Guest producer tastings

How/Why did you open your own business?
I’ve had my own bar (Clayton’s Marlow) for ten years now, but the Clayton’s Cocktail business started in lockdown. Tash, my sister and co-founder (who works in drinks branding) was living with us during lockdown and we’ve always spoken about starting a business together. I was going to start selling bottled cocktails from the bar just to survive but my sister took the idea and elevated it into what it is now.

It’s been a steep learning curve for both of us but we think we’re really happy with our progress and very excited about the future.

Is there a particular inspiration behind your cocktails?
It sounds strange but the bar was actually the inspiration. The idea was to provide the experience of the bar in people’s homes. Each cocktail comes with it’s own playlist curated by DJs so as well as having bar-quality drinks at home, people could have the music of the bar as well for which it is renowned.

Do you have a favourite?
I genuinely love them all as I wouldn’t have been able to create them (and keep making them) and  then sell them to people if I didn’t, but the one that I could maybe call my favourite would be the It’s A London Thing. It’s fresh, zingy and a bit too easy to drink.

It’s a warm summers day – what is your go to drink?
I would definitely go for our new Pampelita cocktail. It’s a twist on a classic margarita adding ruby red grapefruit aperitif. Accompanied by the playlist it really does transport you to a tropical place.

You mentioned using your cocktails with desserts, please can you tell us your favourite way of doing this.
Two of my favourite things are coffee and ice cream so an affogato is a perfect dessert for me. We’ve taken it to another level by substituting the espresso shot with our espresso martini, drizzling the shaken cocktail over the ice cream.

How/Why did you open your own business?
We moved out of London with our family in 2018 to Long Crendon in Buckinghamshire and immediately felt inspired by our new life in the countryside, we absolutely loved village life from the get-go. Inspired by our move and new zest for life, our talk soon turned to starting our own business together as a wife and husband team, which had always been a long-held dream of ours. We have always loved spirits and cocktails (we even met each other in a bar…ha ha!) and it seemed like a obvious choice for us to start a spirits brand.

Is there a particular inspiration behind your product?
After making this momentous decision to start our own business within the spirits industry, we decided that rum was going to be our first product. Back in 2018, the choices of rum were very limited and those that were readily available looked extremely dated. We started tasting rums and found them to be very harsh and not as beautiful to drink as we would have liked, needing a mixer to make many of them palatable. That was our sort of lightbulb moment, let’s create a rum that is so beautifully smooth it can be drunk on the rocks with no mixer. So fast forward a couple of years of planning, creating, designing…followed by a period of abandoning our idea, then living through a pandemic (which reignited the dream)…here we are today with Rockfall Rum.

Do you have a favourite within your range?
We launched our brand in November 2020 and have spent the year focusing on our hero product which is Rockfall Rum, a botanical spiced rum which we sell 70cl, 20cl and a smaller 5cl sizes. We have lots of future plans for new products so do ask us this time next year.

It’s a warm summers day – what is your go to drink?
This is so tricky, and I’m going to have to say two of my favourite cocktails…rum based obviously. It has to be either a Mojito or a Pina Colada, both of which remind me of summer holidays on the beach, or by the pool, such happy and chilled out times. I love the fresh and minty clean taste of a Mojito but equally love the indulgent creaminess of a Pina Colada. Both taste like heaven, particularly when made with spiced rum for an extra flavour dimension…ideally Rockfall.