Hendrick’s is a staple of my gin collection. And I’ll apologise now, as this may become a little bit of a love letter to one of my favourite gins.

Let’s start with the bottle. The distinctive Hendrick’s gin bottle jumps out to you on the shelf. The black glass and large diamond shaped label make it really appealing before you even pick it up. I’m not sure if it’s intentional that it looks like a bottle you’d find in a dusty apothecary, but it does and it works. Once you get it home and open it, there’s a really satisfying noise as you pull off the cork top which makes you excited about having a taste.

As with a lot of modern gins that are infused with botanicals, a balloon glass is essential with Hendrick’s gin. Drinking it in a narrow glass is going to cheat your sense of smell out of the wonderful fragrance that greets you as you raise a wide balloon glass to your lips. It’s a clean, crisp cucumber smell that hits your receptors and invites you to take the delicious first sip.

Once you taste Hendrick’s gin for the first time, the first thing you will notice is how smooth is it. It’s almost as though you’re not drinking gin, until you’ve had a few more mouthfuls and the effect of the 40% alcohol content begins to give you the warm fuzzy glow at the base of your skull that only gin can give you (everyone gets that, right?).

There’s only one garnish that you can have with Hendrick’s gin. Cucumber. If you’ve never tasted and you’ve read this only to think that adding cucumber to a gin that already tastes of cucumber is pure madness, then think again. I cut a really wide bit of cucumber and then sliced it length-ways so that I could add three long, flat slices to my glass. The fruit (I had to google that, it seems very strange calling a cucumber a fruit!) accentuates the taste infused in the gin without it being overpowering. In a glass with lots of ice and a high quality tonic like Fentimans or fever Tree, Hendrick’s is probably one of the most drinkable gins I’ve ever tasted.

If your taste buds enjoy a little kick, crack some black pepper over the top of the cucumber. You can thank me for that one later.

When I drank it

Any time, any place, anywhere

What I used as a garnish

Slithers of cucumber, and some cracked black pepper

Is it worth the money?

Yes, yes, YES. You can buy it online here