Tides Fortune Fine Gin the riches of the Coast

Landermere Farm Buildings 3A, Landermere Rd, Thorpe-le-Soken CO16 0NH, UK

A warm welcome to East Coast Distillery, our small batch gin distillery in Essex

We’re proud to be able to celebrate the beauty and the character of the Essex Coast.

Our small gin distillery in Essex is located just off of the estuary in Landermere, where the pace of life reflects the time we take to produce every bottle of Gin so that each one brings happiness to the gin lover.

Inspired by the sea – Made by the sea

Tides Fortune Fine Gin the riches of the Coast

Discover the riches of the coast

Tide’s Fortune is crisp with classic
juniper flavours, perfect for any gin lover.

A fragrant juniper nose, citrus piquancy moving into a warming anise flavour and a long, lingering smokiness on the palate.

Tides Fortune Fine Gin the riches of the Coast

The story so far

It began where all good ideas do – over a cup of tea and a chocolate biscuit at the end of a hard day in the office. Whilst we all love our day jobs which span across the public sector, we started to think what else we could do. It had to be something we would all be excited about. An opportunity to be creative, to give something back to the local area and a chance to meet new and interesting people.

After a very fleeting mention of becoming goat farmers, we had our eureka moment – gin!

The next day we started our research and immersed ourselves in every opportunity to learn about distilling and the magical botanicals that make each gin unique. We had lots to learn so we looked for people we could learn from – from master distillers producing beautiful gins already, to experienced foragers and farmers.

Tides Fortune Fine Gin the riches of the Coast

Both the Mann and the Burrows-North households had extensive gin cupboards, so we set about a series of tasting evenings. With each bottle carefully wrapped in newspaper we tasted every single bottle in our cupboards, developing our taste buds and building a picture of what we loved and hoped for in our gin.

That was 2018 and two years later we were delighted to launch our signature gin – Tide’s Fortune.

That was only the beginning. We are super excited to see where our fortune takes us next. Over the coming year we will be adding a small number of limited edition gins and other spirits to our range. Keep in touch to find out more.

Tides Fortune Fine Gin the riches of the Coast

What do we do

Our Gin is distilled in small batches using our still – Monty – the beating heart of the distillery. Monty is a modular still and arrived for us to build to our own design – much like a giant Meccano set! A series of copper bubble plates create cycles of reflux in the column.

From here the vapour travels up and passes through the botanicals held in wire baskets where they are able to impart their natural oils. Finally the vapour condenses and collects to give a long and lingering, yet smooth mouthful with each sip.

Tides Fortune Fine Gin the riches of the Coast

Along with our big boy, Monty, we use two storage tanks – Withnail and Marwood (can you tell what our favourite film is?!) – these allow us to distill in small batches and to develop new recipes. We take our time and do everything by hand, from foraging and picking our local botanicals to filling, labelling and hand stamping each bottle so you can see which one of us got the final job of sealing the bottle with the beautiful neck label.

If you would like to work with us to develop a gin for you – maybe to mark a wedding day or a landmark event for you or your business – then please do get in touch.

Get in Touch

Tides Fortune Fine Gin the riches of the Coast

What goes into our gin

We knew from the very start that we wanted to use some local botanicals, infusing our gin with the fortune of the east coast. But where to begin.

We are lucky that the hedgerows and shoreline around our distillery are rich with wonderful inspiration. For our signature gin – Tide’s Fortune – we knew we wanted to use the amazing Sea Buckthorn which grows wild on the sandy beaches nearby and is also farmed just a stones throw from the distillery. With this as our starting point we created our recipe. Here are some of the botanicals that we use:

Common JuniperThe one essential ingredient of all gin. Without them, a spirit just isn’t gin. It is the juniper berries that give you the slightly green and lightly pine nose and flavour.
Sea BuckthornThis grows along much of the east coast, but beware if you try to pick it. Its barbed wire like branches protect the wonderfully orange juicy berries. The ancient Greeks used the pulp to apply to sunburn but we use it to provide the next wave of flavour – a citrusy sweet undertone.
Sea PurslaneAgain this carpets much of the coastline especially the muddy coastal inlets around north Essex. Its plump silver leaves carpet the area around the distillery. Nicholas Culpeper, the famous 17th century botanist highlighted the interesting properties of sea purslane as having the ability to cool the outrageous Lust of the Body, Venerious Dreams and the like. Whilst we can’t confirm this it does add a lovely minerally layer to the gin, and compliments the heat of some of the more traditional botanicals that you would expect to find in a London Dry Gin.