Did you know that in the Dutch army, when an officer has served the military for 15 years, he will receive an officers cross, which is also known as the “jenever cross”. This is because when the officers receive the cross, they also receive a glass of Jenever.
Jenever and Gin have an intertwined relationship. While Jenever is often overlooked, it is also credited to be the “grandmother” of Gin. These days however, Jenever is officially a subcategory that is classified as “juniper flavoured spirit drinks''. Jenever is often served in a classic “tulip” glass along with a beer. This combination is called a “kopstootje” which translates to “headbutt”
Jenever is also described as Genever or Genievre. Together with Belgium, certain parts of France (the departments Nord and Pas de Calais) and certain parts of Germany (Nordrhein-Westfalen and Niedersachsen) The Netherlands have a controlled designation of origin on these product names.. It is therefore not allowed to make a juniper flavoured spirit outside of these specific areas, and label it as Jenever.
Jenever is a clear spirit and can range from fully transparent to an amber colour, depending on the amount of time the product has aged and which ingredients are used.
In the base, Jenever are two spirits blended together: Maltwine, which is a grain spirit (often a mixture of corn and rye and sometimes made with malted barley) in a copper pot still and has a minimum ABV of 46%. Before Maltwine is obtained, three distillations need to take place, whereas the first and the second distillation are called “ruwnat” and “enkelnat” and only the third distillation,“bestnat”, can be used as Maltwine. This Maltwine only makes up for a small amount of the Jenever though. The largest part is a neutral spirit (watch our videos about distillation and vodka for more details on this) Which is then (very similar to gin) redistilled with a mixture of botanical extracts. Juniper berries are always present but are often complemented with coriander, orris root, caraway seeds, liquorice and angelica. Unlike Gin, the juniper berries do not have to predominate.
After the maltwine and the redistilled spirit are blended together. The two main categories of Jenever are “old jenever” and “young jenever” This has nothing to do with ageing, but with the blend. Young jenever only contains between 1.5% and 15% of malt wine , while old genever has to contain more than 15% of Maltwine. Young Jenever can contain a maximum of 10 grams of sugar per litre, while Old Jenever can contain a maximum 20 grams of sugar per litre. Both jenevers have to be 35% ABV.
Other subcategories are aged genevers, which are always aged old jenevers, fruit jenevers, 100 percent grain jenevers, malt wine genevers with a 100% malt wine and “korenwijn” However, this last grainwine does not fall under the same protection of the controlled designation of origin. We will explain more about these subcategories in future videos.
In many countries, folks are proud of their local spirit, and domestic consumption tends to be high. Jenever has been falling behind in that sense. For example, in 2017 China produced over 17 billion litres of their domestic spirit: Baijiu. This makes up over 90% of the market share of spirits consumed in China while meanwhile Jenever only made up 7,8 % of the consumption of spirits in 2022 the Netherlands.
The last decade however, several Jenever brands and special initiatives have been working hard to increase the popularity of Jenever amongst Dutch consumers. This, combined with the trend of consumers seeking for more authentic and local products could mean that Jenever has a chance to regain some of its former glory!