Gin distillery fizzes with plans for home-grown juniper

A Kāpiti distillery is trialling growing juniper berries to bring even more of a home-grown, sustainable vibe to its artisan gin.

Bec Kay and Chris Barber already harvest Wairarapa-grown kawakawa to give their gin a peppery, lemony flavour.

They're now waiting for their small plot of juniper trees to come to fruition, but they're not holding their breath.

Juniper is a key ingredient of gin, and while juniper trees are considered invasive in some parts of the world and threatened in others, they are rare in New Zealand. 

"All our juniper comes from Macedonia or Albania," Barber told Country Life during a visit to their small farm east of Masterton.

"It kind of goes against what we're trying to do."

They are nursing 20 baby juniper trees sourced from a Nelson nursery on a patch of land by the house and are patiently waiting for them to bear fruit.

"It could be up to seven years before they decide whether they're male or female for a start."

"Who knows, we might find juniper loves Wairarapa and it might grow a bit quicker."

But they use up to 150 kilogrammes of the berry a year and Barber realises they'll need a lot more than their trial patch.

The juniper trial, replacing pine trees with natives, trapping pests and sustainably harvesting kawakawa leaves are all part of the couple's plan for their Bond Store brand which focuses on sustainability and community involvement. 

They and their distillery are based at Paraparaumu Beach and they make a two-hour trip to their Wairarapa block - which was once part of the large and historic sheep station Blairlogie - about every three weeks to harvest.

When Country Life visited, Barber was planting more native trees to help hold riverbanks, gouged in the recent cyclone while Kay collected the kawakawa.

"Because we're basically getting employment and a lifestyle from these trees we want to make sure we're looking after them," Kay said.

She picks only the bigger leaves, and sparingly, preferring those which have been nibbled by the looper moth, the only insect not repelled by the plant. 

"Those (leaves) are the good ones. It makes the tree strong as well but also they're obviously probably the tastiest."

The couple have been making gin for about five years now and Kay says she freaked out a bit after steeping the kawakawa the first time. 

The base alcohol came out bright green "like radiator fluid".

But once it goes through her "workhorse" - a hand-made shiny copper still - the pure gin comes out clear and smooth and not too heavy on the juniper, Kay said.

"It took a good six months to get it right. We had some very bad batches."

A former theatre nurse and one of few women distillers in New Zealand, Kay likes process, cleanliness and order in her distillery.

She has an area in the corner for experimenting and coming up with recipes for bespoke gins, sold as fundraisers.

Wild rosehips went into a "Down the Garden Path" gin to raise funds for the Wellington Botanic Garden.

Instead of importing the base alcohol for her gin, Kay uses that derived from whey, a waste product from Fonterra's dairy factory in Reporoa.

"It would be cheaper for us to import it, strangely enough, but we feel the best thing to do is get it from just up the road, using a waste product. It's a good alcohol."

The gin bottles do have to be brought in though, although Kay and Barber are extending the bottles' life through a recycling scheme.

Customers can return their bottles which are twice sanitised before heading back out again to be used ten times over, Kay said.

With the couple's 14-year-old daughter calculating the business' carbon emissions as Chief Sustainability Officer, this distillery appears to be in good hands for the future.

"While it causes some arguments, that's a pretty cool thing to do too," Barber said.