The Newfoundland Distillery Company Seaweed Gin
Elite Norse society loved its wine. A thousand years ago, when Vikings exploring the east coast of Canada came across wild grape-like berries, it was like hitting the Scandinavian jackpot. They named the area “Vinland” and built a settlement, now called L’Anse Aux Meadows, on the northwest tip of Newfoundland. Historians believe they made L’Anse Aux Meadows their base camp because the weather was milder than their Greenland home, and hardwood for repairing ships was abundant.
The Vikings fled L’Anse Aux Meadows within a decade, though, and no one is sure why. But we can certainly guess. It takes an extraordinary person to put up with what Mother Nature throws at you on the northern tip of Newfoundland. Winds whipping off the frosty sea cut through to the bone. Had the village staged a burlesque show, frozen locals would more likely gather to watch Astrid don, not doff her clothes. On top of that, the Vikings covered their dwellings in turf. So it’s numbing cold and your spouse is pestering you to water, fertilize and weed the roof?
The Botanic Bounty of Newfoundland
Had Vikings only known that Newfoundland was also rich in gin-making botanicals, there might still be plenty of Leif’s and Erik’s walking about. But no, it took another ten centuries for an artist named Peter Wilkins and Cordon Bleu Chef William Carter to turn Newfoundland’s botanical bounty into gin.
In 2017, the Newfoundland Distillery Company in Clarke’s Beach on Conception Bay began making gin to bridge the gap while their whisky matured. After a tenure as a chef in Ottawa cooking for high-profile names, Carter had returned to Newfoundland. His experience in the kitchen honed his approach to the culinary arts – making humble seasonal ingredients pop on the palate. Gin was already in his culinary DNA.
A Simple Complexity
He and Wilkins decided to keep their recipes simple right from the start by using local ingredients. This included seaweed harvested from the Grand Banks, savoury from a local farm and Newfoundland juniper for their Seaweed Gin. As Newfoundland’s juniper growing season is shorter than a Viking visit, the berries are small, but with concentrated flavours. Newfoundland juniper packs a wallop. Flavours from the three botanicals infuse into barley-based spirit as it passes the still’s gin basket. After distillation, Wilkins and Carter dilute the gin to bottling strength, then leave it to soak in the same botanicals, thus boosting their essential oils and giving the gin its straw yellow hue.
It’s an exercise in elegant simplicity, yet without compromising complexity. The gin’s sweetness balances the seaweed’s brininess, fine-tuned by an earthiness that underlies the juniper flavours. A slightly bitter spiced tone adds depth to the palate, rounding off the coastal sweet notes.
Vikings were known to set their base camps on fire before moving on - anything to get warm before heading back to sea. But, along the shores of Conception Bay, you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone still practicing this Viking tradition. With gin like this, you’ll want to linger.
Davin de Kergommeaux and Blair Phillips are the authors of The Definitive Guide to Canadian Distilleries.