Multi-Shot Gin Distillation Process

During my time in the UK, I briefly worked at a contract distillery in Wales where they made gins for several gin brands. In this post I’ll explain our multi-shot gin distillation process.

What is the Multi-Shot Method

A multi-shot distillation is where a gin concentrate is produced by increasing the gin botanical load in your recipe by 2 fold or even 200 fold. Then neutral grain spirit and water are added to it to produce a gin of the desired alcohol percentage and volume. So you can collect 20L of gin distillate and produce 200L of gin using this method. For a single-shot distillation, you put in the normal botanical load, collect the distillate, and then add only water to achieve the desired alcohol percentage. So if you collect 20L of distillate you’ll probably end up with around 40L of gin. As you can see the multi-shot gin distillation process is more time, energy, and money efficient compared to the single shot method.

1. Scale Up the Recipe

Each gin recipe is made to produce 1L of gin at 40%abv. Depending on the volume of gin, I will multiply the botanical amounts in the recipe to produce the desired volume. For instance, if I am asked to make 200L of gin at 40% abv I will multiply the recipe botanical amounts by 200.

2. Prepping the Botanicals

Once I have calculated the amount of each botanical required, I will weigh all the botanicals out on a scale. Depending on the recipe, I may process the botanicals differently. For instance, in some recipes I may crush up black peppercorns with a mortar and pestle, whereas in other recipes I may leave them whole.

For lemon, orange ribbons, and other large-sized botanicals, I will cut them into smaller pieces to increase their surface area and make them fit more easily into the botanical bags. Then I divide the botanicals evenly into muslin bags. The tops of the bags are tied up tightly to prevent botanicals from escaping and making a mess in the still.

3. Prepping the Still

I dilute 96% abv neutral grain spirit (NGS) with tap water to 40% abv. This 40% abv spirit is used to charge the still with. The reason we don’t charge the still with 96% abv NGS is because the distillation would run too quickly. We want the vapour to spend some time in the pot. The water, alcohol, and oils in the botanicals need time to interact so that the botanicals’ volatile oils can be extracted.

I fill the 50L hillbilly still with 50L of NGS at 40% abv. Then I add the botanical bags along with any botanicals in powder form. I will poke the bags with a long metal spoon to ensure the botanicals are submerged in liquid and everything is well mixed. The botanicals will then be left to macerate in the still for 24 hours to ensure greater flavour extraction.

4. Distillation

The next day I will turn the still on. It takes about an hour until distillate starts to flow out. The vapour will rise and move into the thumper keg in the middle. The thumper keg is left empty in our set-up. Many distillers will fill their thumper keg with a liquid before starting the distillation.

When the vapour reaches the empty thumper keg, it cools and turns into liquid. As vapour continues to enter the thumper keg, the keg becomes warmer and a second “mini” distillation occurs in the thumper keg. Vapour travels from the thumper keg to the condenser where it is cooled. The distillate is collected on the other side.

5. Diluting the Distillate

18L of distillate is collected. It is a super-concentrated botanical distillate. It is important to note that no matter how many times the original recipe is scaled up, the volume of distillate collected remains ~18L. I add deionised water and NGS to the super-concentrated distillate to reach the desired volume and %abv.

I rest the finished gin for a few days or weeks before bottling it for sale. And there you have it, our multi-shot gin distillation process!

Watch it Below on YouTube

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