12 Little-Known Facts About The Gin And Tonic

For what seems like a simple drink, the facts about gin and tonic are more complex than you might think. The components of this legendary cocktail, in themselves, are quite interesting. When you put gin and tonic together, you have a great drink, but how did they get together in the first place, and what secrets are they holding that you likely didn't know about? Well, we dug deep into the history of the cocktail and its components to find out. It turns out that even what we thought we knew about the history of gin and tonic may be a little different from reality.

Once you learn more about gin and tonics, you're probably going to want to investigate further to upgrade your classic version with something other than plain tonic, unimpressive gin, and a lime slice. There are way more variants of this classic than you likely ever knew. Also, the history of how the drink came to be is quite fascinating. So, come along while we delve into the world of gin and tonic, and learn a few new facts about this time-honored drink.

A Flemish chemist and doctor from the 1600s named Franciscus Sylvius created genever, a drink we mainly considered to be gin's precursor. He initially prescribed it as a medicinal elixir for a variety of ailments. People drank genever to get rid of their heartburn and relieve the symptoms of gout. Plus, it seemed to help with gallstones. Genever was originally a brandy made from rye or barley, but it was flavored with juniper berries. As some contemporary gin is made from barley and rye, we can say that the spirits are not totally different, and genever did inspire the invention of gin as we know it.

The soldiers who had fought in 17th-century Holland during the Thirty Years' War brought their love for genever back to England. During the war, they called the drink "Dutch courage" as it allegedly gave them strength, calmed them down, and helped with certain ailments. Around that time, England passed the laws to limit the import of French brandy and ended the distiller's monopoly, which caused people to start making their own genever. Eventually, the name was shortened to gin, and England soon fell in love with the drink. 

Just like in Flanders, juniper was often used to cover up the low-quality distillation, but people were no longer using it as a health elixir. As it was cheap to produce, vendors could easily sell it to the masses who were mostly enjoying it due to its alcohol content. 

As the name suggests, tonic water was created as an elixir in the 1850s, just as gin. If you buy Schweppes Tonic Water, you're buying one of the first versions of tonic water that existed. The tonic water that Johann Jacob Schweppe first produced in the 1870s had 30 milligrams of quinine per pint.

According to legend, the power of quinine against malaria was discovered after a person from the Andean culture drank stagnant, bitter water while fighting a fever in the forest. After the fever went away, the community started using the bark of the Cinchona tree, which grew around the water and made it bitter, to treat fevers. This tree produces bitter quinine to ward off hungry insects. Although there are some reasons why this story is suspicious, the written history of the use of quinine to treat malaria dates back to the early 1600s, even before anyone realized that a parasite (Plasmodium falciparum) in mosquitoes caused the illness.

Schweppes tonic water featured a bitter flavor from the quinine. Plus, with quinine being known as an anti-malarial, there was certainly the hope it might have some medicinal qualities, too.

The gin and tonics people eventually started drinking most likely originated with the idea of mixing bitter, medicinal doses of quinine with alcohol to make them taste better. Gin wasn't the only option, with people sometimes using wine or other alcoholic drinks. Before there was gin and tonic, there was a drink made simply with gin, sugar, and quinine. There was a Scottish doctor prescribing a drink made of gin infused with Cinchona tree bark, snakeroot (a toxic root once prescribed for fevers and other ailments), and orange peel for flavoring. During the U.S. Civil War, doctors were suggesting a mixture of quinine and whiskey.

With the known antimalarial medicinal qualities of the quinine, the British Army and the British East India Company eventually encouraged drinking gins and tonics. After all, the effects of quinine only last for a few hours at a time, and it's certainly easier to remember to take your medicine when it's in a pleasant drink than bitter-tasting quinine pills. Winston Churchill once said, "Gin and tonic has saved more Englishmen's lives, and minds than all the doctors of the Empire" (via Le Infezioni in Medicina). But, from what we know today, this wasn't entirely true.

Yes, tonic water contains quinine, but it turns out that you'd have to drink buckets of it to equal the amount of quinine needed to fight off malaria. So, all those gins and tonics people were drinking to ward off malarial fevers might not have worked at all.

While Johann Jacob Schweppe likely meant well when he introduced tonic water to the world, the amount of quinine that he put in his tonic water (30 milligrams per pint) wasn't sufficient to treat malaria. According to the Mayo Clinic, the actual dosage of quinine necessary to treat malaria in adults is actually 648 milligrams every eight hours for a whole week.

Let's put that dosage of quinine necessary to treat malaria into perspective. To be effective, you'd have to consume 21.6 pints of Schweppes original tonic water every 8 hours, which would come out to 64.8 pints per day. Even without adding gin, Healthline reports that you can start experiencing water intoxication after drinking around 6.3 to 8.4 pints of water. So, drinking that many pints of tonic water is not recommended and could endanger your health. Today's Schweppes tonic water has only slightly more quinine than it once had: around 32 milliliters per pint. There are quite a number of tonic water brands, but none have anywhere near enough quinine to be effective against malaria. So, the quinine in tonic water is a mere bitter flavoring agent rather than medicinally significant.

Interestingly enough, you can tell how much quinine is in your gin and tonic by placing it under a black light. So, if you've ever been in a dark bar or nightclub and seen people with glowing drinks, they were probably drinking a gin and tonic.

So, what makes a gin and tonic glow? It turns out that it's not the gin but the tonic water that's glowing. And the culprit is the quinine. When the quinine in your tonic water absorbs ultraviolet light, it emits a glow that is visible under a black light. The more diluted the drink, the less it will glow. So, your drink might start out shining brightly but dim as the ice melts. Something else to note is that the more quinine is in your tonic water, the more brightly the drink will glow. So, you could potentially guess which tonic water brand might be more or less bitter by being that weird person who brings a black light to the store with you.

We don't known when people started drinking gin and tonics as a full-fledged cocktail. As previously mentioned, tonic water first hit the scene in the 1850s, but the first written account of gin and tonic as a drink didn't show up until 1868. So, there's a slight time lag between the creation of tonic water and us being sure people were adding gin to it.

We first find mention of the drink in Oriental Sporting Magazine, which was an English-language magazine printed monthly in Calcutta at the time. By then, the drink was obviously popular enough not to require any explanation when the author talked about it being available at the end of a horse race in what is now Pakistan. As it seems, the vendors were yelling out names of drinks they had available for sale, and one was a gin and tonic.

One of the perils sailors once faced after being out to sea for months on end was developing scurvy. Since they tended to subsist on fish and dried salted foods that could last through long journeys, the sailors weren't getting vitamin C from fresh foods as they would on land. Once British Navy realized what was causing scurvy, citrus fruit were sent with seamen on these long voyages in the 1700s.

Of course, citrus fruits don't last indefinitely. So, it was helpful for British military doctors to find another way to offer Vitamin C beyond fresh citrus fruit. The idea that the doctors eventually landed on was to have the seamen drink tonic water infused with lemon or lime peels. With tonic water being bitter on its own, the men often added gin and other alcoholic beverages to make them easier to drink, and one of those was gin and tonic. So, maybe gin and tonics didn't save lives so much when it came to malaria, but those made with citrus-infused tonic water were certainly helpful to combat scurvy.

With so many brands of gin and so many brands of tonic water out there these days, it can be tricky to know which ones to put together. However, there's one big tip that can help you match gin with tonic with fairly accurate results, and it makes a lot of sense once you think about it. The trick is to pair old-style gins with old-style tonic waters and new-style gins with new-style tonic waters.

For years, when you'd go to the liquor store, the gin section was mainly filled with classic gins, like Tanqueray, Bombay, and Beefeater. These no-frills brands have stood the test of time and pair well with the popular brands of tonic water like Schweppes. We've found that classics like Seagram's Lime Twisted Gin works fine with these tonics, too. Basically, you want to pair classic flavors together. If the tonic water is simply quinine flavored with a bit of citric acid and sweetener, you know it's going to work with old-school gins.

The pairings get tricky when you start incorporating new gin flavors and craft tonic waters. Here, we are talking about innovative tonic water flavors such as Elderflower Tonic Water from Fever-Tree that's perfect for gin and tonic and has even topped the list of best Fever-Tree mixers. Essentially, tonic waters such as this one would probably work better in craft gins, and you can even try to pair them with sipping gins.

If you've been stuck in a rut using the same type of gin because it's the only one you're familiar with, you've not yet experienced the full depths of what a gin and tonic can be. There are plenty of new craft gins and tonics that go beyond the juniper and lime and provide various combination of flavors that you can then use in your cocktails. To start with, it's important to understand the different gin styles and their flavor profiles to learn what character your gin and tonic could have.

Some of the most popular styles of gin are London dry, Plymouth, Old Tom, and new Western dry. London dry gins are classic, unsweetened, high-quality gins. These juniper-forward gins are light, and producers add all the botanicals during distillation, none of which can be synthetic. Today, you can only get Plymouth-style gin from the Plymouth Distillery in Plymouth, England. It's similar but lighter than London dry gins and has a lot of citrus flavors, with an earthier and sweeter nuances. If you're used to London dry gins, Old Tom gins might surprise you because they're sweeter and maltier. Plus, they're aged in oak barrels, so they tend to remind people of whiskey. Meanwhile, new Western dry gins are unsweetened gins that focus on a variety of botanical flavors rather than juniper. So, by trying a different style of gin in your gin and tonic, you can end up with an entirely different flavor profile.

Grabbing a random brand of tonic water from the shelf without bothering to read the label is a thing of the past. If you want the best gin and tonic and want it on your own terms, you'll need to label-read a bit.

Just like with gin, the flavor of your tonic water is going to be important. So, you'll want to note if it's a classic one or if it's infused with citrus notes or botanicals because you don't want something that will clash with your gin. For example, if your gin has cinnamon and your tonic water has rosemary, it's probably not going to be a match. Another thing to note is how much quinine it has. If you like the bitterness quinine adds to a gin and tonic, then, by all means, go for one with a lot of quinine. The type of sweetener and the total amount of sugar your tonic water has is likely also going to be important to you. Accidentally grabbing a diet one can ruin your cocktail if you don't care for the flavor of artificial sweeteners. Also, many people prefer drinks sweetened with high fructose corn syrup versus real sugar, while some are picky about the amount of sugar. Another important element may be the level of carbonation. If you like a lot of fizz, you might check some reviews before settling on a brand.

Gin and tonic might not be Spanish, but the Spanish have perfected it. There are several qualities that make Spanish gin and tonics better: high-quality tonic water, ice, advanced technique, and the serving glass.

Ingredients are part of the secret to a great gin and tonic. You won't find low-quality tonic water in Spanish versions. Unlike in the U.S., where it can sometimes be a challenge to find tonic water without high fructose corn syrup, Spanish tonic water typically uses real sugar. The drinks are also super cold, with large ice cubes that won't melt too quickly and water down the cocktail before you have a chance to finish it. Plus, a Spanish-style gin and tonic isn't likely to have just a lonely lime slice added as an afterthought. Instead, it's going to contain add-ins like bitters and fun garnishes like citrus slices, herbs, fruit, and spices.

The technique also matters. Whipping up a gin and tonic in Spain is a complex and long ritual, with different bartenders developing different techniques. For example, the bartender might start with a chilled glass, do a gentle pour of the tonic water to keep it as fizzy as possible, or glide citrus around the glass rim to coat it in citrus oils. Spanish bartenders also serve gin and tonics in bulbous cabernet glasses to provide more surface area that allows you to experience all the lovely aromas of the drink.

With so many styles of gins, it can be a challenge to decide what type of garnish goes best with your gin and tonic. However, once you figure out what goes with what, you can elevate your drinking experience.

There are lots of great gin brands, but the trick is to note the dominant flavor of your favorite label. Then, choose a garnish upgrade that complements or enhances it. For classic juniper-forward gins, citrus and juniper berries bring out the best in them. Citrus-flavored gins pair well with licorice notes and fresh herbs. To create a licorice note, try adding star anise, and to introduce a herbaceous profile, consider mint or lemon thyme with citrus-forward gins, but if you want something more prominent, choose bergamot or basil. If you choose a gin with spicy notes like cinnamon, match it with oranges or complementary spices such as ginger, cinnamon, and peppercorns. If you've stumbled upon a floral-forward gin like an elderflower one, match it with other floral nuances, zesty herbs, or tart ingredients. Rose petals, chamomile, lavender sprigs, and rosemary make excellent choices for floral gins, as do tart ingredients like apples and rhubarb. Fruity gins pair with tart fruit, heat, and strong herbal notes. So, try adding ingredients like tart berries or pomegranate arils, spicy ingredients like chili peppers and black pepper, or strong herbs like basil to these gins.