Sloe Gin

Known as mothers ruin, gin sure can de ruffle the feathers after a hard day, adding sloes to the gin can add great flavour and is pretty simple to do and makes a lovely drink for Christmas.

We started making our sloe gin back in September as we now are lucky to have a sloe bush or two in the meadow.  We wait till the fruit looks good and plump which is normally around the first frost but with the climate change and it being warmer you can always put these in the freezer instead.

You can prick these and pop them into a bottle of gin and turn every now and then and wait till Christmas to drink it. 

However we start by pricking and popping them in a jar and leaving for a few weeks and then we use or cocktail muddler crush the berries so they are all macerated which gives loads more flavour, a few days before Christmas this is passed through muslin into sterile bottles ready for drinking. 

I have added a second picture below to compare to the top picture so you can see the colour change and only imaging the flavour development.  The top picture is taken 2 weeks of making and only pricking where as the below is muddled and left just before Christmas.