How to store gin at home
Common questions about Gin at tastings with visitors at our distillery
What is the best way to store a Humdinger Gin at home? As with all quality gins, here are some important tips to ensure your precious gin stays in tip top condition.
Store your bottles of Gin in a cool area
Heat can degrade gin, so it's best practice to keep your gin in a cool area with a consistent temperature. 4°C is the absolute optimum temperature to avoid oxidation, evaporation, and any botanical notes from degrading. A cool dark cupboard preferably on the southern side of the building works pretty well.
Avoid direct sunlight
As much as we like having our pretty bottles of Humdinger Gin on display, sunlight has an adverse effect on the quality of the gin. Sunlight breaks down some flavours, and can also make your favourite pink gin or strawberry gin an unsightly brown colour.
Interesting fact: This is why some distillers use really big labels, it helps to block out most of the damaging light.
Ensure the bottle cap remains tightly sealed
Oxidation occurs not just from heat and light, but also from the air. Citrus notes are the first to disappear through oxidation, so keep the lid on your gin and where possible minimise how often you open and close the bottle to curtail how much fresh air is being introduced into the bottle.
Keep Gin bottles in an upright position
It is important to store your gin upright, for two main reasons:
- Reduces the likelihood of leaks,
- Lessens the chance of the closure leaching colour into the gin.
Natural cork and agglomerated cork closures can leach colour into your gin despite manufacturer's best efforts to wash and pre-treat the closures. Keeping the bottles upright decreases the chance of this happening, and keeping the bottles in a cool place also helps.
Does gin go off?
As with all quality gins, our Humdinger Gin, if stored correctly (with the bottle upright, sealed, in a cool place, and away from direct sunlight) will retain its quality and botanical flavours for several years, not that Humdinger sits on the shelf for that long!
