Free sloe gin in return for foraging rights
Posted by Fiona Nevile in Liqueurs | 25 comments
Sloes cost nothing to harvest – here they are on a blackthorn tree
Today, I was in our local shop, chatting to John about home made grog. Having lived in this area all his life he is a wonderful source of local knowledge and has a great fund of stories and reminiscences about the locals, living and dead.
“Aren’t the sloes amazing this year?” John remarked
“Where are these amazing sloes?” My foraging antennae were instantly alert.
“In my garden. They are hanging like bunches of grapes. Perhaps they have spoilt by now.”
Within a nano second I twigged that he wasn’t going to harvest the fruit himself. As he works a seven day week, it was probably a question of time. He would enjoy the novelty of bottle of sloe gin made from his own sloes.
“Do you like sloe gin?” The tone calm. 40 ton air brakes held my growing excitement.
“Of course I do.”
“How about swapping the picking rights in your garden for a bottle of superb grog.”
“Yes please!”
Jalopy and I rumbled over to John’s house after work today. I found the large sprawling blackthorn bush in the corner of his back garden, absolutely laden down with large, juicy black sloes. The nearest road must be 300 yards away and the garden overlooks farmland, so pollution would be minimal. I stood and gazed at this bounty, amazed at my good fortune.
Picking sloes is normally a time consuming and laborious affair. Today, with sloes hanging like small bunches of grapes, I picked for an hour and the resulting bounty weighed in at two kilos! I’ll be back tomorrow with my walking stick. This pulls down the taller branches that are out of reach. The stick transforms me from diminutive smallholder to giant hunter in the foraging stakes.
I will be able to experiment endlessly with the sloe gin recipes on the blog and also make a decent amount of Sloe and Bramley jelly. This is a punchy, versatile jelly, really great with sausages and for pepping up casseroles and sauces. If you are not into fruit liqueurs, our sloe and Bramley jelly is the most useful one in our larder and makes a great present for a foodie.
I might even have enough to try sloe vodka this year.
The moral of this story is to talk. Mention your hedgerow fruit quest at every pertinent opportunity. Keep on enquiring and chatting. Tell people what you are looking for and why. Nobody I know would turn down the prospect of a free bottle of sloe gin, a jar of membrillo, wild plum chutney or bottle of raspberry wine etc. for directions to a new source or an invitation to harvest the fruits in a private garden or estate. John’s sloes may well have rotted in his garden whilst Jalopy and I searched in wider and wider circles for the fruit. Now everyone is happy and sloe wise I am probably the happiest forager in Cambridgeshire tonight.
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i’m trying to domesticate wild sloes, in an arbor set on fence wire. each year the sloes after blooming, returns to a small grape, then turns brown. days later turns black and falls off the vine. the entire crop is lost. can any one refer me to a place on the net where i can find out what am i doing wrong. thanks
oscar
Hi Sam,
Thanks so much for the update on your update!
i think it’s worth experimenting. maybe make a smaller bottle with the shrivelled fruit, as on the one hand it seems a shame to waste the fruit, but on the other hand it’s a crime to waste gin!!
we will keep testing ours and adding sugar if it needs it, but to be truthful, the hedgerow sloes win hands down.
Hi Sam
Yes, it is well worth talking to everyone. So many hedgerow fruits just rot in the hedgerows.
Thanks so much for popping back to share your information on the shrivelled sloes. Now we know that they can be used. Great stuff.
hi, i seem to be leaving posts all over this website!!
i agree with the talking to everyone…. my friend anne and i became firm friend around this time last year, ie after the sloes had all been picked. this year i mentioned that our pickings had been a bit slim, so we went together to a hidden hedge at the back of her house. we picked more than 2kg each and there were more there waiting. unfortunatly she didn’t know that i was looking for blackberries too, so those went over before i could nab them! in exchange for the info i handed over a precious bottle of raspberry gin for her to mature! i wouldn’t have such a good stock if i hadn’t talked to her about it!
as for the shrivelled sloes, we picked and used ours. we did a taste test on the weekend and they are slightly sharper than the hedgerow sloes. we added 50g more sugar and will just keep testing it as it goes along. hope this helps?
Hi Marion,
I’d avoid the shrivelled berries if I were you. When I was picking in September there were shrivelled ones then, they had gone over. It would be a shame to spoil the wine.
Lucky you with your own hedgerows of blackthorn!
Lucky me… On our farm we have about a mile of blackthorns in our hedgerows 🙂
I love sloe gin and this year (someone very kind asked me to look after his wine-making equipment) I want to make sloe wine.
Does anyone know about the shriveled berries? It would make picking a lot faster if I could use those too.
Hi nà ,
Great! Sloe gin is such a treat.
I can’t recommend a book with photos. I’d love to find one too. I use Richard Mabey “Food for Free” – it just has drawings.
how exciting, how exciting! i will be back for more sloes (if there are still any) after the first frost, i’ve now decided! i shall try sloe gin with those ones then!
btw – i’ve been hunting down a good book with good photos (not drawings) of wild berries and fruit (edible and not) to go wandering with – the woods here in italy are full at the moment! can you suggest anything? thanks!
Hi Farming Friends,
I think that it’s the perfect time for picking sloes. We had run out of sloe gin so I made masses last night.
Hi Amanda,
I love your eldest’s comment! I don’t use the shrivelled fruit. There was some shrivelled fruit on John’s hawthorn and I avoided it as there was so much plump perfect fruit to pick. So sorry, I can’t answer your question.