Mixing pleasure
With business, two Montreal gin lovers concoct their own tonic.
With its characteristic bitterness yet hint of sweetness, a classic gin and tonic is one of the cocktail world’s simplest pleasures. And now that we can choose from several premium gins at the SAQ, including Quebec-made Ungava and Piger Henricus, the drink is even more enticing.
If you splurge on a new gin, your next logical stop might be the grocery store for a case of Schweppes or house-brand tonic water. But if you think it’s only the gin that makes for a perfect G&T, think again.
Commercial tonic water is often made with high-fructose corn syrup and chemically extracted quinine. “It’s quite treacherous. You always think there’s no sugar in tonic water, but there’s a lot of it,” says Hannah Palmer, 29, a Montreal photographer with a bachelor’s degree in chemistry and engineering. “It can really mask the flavour of the gin.” To put it in perspective: a 355 mL can of Canada Dry tonic water has 32 g of sugar; a can of Coke has 42 g.
That’s why Palmer decided to make her own tonic water. To do so, she teamed up with fellow gin and tonic lover Alexandrine Lemaire, 26, an industrial designer. Inspired by homemade tonic at some of the city’s bars, Palmer and Lemaire wanted to make a product available for retail. It wasn’t easy. “At first it wasn’t good. It takes a while to get a good recipe going,” Palmer said.
They perfected the recipe just in time to sell 3/4 oz. Tonic Maison (the name is a reference to the amount needed for a standard drink) at the city’s Christmas markets last December. When combined with soda water, a 500 mL bottle ($24.95) makes about 22 drinks. Palmer and Lemaire say it’s three times less sweet than commercial tonic.
Apparently, they’re not the only ones who prefer their tonic on the bitter side. Their product did so well that it’s now available in several specialty shops around Montreal, like the Marché des Saveurs du Québec in the Jean-Talon market. They’ve also begun selling to bars. What started as a side project for the two women has quickly become a full-time venture.
Since making soda would have required a much larger investment, they decided to make a syrup. Their product joins such tonic syrups already on the market as Tomr’s Tonic, which is unfiltered and has a strong, tart taste, and Jack Rudy Cocktail Co.’s small batch tonic, which is clear and has a cleaner, slightly sweet and intense lemon taste. Palmer and Lemaire wanted to make something in between the two. The result, filtered yet amber in colour, is more complex than commercial tonic water, with more of the botanical and citrus notes coming through.
To achieve this, before adding the requisite sugar and citric acid, they start with an infusion of oranges, lemon grass, allspice berries and cinchona bark. This last, difficultto-obtain ingredient is the clincher.
Derived from the bark of the cinchona tree, quinine is the key ingredient in tonic and what gives it a bitter flavour. Quinine was also the original antimalarial drug: the precursor to the gin and tonic was born when British officers attempted to mask the taste of their prescribed quinine while stationed in India.
Palmer and Lemaire were inspired by tonic’s history. The two gin lovers prefer simple, classic cocktails. “It’s a bit of backlash from the era of heavy mixology, of having 20 ingredients in one drink,” Palmer said. Jean-Sébastien Michel, owner of Alambika, a cocktail supply shop on Van Horne Ave., shares the sentiment. “The current cocktail trend is inspired by pre-Prohibition,” he said. “Using few ingredients, good ingredients, and not so sweet.”
Michel prefers tonic syrups to ready-made tonic water. “We found that the syrups allow for more versatility. There are a lot of new gins coming in (to the SAQ), and the same strength of tonic doesn’t apply for every gin. You have really delicate gins, and if you go full strength with them, you can kill any subtleties,” Michel said. In addition to 3/4 oz., he stocks another made-inMontreal tonic syrup, Le Lab’s Ol’ Timer’s Tonic.
When using syrup, drinkers can choose the strength of the tonic — and of the bubbles, because they add their preferred brand of sparkling water. “You never have a half-can of Schweppes going flat in your fridge,” Michel said. The main difference between the syrups on the market is that some use quinine extract, which makes the tonic clear, while others use cinchona bark, re- sulting in an amber colour.
“Some have a more astringent finish that is brought by the quinine, and some have more of an acidic lemon-y finish,” Michel said. Once opened, the syrup should be refrigerated, but it can last for several months.
If mixing syrup sounds complicated, you can find alternatives to the big brands of carbonated tonic water at such specialty stores as Épicerie Latina on St-Viateur St. W. or Les Douceurs du Marché in the Atwater Market. Look for FeverTree, Fentimans, or Q Tonic.