“I’m not a lush though!” she exclaims in the neat kitchen of her home at Acle, between Norwich and Great Yarmouth. “I have just always drunk gin, even when I was going out in the 1990s with friends and they were drinking violently coloured alcopops.”
Then, Sue happily enjoyed the standards of the gin world, like Gordon’s, Bombay Sapphire and Beefeater, but a decade ago the gin world exploded when craft distiller Sipsmith took on the big guns and the law was changed, allowing small players to acquire the base spirits and equipment needed to join the party on a micro-scale.
And so Sue decided to join in as well – not as a commercial player, but just for the fun of it. She bought herself a tiny air still and some botanicals, got herself licensed by HMRC, and started experimenting – effectively turning her little nine-foot-by-nine-foot kitchen into a weekend gin distillery! At the time, she knew nothing about distilling, although she was a keen home cook and loved experimenting with flavours.
This story is from the March 2020 edition of Let's Talk.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the March 2020 edition of Let's Talk.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
STOP ME AND BUY ONE: Nigel's on the way with his 1981 Bedford
It’s something we all recall with delight. “Mum, it’s the ice cream man!” Let’s Talk’s motoring man David Clayton meets someone happy to be the owner of a Bedford ice cream van. Bring on the Strawberry Mivvis, choc ices and 99s ...
Beautiful Hill: Normandy Origin For A Name Meaning
Let’s Talk’s surnames expert Derek Palgrave, from Suffolk, researches three more of our readers’ names, the first of which probably stems from the geographical presence of a beautiful hill.
Words of wisdom about a hobby so many of us love
Let’s Talk’s gardening expert Charlotte Philcox has been trawling through some books to find words of wisdom from so many people about gardening and farming. Here she shares just a few.
Vicki remains so positive despite missing her panto
For actress Vicki Michelle, Christmas usually means performing in panto. But, due the coronavirus pandemic, this year will be different. Vicki speaks to Rachel Banham about her plans for the festive season, her outlook on life and her fond memories of filming in East Anglia.
Two centuries on Thomas would be DELIGHTED WITH HIS SUCCESS
He was a man without sight but with such vision. Derek James remembers Thomas Tawell who died 200 years ago.
TURNING 50
Here at Let’s Talk we recognise that our magazine is targeted at those aged 50 and older. So we hope we are always fair to our readers and to the older generation in general. But it seems many believe other media and businesses do not treat older people in the best way.
THE CHASE COULD BE ON FOR a Norfolk home for Bradley Walsh
He is one of the most popular celebrities on television at the moment. He’s a comedian, singer, actor, personality and probably the best quiz show host doing the rounds. David Clayton looks back to when Bradley Walsh came to Cromer.
The calendar is rolling around to the WINTER SOLSTICE
Claire Manion, of Norfolk-based Broadsky Astrology, looks at how we have always honoured the winter solstice, our shortest day.
PEACE, GOODWILL AND PROSPERITY must surely follow
In view of such uncertainty hanging over the rest of this year – and possibly well beyond – it was hard to come up with a suitable offering for December in his usual style, says Keith Skipper. So, he has decided to settle for a festive story set in 1951, that he wrote some time ago.
Friends
Readers of our short stories don’t have to have long memories to recall work by Anne Maxwell, who had a previous short story entry published in the summer.
