The ultimate sloe gin recipe

It is almost sloe-picking season which is an annual ritual of sorts in my family and has in recent years become a bit of a competition as to who can return home for Christmas with the best tasting batch.

The fruits of the blackthorn (Prunus spinosa) are suddenly looking plump and purply-blue and it should only be a week or so before they can be picked. The sloes should infuse for at least three months so if you start the process in September then the gin will be ready for Christmas.

Harvesting and preparing your fruit

You’ll know the sloes are ready to pick when you squeeze them and they yield slightly to the touch (like a ripe plum).

When harvesting, gloves are a help to avoid getting scratched. Having a bit of antiseptic cream on hand can be useful if you get scratched as a blackthorn wound can become infected. Pick the sloes from bushes that get the most sunshine and pick from the waist upwards remembering to leave some on the bush for wildlife.

Contrary to popular belief there is no need to wait until the first frosts have been to harvest the sloes. The freezer can help you out with that part!

Once you get home, rinse them and pour them into a bag or box and put them in the freezer for a couple of days. This eliminates the need to prick each sloe with a pin and mimics the effect of the first frosts which bring out the sweetness in the fruit and break down the thick skin of the fruit to let the juices infuse into the gin better.

Ingredients

• 500g sloes (rinsed and frozen)

• Approximately 250g golden caster sugar (best to test as you add it)

• One or two crushed almonds (optional - to give it a little marzipan-flavour, without needing to get the bitterness of the flavour of the seeds in the gin)

• 1 litre of gin (it is worth using as nice a gin as possible as cheap gin won’t miraculously taste nice with the addition of fruit and sugar!)
  
  Tools
  A clean kilner jar or two
  A muslin or fine sieve

Directions

• Pour your frozen sloes into the kilner jar(s) and add the gin.

• Add in one or two crushed almonds. The stones of the sloe berries have an natural almond flavour. The sloe (Prunus spinosa) and Almond (Prunus dulcis) are both from the same family of plants.
  An almond flavour be added into the gin by macerating up the berry mixture but the seeds can be bitter, so using an almond can add a slight marzipan flavour without the bitterness.

• Keep it in a dark cupboard and give it a turn and swirl once or twice a week - do this for about three months.

• Strain off the fruit and almonds through a sieve or muslin and put the infused gin back into the kilner jar(s). Add the sugar in and give it a regular swirl two or three times a week to help the sugar dissolve. The wisdom behind adding the sugar in at this later point is that sugar can inhibit the full flavour from being extracted from the sloes. It also means you can taste-test the sweetness and avoid making the mixture too syrupy and cloying.

• After at least another couple more weeks of regular jar-sloshing, your sloe gin is ready to decant into clean sterlised bottles and capped or corked.

Our family festive tradition is to mix sloe gin and prosecco together to make a heady and slightly decadent cocktail.

Bottles of gin make a nice present for friends and the bottles can be stored and used the following year as the flavour tends to improve over time.