The name South Hollow Spirits jogged our memory a bit, and lo and behold – we’ve had their rum. The rum was an overall failure, was barely able to be mixed, and hilarious overpriced. This too is a small batch and is ridiculously priced as well, but mercifully it’s nowhere near as deplorable.
The real trouble here is that because there’s just a bit too much burn to be silk smooth, and because of the main cocktails failing to make good usage of this, it will likely do it’s best as a bartender’s gift. Something that such a person with knowledge in crafting a signature cocktail knows that what the gin adds is exactly right. For everyone else in the world though – it’s simply okay and WAY too pricey to justify it.
What they Say: “For serious gin, head East. All the way to the tip of Cape Cod, where our juniper trees grow as high as 30 feet. At South Hollow Spirits, we harvest juniper berries from the trees just steps away from our distillery.
At our New England outpost, we’ve crafted a can-do know-how gin of high-quality botanicals that’s perfect over ice, or as the star in any classic cocktail. Distilled from 100% sugar cane. ”
Taste: 7.0 – At the beginning it’s much more of that floral and minty components. It’s nice overall and again refreshing to have.
Aftertaste: 5.0 – That’s much more juniper on the backend and along with some of the burn aspects it rises in ‘heat’ and isn’t as nice and clean.
Burn/Smooth: 5.5 – There is a burn there, especially on the backend, but it’s not debilitating.
Aroma: 7.0 – It’s more of a minty kind of juniper. There’s a bit of floral notes, but overall it’s really a spearmint juniper combo. It’s nice and refreshing though.
Honesty: 6.5 – They talk about trees which is good, but they say perfect over ice so head down real quick before we discuss the honesty here. Sadly because they use the P-word, and well – aren’t they lose a bit here. However, the design overall is great so they can afford a small hit.
Mixability: 5.33
W/ Rocks: 6.0 – That is not ‘perfect’ as they claim. Sure it gets rid of a little of the burn, but it’s not marketably improved.
Gin and Tonic: 5.0 – You know what – subpar. It’s not a good G&T. It was sort of hopeful after the rocks being decent, but no.
Martini: 5.0 – That’s o-kay? It’s honestly better the less vermouth which I guess for some people is what you want, but then we defer to rocks score.
Value: 1.0 – We did not pay this amount of money, that may be one of the smartest things we’ve done in this review. Nonetheless, it’s hard to escape the elephant in the room that this is over 50 dollars. For comparison Tanqueray No. Ten is $34 dollars.
Google Shop Average: $51
Website: http://southhollowspirits.com/
Reviewer Scores:
BuffaloJern: 4.0
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Metric Score: 37.33/70 |+| Metric Average: 5.33 |+| Reviewer Average: 4.0
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Final Thoughts: In fairness, we have to be clear – this is a good gin. But you shouldn’t buy it – we won’t. That’s because this SHOULD be a great gin, but because it’s not priced to match, and because it’s so tantalizingly close to a good cocktail just a minor change would propel it into that territory. It falls short though and as such should be left upon the shelf.
