Cheers: Meet the man from Bewdley who makes gin

Refreshing, versatile and quintessentially British – gin’s popularity is soaring.

It’s gone from being ‘mother’s ruin’ to a trendy tipple with new gin bars popping up in town centres all over the country.

Changes in legislation have also led to the rise of small scale craft gin-makers, introducing more choice and a variety of new flavours to tempt the tastebuds of drinkers.

It’s estimated that there are now more than 130 distilleries, double the number in 2012, amid a surge in popularity of artisan gin.

Sales of the drink have also increased significantly over recent years, exceeding £1 billion last year and are predicted to rise to £1.3bn by 2020.

One gin maker who is hoping to make waves in the the industry is Nick Hinton from Bewdley whose summers spent on the family farm and a love offor the drink has helped to inspire him to set up his own micro-distillery.

And he has just launched his first two creations – Wyre Forest Gin and Regatta Gin – both of which contain ingredients foraged and sourced locally.

Wyre Forest Gin has fruity tones of blackberry, raspberry and blueberry, which he says complement the juniper, elderflower and fennel as well as the other botanicals used in the recipe.

He describes his Regatta Gin as a light-tasting summer drink with subtle hints of cucumber, mint and strawberry as well as ingredients such as angelica and star anise.

“Gin is so versatile. You can have it as a short drink or with tonic for a long drink. I love the after-taste of juniper. I love everything about gin and it’s become a real passion of mine over the years.

“Twenty-five years ago there were very few gins to choose from and the ones that existed were pretty similar in taste. But in the last five or six years, gin’s experienced a bit of a revival and now there are gins with different flavours offering people something different that wasn’t around before,” the 48-year-old says.

His love of gin and inspiration for his new venture is actually linked to another passion of his – rowing.

In 1993, Nick, a member of Bewdley Rowing Club, created his first recipe at Bewdley Regatta after the then coach Jim Geddie offered to buy the crew a drink to celebrate a win.

“Jim was a big gin drinker so proceeded to order 10 gin and tonics.

“Back in 1993, the only one available at the rowing club was the one in the green bottle.

“This was my first taste of gin and in my opinion I felt it was rather bland. After a trip to the kitchen where sandwiches and strawberries were being prepared, I collected a few ingredients.

“I then added strawberries, a sprig of mint and a couple of slices of cucumber and Regatta Gin was born,” explains Nick, who lives in Bewdley.

He continued to play around with infusing various base gins with all sorts of different flavours and used to make damson gin and port on his family farm at Erdington.

But it was only last year that he decided to expand his passion and share his drinks with others.

“I left school and did a traditional engineering apprenticeship and after that I moved to British Sugar.

“I was very interested in nature and ecology and studied an A-level in environmental science at night school. I then went to university and did a degree in biology.

“I guess my interest for nature goes back to spending summers on the family farm, my dad’s love for the forest and being brought up in such a lovely place.

“Sadly, my mother passed away last year and I had time to reflect on life and so decided to use my inheritance to follow my dream,” says Nick, who is being helped by his wife Angie, 49, and his two children; 17-year-old Jack and Molly, 12.

This led to the creation of his second product – Wyre Forest Gin.

“After producing infused gins for a number of years for personal consumption using a base gin and adding flavours it became obvious to us that we should try to develop a gin that captured the beautiful place in which we live.

“We began to explore the banks of the River Severn, the hedgerows of the family farm and the fruits of the Wyre Forest. We mixed these with other locally grown produce to balance the flavour profile and then blended it with a unique mix of the standard botanicals used in flavouring gin.

“Our aim is to produce hand-crafted gins where ingredients have been foraged and sourced locally. We have used this philosophy throughout the business trying to use local businesses for everything – the website, labels, artwork, ingredients and photography so the venture is one the whole community can feel involved in.

“We feel very lucky to have been able to work with local artist Nick Ashby from Bewdley Ducks Gallery who created the artwork for our labels,” says Nick whose business is called Hinton’s of Bewdley.

The process of creating his trademark gin begins with a natural, flavourless UK grain-based spirit which he buys from Langley in the Black Country.

“It is 96 per cent ABV and we have to pay HMRC duty up front on that,” he says.

This goes into the 30-litre still along with 500g of berries and the other botanicals in his top secret recipes. This is left overnight to help the flavours infuse. The still is heated to help give the flavouring to the spirit and the distillation process takes all day. It is then left to rest for between four days and a week before being diluted to bottle strength with pure, cold filtered water. Each batch will make 45 bottles.

“We’ve had a fantastic response already from people who have tried it. I’ve got other recipes so I hope to be able to introduce more products.

“I currently work away from home two or three nights a week in the food industry so in the long-term it would be great to develop the business so I didn’t have to do this,” he explains.

“Everything has come together with gin becoming more and more popular. My still is named after mum. I thought it was only fitting as she has made this all possible.”

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