Ultimate Summer mocktail & BAX BOTANICS

Read the story behind BAX BOTANICS, ethically sourcing, NO and LOW growth and The Ultimate Summer Mocktail which BAX BOTANICS and VINADA just launched……

Let’s start with the recipe so you can enjoy your lovely mocktail while reading this blog:

BAX BOTANICS

Rose can you tell us how the idea for BAX started?

The story of Bax started when I met Chris: he was a Chef and I a plant expert. We bonded over the beauty of the natural world with me sharing my knowledge of the plants we’d find whilst out walking.

‘They’re all very pretty, but can I eat them?’  Chris asked. A little research later, we found ourselves with a whole new cupboard of ingredients to play with in the kitchen. Nature was inspiring Chris’ cooking in a whole new way.

Then came time to put down some roots, and we bought ourselves a woodland, as you do! Haha. It was in this woodland that we began running outdoor courses to ‘Taste the Wild’. The courses covered foraging & cooking wild plants, all with the aim of inspiring guests to find a deeper connection with nature.

We showed people many ways of harnessing and celebrating the unique flavours of the woodland through both food & drink. It was here, in these first drinks, that the idea for Bax Botanics was born. Guests would always drive to the woodland due to its middle-of-nowhere nature, and so the drinks were inclusively non-alcoholic. We served a range of shrubs, preserves & eventually what became known as non-alc spirits. ‘Can we buy some?’  they asked. We thought… ‘Well, maybe?’ … But if we were going to do this, the ingredients would have to be Ethically sourced at scale. You see, it’s quite hard to scale foraged ingredients, and it can actually be damaging to the natural environment, so that was something we needed to explore.

Ethically sourced organic botanics at scale, can you tell us more about this?

Sure, our production process starts with the raw ingredients, and all the botanicals we use are ethically sourced & organic. We first connected with the natural world through sustainable foraging, but to move into creating our non-alcoholic spirits at scale we needed to make sure to source our botanicals from trusted partners.

The distillery

Once the botanicals arrive at our distillery in Yorkshire, we then blend them together & extract the flavours we want. Each of our spirits have a unique recipe that brings a number of different botanicals together to create the complex & nuanced character we love. Every botanical is distilled in one of our three stills, Ebenezer, Hephzibah & Edith – each named after a family member with a unique connection to what you see as Bax Botanics today!

Filtered, blended and bottled

Once the stills have done their thing, the liquids are collected before filtering, blending & bottling. Filtering is super important in a non-alcoholic spirit to take away any impurities. We then acidify & blend the spirits to ensure they have a good shelf life & of course, taste delicious every time. Each bottle of Bax Botanics is truly created by us, in our distillery before heading out around the world.

What are your thoughts on the growth of NO and LOW and the large number of products in the market?

It’s great for people to have a wide choice of products. Something for all tastes and pockets. I hope that inferior products will disappear quickly, leaving the best in each category. That would be my wish, so that consumers can taste the best on offer and the sector gains more and more respect.

I feel that distributors can help producers and the public by getting behind the best products in the sector and categorising them well for the marketplace. Guidance here would inform buying choices and give people what they are looking for. This is an emerging sector still and there is a way to go. I feel Bax Botanics fits into a sub category of spirits ‘Alcohol-Free Botanicals’ which we are starting to see, certainly in the US.

Can you please, from your expertise explain why this BAX x VINADA summer mocktail is that good?

Ah, flavours are my favourite thing!

Creating a cocktail you need to consider many elements. Imagine a spinning top with bags full of flavour balanced around the edge. These need to be in harmony and not all piled up in a couple of areas. So, if you go herbal, fruity, acidic, earthy: for example, these layers of taste can give the drink complexity and fullness. Of course, the flavours need to work together with texture too, so we think about mouthfeel, smoothness or sparkle as well.…My cocktails are relatively simple and not a patch on the creations of a true mixologist!

The Bax Sea Buckthorn and Vinada Gold were great building blocks. With the unique flavours of Sea Buckthorn, bitter orange and Mediterranean herbs in Bax Botanics and the Vinada Gold adding mellow acidity and bubbles we just needed to choose some richness, earthiness and top notes. This is where raspberries, blackberries and lime juice came in. Sugar was added to adjust the sweetness and the resulting cocktail is gorgeous.