Two recipes: Wild Damson Gin and Sloe Gin recipes
Posted by Fiona Nevile in Liqueurs | 713 comments
Wild damsons are a beautiful rich dark colour
Unlike sloes, 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 Danny’s famous 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
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. We have a recipe for this in our wine and gin section.
- 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. I haven’t tried this with the damson gin but return in a years’ time for our review.
- 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.
| Wild Damson Gin and sloe gin Recipes |
Recipe Type: Liqueurs
Prep time: 15 mins
Total time: 15 mins
Ingredients
- Wild damson gin:
- 1lb/454gm of washed wild damsons
- 6 ozs/168gm of white granulated sugar
- 75cl bottle of medium quality gin
- Sterilised 1 litre (at least) Le Parfait jar or wide necked bottle with stopper/cork
- Sloe Gin:
- 1lb/454gm of washed sloes
- 4 ozs/112gm of white granulated sugar
- 75cl bottle of medium quality gin
- Sterilised 1 litre (at least) Le Parfait jar or wide necked bottle
- 1-2 drops of almond essence
Instructions
- Wild damson gin:
- 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.
- Sloe gin:
- Wash sloes well and discard any bruised or rotten fruit. Prick fruit several times with a fork and place sloes in either a large Kilner/Le Parfait jar or a wide necked 1 litre bottle. I put several sloes in my palm to prick them rather than picking them up one by one.
- Using a funnel, add the sugar and top up with gin to the rim. Always open sugar bags over the sink as sugar tends to get caught in the folds at the top of the bag.
- Add the almond essence.
- 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).
- 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.
Leave a reply
Great recipes thanks. We’ve been making sloe gin for a few years now with sloes collected from the nearby park, albeit with a few strange looks from passers by. We never prick the sloes (too fiddly) but open freeze them and pack them in 1lb bags ready for use. We always add a few drops of almond essence as per most receipes so it was interesting to note that other people do as well. Hopefully this year will be a better year for sloes as last year was a disaster.
We’ve picked quite a few wild damsons in the park so we will definitely be trying out your damson gin recipe and if we’re still standing will report back.
Thanks.
Hi everyone glad I’ve come across this site. I have been thinking about doing flavoured spirits for a while, can anyone tell me if all the recipes work using white rum, also someone told me I could put the fruit in the freezer instead of pricking
Hi Glenda
If you leave the sloes spread out on a plate for a few days they will slowly ripen (we do this with blueberries).
Then pop them in the freezer for a day to replicate a hard frost. Then you are ready to go.
I’ve just been give about 1kg of sloes I HOPE to make sloe gin! But, having just read that they should still be on the bush until after the first frost! Can I still use them? They are a greenish purple colour, so perhaps not ripe and no good!
HELP!!!!
Many thanks Pete. I will let you know how it goes.
Hello Roger
I never cook the fruit for liqueurs I think that it would dull the flavour.
Hello Pete
Thanks for this! I still have some rhubarb in the garden so I think that I’ll give your recipe a go.
Roger
Don’t bother cooking the rhubarb.
I did select the most pink/red bits to give a good colour to the product, but otherwise, it’s just a matter of chopping it up and mixing in the sugar and vodka. Enjoy after 2-3 months.
Hi, I have been busy making various sloe/blackberry/redcurrant gin and vodka for the first time last autumn, with mixed results. I’m keen to make rhubarb gin or vodka but I’m unable to find a recipe. I saw a comment from Pete last year but one key point was missing – it may sound stupid but do you cook the rhubarb first to soften it or use it as it comes. Any experience with this?
The deal with the stills is that anybody can buy, fairly cheaply, a licence that allows them to distill up to 50 liters of spirits at one of these “official” distilleries. You have to pay for the fuel (previously you brought the wood to fire the still, now they are mainly gas fired), plus a small charge for the use, related to how much you distill.
The stills typically hold 2-3,000 liters, and the liquor is run through twice, with water added in after the first pass to bring it back to the original volume.
Most of what is produced is what they call “mixed fruit” palinka. Which is to say, you take all the windfalls and all the spoiled / wormed / scabbed fruit of whatever sort you have in your garden and throw it into plastic drums (50 or 100 liters) throughout the growing season. When the drum is about full, you top up with water and cover. They sit in the open, warmed by the sun and the fruit ferments.
In the late autumn, you load up your drums and take them to the still. The average “take” is about 7 – 8 liters per 100 liter input, so 6-700 liters of spoiled fruit will take you to the limit of your licence.
Making a single fruit palinka is more complicated, because you have to have enough fruit to fill the still. My partner’s father has a fair number of plum trees, and in a good year he can easily exceed 2,000 liters. So he gets a licence for himself, his wife, his daughter (my partner), his son, and me…and he’s good for 250 liters. In a bad year he might team with somebody else who has plums.
And the plums are picked from the ground, not the tree. You want them when they’re really ripe, for the maximum sugar content. So the deal is to go out every morning and evening with a bucket or two, and fill up with what has dropped.
The other approach is to have your own still…not legal, but not rare either. I’m on the look out for one, as we have lots of cherry trees and I could probably fill 2 or 3 drums each year with what is spoiled or I simply can’t use. Nothing like enough to take to the “official” still and get back cherry palinka, I would only get the “mixed fruit” and for me it’s not drinkable. However, if I had my own still, 10 – 15 liters of cherry palinka would be worth the effort. I’ve been given a little of this “private” produce on occasion, and it’s wonderful – the best commercial product is nothing close.
That is a brilliant account, Andy. You are obviously a fully paid up member of SFTA* like ourselves. Back home in West Cork in the 50s and 60s, poteen making was a vital income stream for the hill farmers. The constant threat of police raids added tremendous excitement to the whole business.
Well done to Hungary for licensing official stills in villages. That’s a cracking idea.
*SFTA: See Fruit, Think Alcohol