by illegal alcohol perhaps it wouldn't be such a good idea to drink unnamed spirit passed through a spout in a painting. Desperate times do indeed call for desperate measures and it just proves that Brits will do anything for a shot of gin.

Something else that really interested me was the hidden bars also known as secret speakeasies.  From a secret bar in New York called PDT (Please Don't Tell) which you access via a phone booth in a hot dog joint to a Detective Agency in Kensington which has a bar hidden behind a secret entrance in the wall, they sound like amazing places that I would love to visit.

It's such an interesting book that I am sure I will pick it up again for many years to come.  It has certainly made drinking whisky and gin much more interesting as I now have so many stories of their origins.  I think the author has done a brilliant job of writing such a comprehensive history of booze, with just the right amount of history and humour.

I received this book from the publisher, Elliott & Thompson, in exchange for an honest review.

My rating:

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