Made some sloe gin at the weekend.

I was on a walk around the countryside surrounding Eastbourne – walked from Polegate to Hankham and then back via Stone Cross.
I was walking up a country lane and saw the largest Sloes I had ever ever seen. This climate change seems to be doing us some amazing favours. The long extended summer this year has obviously meant that the sloe growing season has definitely not been slow. it’ s been long and fast.

I picked as many as I could reach and took them home and used my usual recipe to make up 7 bottles of sloe gin.

Quantities for 7 x 750ml bottles:
4 x 750ml bottles of gin
About a bucket of sloes – or about a mugful per bottle.
About 3 mugs of sugar – granulated or castor – I don’t think it matters.
dash of vanilla essence

Half fill each bottle with sloes – pierce or cut them before they go in the bottle.
cover these with sugar
top up the bottle with gin ( I have also done this with Vodka in the past)
add a drop of Vanilla essence.

Job done!

But over the next few weeks and months try to give each bottle a turn to keep the sugar from settling down to the bottom for too long.

After a year I usually sieve and funnel the flavoured gin into other bottles and it will probably make a lot less than you are expecting but should hopefully still equate to the original 4 x 750ml bottles – although the sloes will have soaked up some of the gin. This is where I usually decide to re-use the gin soaked sloes in a chutney – and then spend the rest of the year spitting out the pips when eating the chutney. If anyone has any better ideas what to do with the gin soaked sloes please let me know.

You don’t have to leave them for a year but a year always works well for me – as that is when I need to use the bottles again for a new batch.

Here are 5 of the 7 bottles. I like to use a big black marker pen to write over the existing labels.

1.    livingofftheland 02.18.12 @ 14:04      

   Hi
   Just discovered how to search by subject on Vegblogs and found your post re sloe gin. Very useful info and good idea re labels. They look great and you don’t have to spend ages trying to get the old ones off – which seem to be attached with superglue these days.
   I’m only in my second year of making sloe gin, so still have a lot to learn. But I have discovered that the marinated sloes are delicious with icecream.

2.    Allotment Diary 04.17.12 @ 08:09      

   Hi. Glad to hear you liked my sloe gin post. I saw the bottles in my shed the other day and got to thinking about the sweet dining to be had soon. I really must decant them into new bottles and make use of the fruit. I like the idea of the sloes with ice cream. I had previously used them in my chutneys but the surprise of finding a sloe stone in your chutney is not a good surprise.

   Lee