Deaths Door Gin (700ml)

Washington Island was once known for potato farming. Its “spuds” made their way around the world and were celebrated for their quality and flavour. Then in the early 1970s, vertical integration left Washington Island farmers without contracts. Without customers, they switched to other jobs that were either more tourism-based, or else they moved off the island to find work.

In 2005, a small group of like-minded people began reinvigorating the island's agriculture. Armed with enough seeds & know-how to plant five acres, brothers Tom and Ken Koyen began growing wheat. What started as grain to use as flour at the Washington Island Hotel grew into a select specialty for use in Capital Brewery’s Island Wheat Ale and all of Death’s Door distillery spirits.

This is a classic London Dry style, but with a surprisingly simple botanical mix of organic juniper, coriander and fennel. Like Death's Door vodka, it employs a base of organic Washington Island wheat and organic malted barley from Chilton, Wisconsin.

In case you're wondering, the distillery's peculiar name refers to the body of water between Door County Peninsula and Washington Island. Potowatami and Winnebego tribesmen originally coined the waterway.