Sloe Gin

I have noticed that many people are preparing their sloe gin.

When I went on a local foraging walk the other day, I discovered that the two trees on Ham Lands had already been harvested!  And last week at Virginia Water there were plenty of chestnuts, but no sloes. (It is a managed woodland.)

As I'm not going to Ireland (where I usually gather sloes) until the first weekend in November I began to feel anxious that they may have all vanished, so decided some pre-emptive action was required.  I did something completely new for me, I ordered sloes from ebay!

To make Sloe Gin I use my Mother-in-Law's recipe.  She taught me how to make it many years ago, and I know my husband loves the fact that it is her Sloe Gin we drink every winter.

Vanessa published a recipe for sloe gin on her blog here, which gives precise measurements and I'm sure is really super.  But I do love the less precise but more interesting recipe  that I follow.

My Mother-In-Law's Sloe Gin

Pick your sloes

Prick each sloe with a darning needle (I use a cocktail stick)

Fill an empty gin bottle a third full of sloes

Add a third of a bottle of sugar

Fill the rest of the bottle with gin

Leave to mature, shaking once or twice a week.

And that's it!

So, if like me, you can't find any sloes you can still make sloe gin, just go to ebay.  They arrived quickly and seem really  sloey.

These will be for Christmas, but as Vanessa started her "Let's make Christmas" with sloe gin, I'll wait and submit something else soon.

I made 5 bottle of sloe gin today

The sloes arrived quickly from a farm in Dorset

Well wrapped

Beautiful and jewel like

I use supermarket gin to make the sloe gin,
but keep empty bottles to fill

Prick each sloe with a needle or stick

A third of sloes

A third of sugar

a third of gin

I keep the bottles in the kitchen for a few hours
as they sometimes need to be topped up as the
ingredients settle

Once filled completely I seal the tops of the bottles with
sticky tape, this stops leaking when they are being shook!