‘Field-to-Bottle’ specialist distiller, Arbikie is to launch its latest gin in time for ‘Burns Night’ on 24 January. ‘AK’S Gin’ is named after Alexander Kirkwood Stirling, the father of Arbikie owners Iain, John and David.
‘AK’S Gin’ is distilled using honey and wheat farmed at Arbikie along with black pepper, mace and cardamom. As farmers, the Stirlings are very aware of the importance bees play in pollinating crops with recent figures suggesting they are worth £1.8bn to the UK agriculture industry each year.
With wild bees under threat Arbikie plans to install its own hives to produce the required honey as well as pollinating the surrounding land. Coupled with growing its own Juniper, Arbikie places sustainability at the heart of their business.
Distillery Manager Christian Perez commented, “We chose our Viscount variety of wheat because it gave us a beautiful, buttery character. Coupled with our fresh honey, ‘AK’s Gin’ is incredibly smooth lending itself to a great gin and tonic and an amazing base spirit for cocktails.”
With Burns Night fast approaching Arbikie was keen to launch their tribute to their farming father when one of the world’s most famous farmer’s sons, Rabbie Burns is celebrated across the globe.
Director John Stirling commented, “We’re delighted that ‘AK’s Gin can be enjoyed as part of the ‘Burns Night’ celebrations. Our Dad is an inspiration to us and we wanted to create a gin that reflected his character and our family’s farming roots. He’s farmed all his life and is proud that we are distilling using our family’s own crops and is keen that we share that unique provenance with our Arbikie customers on-going.”
Arbikie has a growing reputation for innovation and field-to-bottle provenance as they grow their ingredients on their estate to ensure traceability. The Viscount variety of wheat used in AK’s comes from the Deils Knapp field, which you can see from the distillery. In 2014, they created the first Scottish Potato Vodka, then launched ‘Kirsty’s Gin’ using locally-foraged botanicals followed by their amazing ‘Chilli Vodka’ distilled using fresh chillies and most recently their ‘Strawberry Vodka’ using home-grown strawberries.