The ultimate guide to making your own sloe gin

Sloe gin is a staple of the shooting season (disclaimer: guns and booze are not happy bedfellows, so we urge you to abstain until the day's activities are concluded), and many a countryman or woman enjoys the process of harvesting their own fruit and concocting their own homemade sloe gin.

Like many traditional rural activities, the making of sloe gin is wrapped in folklore, myth and confusing "rules", so here's our difinitive guide to making your own sloe gin, plus a basic recipe and a few more adventurous versions to try. Let's start with the basics.

Where can you find sloes

Sloes are the fruit of a shrubby tree called blackthorn (Prunus spinosa). Blackthorn was and is a popular hedging plant, its spines helping to keep livestock in. This means that finding sloes in the countryside is usually pretty straightforward. You will likely spot the dusty purple fruit start to appear in the late summer, and they will be become more obvious as the autumn begins and the leaves start to drop.

However, many a seasoned sloe gin maker will pay particular attention to the hedgerows in the early spring. Blackthorn is one of the earliest to flower, with the clouds of white blossom appearing before the leaves have sprouted. This means you can identify promising patches early in the year. Once you've found a good spot, make sure you remember it for years to come, and, importantly, don't tell anyone!

What kit do you need for harvesting sloes?

Not much really, is the short answer. I tend to take pocketful of strong carrier bags or occasionally a bucket, but you may also want to take a pair of stoutish gloves, since the thorns can be a bit fierce. It is important that these aren't too chunky, however, since the fruits are quite small, you need a certain amount of dexterity.

When should you pick sloes

This is a bit of a foxy one, and its where folklore bumps into science. The commonly sited 'rule' is that you should delay harvesting sloes until after the first frost. Some say this 'sets' the sugars in the fruit resulting in a sweeter berry, but that's not scientific. What is true, however, is that the longer you can let the fruit sit on the branch, the sweeter it will be as the fruit ripens.

However, in today's warming climate, the first frost may not be until later in the year than it once was, so by the time Jack Frost has been to work the crop may have been severely depleted by the birds or other sloe-gatherers. There is some evidence that a frost helps to weaken the skins, speeding up the speeding process, but this can be artifcically achieved - more on that later. Do make sure the fruit is actually ripe before you pick them - they should be fairly easy to squish between your fingers. Fruit that is too hard will result in a very tart end product. I usually pick my sloes around the middle of October.

How many sloes should you pick

I'll share my basic recipe later, but there are two basic rules that I follow when picking sloes. The first is that you can never have too many sloes. Being a wild crop, the quantities and quality of the fruit is very much at the mercy of the weather, and it always pays to have a bit of a stash in case of a bad year.  What's more, it is often said that sloe gin (or other liqueurs) improve with age, like wine, so making a few extra bottles to tuck away somewhere could result in a 'vintage'. On one episode of The GunsOnPegs Podcast our guest Gerwyn Jones was drinking a ten year old sloe gin made by his mother, which sounded amazing. I, however, have never made enough that I've been able to lay any down - unaccountably it all seems to have been drunk by the end of January, so I would advise that if you plan to do this, you hide a few bottles somewhere and hope that you forget about them.

The second rule is something of a caveat to the first rule, and it is this: don't be greedy. When foraging it is advisable to think in thirds: a third for you, a third for the birds and beasties, and a third to allow the plant to continue to thrive. Don't strip a particular spot bare of fruit, but rather try to harvest from a variety of different places should you need more fruit.

What to do with the sloes when you get them home

If you're anything like me, your bag of harvested sloes will also contain leaves, twigs, various creepy crawlies and other detritus. You'll want to remove all of this  and then wash the fruit to get rid of the last few bits. The next step in the sloe gin making process depends on how much patience you have, and how strictly you want to adhere to tradition. In order to speed along the steeping process (the extraction of the juice) it is necessary to split or at least thin the skins of the sloes. Tradition states that you should prick or pierce each individual fruit with either a silver pin, or a thorn taken from the same tree as the fruit.

Personally, I don't have the time or inclination to do this, so I prefer to shove them in a freezer bag and pop them in the freezer. This has the advantage of meaning that you don't have to make the gin the same day as you harvest.  Once they have been frozen, you can move on to making the sloe gin.

Sloe gin making equipment

A brewing container - this could be simply a bottle, although many like to use a kilner jar, as the wide top makes it easier to get the fruit in, or something larger like a lidded bucket for larger batches. Beware of the 5L Kilner Jars with a tap at the bottom. These look like a good plan, but the tap's opening is just the right size to be plugged by a sloe, so getting the final brew out of the jar can be a real pain.

Bottles for the final bottling - you can simply recycle the gin bottles that you use to make the sloe gin, but I have aquired a few plain glass bottles with swing-top lids or cork stoppers over the years, which allows me to label the bottles. 

A basic Sloe Gin recipe

Lots of the recipes for sloe gin that you'll find on the internet will tell you to use specific quantitites of the fruit, but because the fruit varies from year to year in terms of sugar content, I find that doing things by eye delivers better results. Plus, it adds a certain random element into the process that is I find fits better with the traditional side of sloe gin making - alchemy, not science.

Ingredients:

• Sloes
• Granulated sugar
• Gin - NB, although Sipsmiths claim that you shouldn't use cheap gin for this, they would say that, wouldn't they.

Equipment

• Large open-necked container - sterilised
• Collander or sieve
• Funnel
• Muslin or coffee filter
• Bottles for bottling - sterilised

Method:

• Fill your container to about a third full with sloes (if you have frozen them, don't defrost them first, or they will discolour)
• Cover the sloes with sugar, giving the container a gentle shake to ensure that the gaps between the fruit are filled.
• Fill the container with gin.
• Put the lid on and give it a bloody good shake, until the gin turns pink.
• Place the container in a dark place.
• Shake the container for about 30s every day for the first week, then once a week for the next three, then once a fortnight until three months has passed or until all the sugar has dissolved, if it hasn't after three months.
• After three months, the sloe gin will be ready to drink, though I recently found a kilner jar that I had started at least a year ago that still had the sloes in it. It has produced a very dark drink with far greater depth of flavour. Leaving the sloes in for six or even 12 months also brings out the almond flavour of the sloe's stones. 
• When you're ready to strain out the sloes, I find that putting a collander or sieve over a big mixing bowl or bucket is the least messy way to do this. Once you have your sloe-free liquid, you can then use your funnel to fill your bottles. I often filter the liquid through a scrap of muslin or a coffee filter to remove the smaller pieces of flotsam. At this point it is a good idea to have a sample, to establish whether the sugar content is right.
• To correct a lack of sweetness, simply add a few teaspoons of sugar and shake until it has dissolved, or make a sugar syrup by heating the sugar in a small amount of water and adding this to the bottle.
• To correct too much sweetness, try adding a small amount of lemon juice.
• Seal the bottles, and label them - this helps you to know when the brew was made when you come to drink it. I now try to avoid cracking into mine the moment it is ready (apart from an important sample when bottling), as I think the drink continues to improve over time in the bottle, so I try not to open them until the start of the next shooting season 

This general process can be used with any kind of fruit, or, indeed any kind of spririt, with adjustments to the steeping time and quantity of sugar used to account for the juiciness and sweetness of the fruit in question. Other popular brews include Sloe Vodka, Damson Gin or Vodka, Bullace (a kind of wild plum) Gin or Vodka. Damson brews have a deep purple final colour. Here are a couple of other recipes to try.

Chris’s Sloe Whisky Recipe

Fill a demijohn up to a quarter with sloes, no need to prick or freeze them, get some long kebab squewers and stab them through the lid of the demijohn, this is the quick way of not pricking each individual one. Fill up to half with sugar (I know it’s lots, but I like it sweet and tastes great). Fill to the brim with Whisky. Leave it for 3 months but turn regularly before trying. I accidentally left some for 5 years and found it last year, it was fantastic!

The Cottage Smallholder's –Wild Damson Gin Recipe

Wild damsons are hard to find. For every thirty wild plum trees there may be just one wild damson tree. When I spot wild damsons in the hedgerows, they are harvested into a special bag. These, and the diminutive bullace, are the kings of hedgerow fruit. These tiny fruit make such an irresistible liqueur that overnight guests have actually turned down cooked breakfast, and gone back to bed to sleep off the excesses of the night before.

Our damson and sloe gin is not the thick ultra sweet variety. We prefer the sugar to enhance rather than shield the flavour. Every three months or so it’s sampled and, if necessary, topped up with sugar. Usually no extra sugar is needed. We try to keep our damson and sloe gin well away from the drinks tray! Each year we make a lot of fruit gin and vodka (more recipes to follow, in time). Sloe gin is the big craze at the moment around here, as sloes are more plentiful. Here are our recipes for both. We are also starting experimenting with sloe gin see this post for details.

Wild Damson Gin Recipe:

Ingredients:

• 1lb/454gm of washed wild damsons
• 6 ozs/168gm of white granulated sugar
• 5cl bottle of medium quality gin
• Sterilised 1 litre (at least) Le Parfait jar or wide necked bottle with stopper/cork

Method:

• Wash damsons well and discard any bad or bruised fruit. Prick fruit several times with a fork and place damsons in either a large Kilner/Le Parfait jar or a wide necked 1 litre bottle.
• Using a funnel, add the sugar and top up with gin to the rim.
• Shake every day until the sugar is dissolved and then store in a cool, dark place until you can resist it no longer (leave for at least three months, we usually let it mature for a year). If you are planning to drink this after 3 months, have a nip afetr a month, and top up with sugar to taste.
• Some people strain the grog (through muslin/jelly bag) after 3 months and bottle it, leaving it mature for six months. We strain and bottle after a year. Don’t leave the straining process any longer than a year; leaving the fruit in too long can spoil the liqueur, as we found to our cost one year.

The Cottage Smallholder's liqueur making tips and tricks

• Make more than you need the first year, so you can compare different vintages. This liqueur does improve over time.
• Some people drain the grog through muslin after a couple of months, to clarify the liqueur and bottle. We don’t bother as one old soak tipped that, once the gin is drunk, you can pour medium sherry on the fruit and start all over again! The latter is devilish and drinkable within three months.
• Keep your fruit gin away from the light as this will maintain the colour. Unless it is in a dark green or brown bottle. Wrapping it in brown parcel paper will keep out the light.
• Make notes on a label of your fruit gin/vodka /sugar ratio and stick it onto the bottle(s) so that you have a record, if you make a particularly good batch. We note our responses as the grog matures. Yucky after sixth months can be to die for in a year (you will probably not remember without notes). Notes seem boring when you are making the grog but they are so worthwhile when you start again the next year. It won’t be long before you will get a feel of what works well for your taste (and the notes will come into their own).
• Adding almond essence to sloe gin lifts it from good to great. 
• Don’t kill the liqueur with too much sugar at the start. Use the amount above to start your sloe or damson gin and then every couple of months take a tiny sip. At this time add more sugar if it is too sharp for your taste.
• Gin v Vodka? Vodka can be used as the spirit for these recipes. Although I’m a vodka drinker, we tend to stick to a gin base for our fruit liqueurs.
• A good damson gin can be made from ordinary damsons available in the shops. As they are bigger you would need to put them into a larger Le Parfait jar (I’d use a 2 litre size).
• People have been picking sloes from September 1st around here. Some people say that you shouldn’t pick sloes until after the first frost. This can be circumvented by putting your sloes in the freezer overnight. We don’t bother with either method and always have great results.
• This year we have made up a number of small (1lb honey jars) of sloe gin to give as Christmas presents.