Fermented sloe gin recipe: a new approach to making sloe gin
Comments(51)
I don’t know whether you saw Colin Boswell’s comment on “The Great Sloe Gin Challenge – Three variations of our sloe gin recipe”. He outlined a method of making sloe gin by fermenting the sloes first and then adding the gin to the liquor. Having been brought up on traditional sloe gin recipes his comment was a revelation.
I love sloe gin and like most other sloe gin makers am keen to make a great brew. I hate to admit it but it would be great to impress my liqueur making guru, Gilbert. This recipe gives me the possiblity of two great outcomes. This new technique may produce a superb sloe gin opera or rolling of drums.
Colin Boswell wrote, “The secret of a good sloe gin is the extent to which the very high natural tannin content plus its other constituents have been extracted. I have found that replicating, as perhaps you have above (that’s me!), red wine production by fermenting the sloes on their skins makes an outstanding sloe gin. What you must beware of is that too high a concentration of sugar will kill the yeast and no fermentation will take place.
Layer 2 inches of frozen sloes interspaced with 3 tablespoons of sugar then another 2 inches of sloes and so forth in a fermentation bucket. Add a port wine or high alcohol yeast, probably fermenting out to 14deg. The more technical can measure the specific gravity before and after fermentation to gauge the alcohol content and how much sugar needs to be added.
Stand in a warm place, keep a close eye on fermentation and add small amounts of sugar until fermentation ceases.
Fermenting will of course raise the alcohol content but more importantly it extracts the full flavours of the sloes which other methods fail to do.
I would greatly appreciate the views of an experienced amateur winemaker on this.”
We make wine but are in no way experienced winemakers. So I couldn’t comment intelligently on the method. Instead I decided to give this method a go. I must admit I never would have considered fermenting the sloes before adding the gin but I haven’t been thinking laterally as regards sloe gin. I can see the wisdom behind this method, upping the alcohol level before adding the gin. As Colin says, why let the sloes become imbued with the gin – unless you are going to use the sloes for something else (they can be added to mince pies, Christmas cake, chocolate or the boozy crumble that will have you mother-in-law finally sleeping in a heap under the table).
For this experiment I am using 2 pounds of sloes (900g). I am planning to use the fermented sloes for sloe sherry.
You can get a range of good red wine yeasts online from many sources. I use the art of brewing .
I asked Colin for the ratio mix of fermented sloes to gin and received this reply. “6l fermented sloe juice to .4l gin, assuming sloe juice has reached 15% alcohol, will give sloe gin at 25%. 50/50 gives 27.5% alcohol. By comparison, if the sloe juice was not fermented, alcohol content at .6l/.4l gin is 16% and at 50/50 20%. The gin and sloe juice need at least two months, preferably longer but should be acceptable by Christmas.
I also recommend the addition of juniper berries, 10 to a gallon of sloes.”
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Thanks for the lovely blog. I am still not 100 percent what a sloe looks like. The recipe sounds rather delicious though!!!
Hi Pat,
Sloes are small round fruit on a straggly sort of thorny hedge. There is a picture of sloes on a bush here http://www.cottagesmallholder.com/?p=442
They are the size of a small marble.
Once you have tasted a great sloe gin you would crawl miles on your knees to find them. Sloe gin is the quintessential UK liqueur and the best is always home made.
Oh, I wish my blog was as interesting and informative as yours! You have inspired me to make quince jelly and to have a go at the fermented sloe gin next time. We only have two gallons this year!
Many thanks for sharing all your experience with us novices!
Hi Mordsith,
I am a permanent novice – things move so fast, I am usually having fun. Sometimes my hair is standing on end but that is only when my wine has stopped murmuring when it should be talking to me.
Thanks Fiona, I can’t say I have seen any around here. Hmmm Wonder if I can talk Brian into a nice walk.
Hi Pat,
It might be worth asking your neighbours if there are sloes around where you live. If you have a local general store/Post Office they would probably know as well.
hi
is it a bad year for sloes? i went out yesterday with a large bag only to find that the bushes i usually find laden were bare!!! horror of horrors!! could be that someone else got there first of course – but they are on private land and away from footpaths. if anyone near hereford has sloes please ‘comment’
Hi, last ime I looked (a couple of days ago) there were masses of sloes in the hedges round us in Herefordshire, Ross area. Perhaps someone got to yours first?
Thanks but live in a big housing estate. Don’t think we have any near by. They even took the lovely field that we used to walk in and built houses on it now.:(
Hi Anne,
I think that the sharp frosts in April might have damaged your sloe blossom.
Hi Virginia,
Thanks for the update on the sloes in the Ross area.
Hi Pat,
That’s a shame that there are no sloes around where you live.
This is fascinating! I’ve been good, haven’t picked one sloe yet. Of course I shall kick myself if others have found my favourite picking place. I did notice that someone had googled – ‘where to pick sloes in Surrey’ which had led them to my blog. As if anybody in their right mind would advertise this.
Hi Amanda
As these sloes are frosted in your freezer you can skip waiting for the first frost and dive in now! We have early sloe gatherers aound here so I’ve been picking for the last month.
I do have a secret place that I visit after the first frosts!
After reading about sloe picking spurred me on to go out to a nearby field hedgerow that is normally good for sloes, brambles and hops, but I was disapointed , as I forgot that the hedges had been cut back severly in the early part of the year to make the path wider. Most of the sloes were about 8-10 feet off the ground due to the fact that the lower branches had been cut away.So I had to go back home to improvise a hook to bend down the whippier branches to allow me to pick a few. I got enough to keep me satisfied, but there are so many out of reach. A passing horse rider offered me her horse to reach up from (she was jesting of course) but she was right in that it needed a ladder or something to get at them.
I have put them in the freezer as I was told some time ago that this helps break the cells open, and means you don’t have to prick the berries when you bottle them. It worked last year.
Martin
Hi Martin,
What a shame about the hedge trimming. I use a walking stick for foraging. Blackthorn branches are quite whippy and the handle of the stick grabs them well.
Freezing the sloes is a good trick. Thanks for dropping by.
I’ve just been out for a walk – glorious day after hard ground frost this morning- and picked 3lbs of sloes. Now, I’ve already made sloe gin and sloe vodka so am debating whether to try sloe and apple cheese or fermented sloe gin. your votes please! Also I have 5lbs of haws so am going to make haw wine but want to use some for hawthorn berry liqueur which is mentioned everywhere but I can’t find a decent recipe. Has anyone ever made it?
Right, now off to pick more damsons. We have a damson orchard nearby, very old and abandoned, and the trees are groaning. Sadly, I am running out of demijohns fast to cope with this year’s abundant hedgerow harvest so it may be jam-making time rather than more damson wine!
Hi Lindsey,
I have never made Hawthorn berry liqueur so I can’t help with a recipe. Why not use the basic sloe gin recipe, I am sure that it would work.
I vote for you making the fermented sloe gin. I’d love to compare notes.
Have you thought of damson jelly and damson cheese? Both delicious. We have a recipe for damson cheese here http://www.cottagesmallholder.com/?p=45
Although I now use this method for all fruit cheeses, it is easy and far more restful http://www.cottagesmallholder.com/?p=467
I picked about 6-7lb of haws and have put 5lb in a plastic dustbin with boiling water for 7 days, stirring daily, for wine. The others have gone into bottles with vodka and no sugar to make schnapps. I found tincture recipes with brandy on some of the herbal sites, but “take a few drops to strengthen your heart” isn’t good enough for us alcoholics!
Once this is made – at least 6 to 7 weeks – I am planning to add different sugar syrups – made with honey, white sugar and brown sugar-to some of the bottles to make liqueurs and see which is best. I’ve only got 4 x 500ml olive oil jars of schnappps for liqueurs (I am definitely keeping some as schnapps as it is a novel drink to offer friends!) from this haul so I’m sort of hoping there is no particularly brilliant liqueur eg with honey as it is a long time till next autumn!
The berries have lost their colour and gone reddish brown and not coloured the vodka which is very unlike sloes and damsons but maybe it will come.. The wine isn’t giving off a particularly fab smell but it is, after all, good for the heart!
Will go for the fermented sloe gin but am going to use vodka as you get more of the taste of the sloes.
Got 11lbs of damsons in abt 45mins and have made damson wine to my partner’s grandfather’s recipe, juice for the kids, frozen 6lbs till the jam jar collection increases, and given some to extremely grateful friends who don’t have time to go picking on warm, sunny days. Will def try the cheese though! Thanks for that. (Oh, and the local pub has agreed to save all the 25cl wine bottles and lids so can decant things into suitable gift sizes now, and it’ll be perfect for the marrow rum etc which smells as though small quantities only should be quaffed for our own safety!)
Hi Lindsey,
Great hearing about your grog experiments with haws! I haven’t tried sloe vodka. I must give it a go.
Well done with the damsons and also doing the deal with the pub.
I’ve been making Sloe Gin for a couple of years now and thought it time to try a new recipe. I was very interested by your idea of fermenting the sloes but with no wine making experience was wondering if you could clarify a few points for a novice like me.
I don’t have a fermentation bucket and only a relatively small number of sloes. Could you explain the ratio of sugar to sloes to yeast so that I can make it in a smaller batch?
I’m also a little unclear once you have fermented the sloes what you do next. Do you discard the sloes and add the juice to the gin or the other way round?
Hope you can help – I’m looking forward to getting started!
Hi Simon,
This is Colin Boswell’s method of making sloe gin, rather than ours. Tis is my first year of making sloe gin in this way.
A large bowl would suffice, rather than a fermentation bucket for a small amount of sloes. The trick is to keep it closely covered (saucepan lid/cling film) otherwise small fruit flies may creep in and turn your brew to vinegar.
You need wine yeast for this. There is a link to where I buy mine on the post. The sachets say that they contain enough yeast fro 5 gallons of wine. Feeling tight I just used a bit of the yeast and minimal fermentation occurred. I put in the rest and suddenly everything was moving and shaking. You need to activate the yeast before adding it (follow the directions on the pack).
You add the juice to the gin. The ratio is in the post – 6 litres of sloe juice to 4 litres of gin. You will have to do the maths when you measure how much juice you have after fermentation.
I’d love to hear how you get on!
Hi has any one heard of carrot whiskey my gran used to make it it was very good any ideas (she never added alcohol but it was potent )
Hi Gary,
I haven’t heard of carrot whisky. Sorry. I’ll do some research and get back to you within a week.
Thanks for leaving a comment!
Hi Gary,
Here is a recipe (scroll down the page to the recipes and on a bit) http://www.oodwooc.co.uk/Lea/Chapter08.htm. I hope that this is what you want. Do report back with your results when the time comes!
Have just found this chat about hawthorn liqeur and wonder if you would let us know how it turned out. I have been wondering what to try making with haws and since you made the liqeur last year you must have tested it and discovered the best tasting version by now.
I am just making some hip and haw jelly as i write, it isnt looking very promising either but will update you in a few weeks when it matures.
Hello Tessa
I haven’t tried making hawthorn liquer, so can’t help you. Perhaps Lindsey will pop back and notice your comment.
Hi
I have read with great interest the method of making sloe gin. Unfortunately I do not have access to sloes from the hedgegrow and was wandering how it would work using dried sloes. Has anyone tried or heard of anyone having any success with them? Has anyone got any ideas?
Any update on the fermenting method of making sloe gin? I havebeen given some sloes and am looking for the best method to try
At the risk of sounding a bit thick, please could someone clarify further the method for fermenting sloes!
I went to a wine making shop yesterday and when I told them what I was trying to do they looked at me like I was mental!
Anyway, I bought a fermentation bucket, some yeast and some enzyme, none of which had any instructions! I layered the sloes (after letting them almost thaw out)and sugar as described then mixed a sachet of yeast with a cup full of luke warm water and half a teaspoon of enzyme powder then poured it over the sloes and then put the lid on. Is this going to work? Do you have to put any extra water in or do you simply rely on the juice being extracted from the sloes to make up the desired liquid?? When can I take the lid off again to see what is going on in there? Please help!!
Hi I want to try fermenting the sloes how di you get on? how long did you leave them in the fermenting bucket in the end?
Hi Claire,
The sloes are still in there! They’re still fermenting away, I’ve checked on them every 3 days or so and there still plenty of bubbles coming up. Incidentally I put enough water in with the sloes to cover them by about an inch and I used light muscovado sugar, of which I keep sprinkling a few spoon fulls in when I check each time. I will sieve the fruit out this weekend I think when they will have been in about 2 weeks. I’ve done the same with a smaller amount of damsons too, they however dont appear to be fermenting as well.
Hello please could some one please tell me would it be better to ferment in a bucket or a demijohn?
at the moment it is fermenting in a bucketwith a llid but it causes alot of pressure so I have to kkeep lifting the lid to release the co2.
would it be better in a demi with an air lock?
thanks alex
Alex – fermentation bucket is best for the first week or so. leave the lid slightly loose to allow the gas to escape. once it calms down (or after you have strained the fruit and stones out) you can use a demijohn with fermentation lock. there are lots of winemaking books around but most of them are from a while back so recipes are too sweet for my taste. I use half what the old books say (e.g. 1.5 lbs sugar to a gallon, not 3!!) Internet is a good resource – and this site in particular is fab!
thankyou richard will leave bubbling and feeding slowly for another weeek
cheers alex
Despite recent gales there are still plenty of the last of the sloes to be had here in south Cheshire – easily spotted as the leaves have all been blown away!
My first ever batch of sloe gin (being sampled early just to check the quality!) is fantastic (50%gin, 25%sloes, 25%sugar) – Might fine-tune the last batches to lower sugar and higher sloe content, but generally very happy, as I prefer the taste of my own brew to that of a commercial producer that I am also sampling for comparison!
Hello
3 ltrs of fermented sloe juice and 2 ltrs of gin
have now been mixed and put in a demi and air lock.
lets see what happens now!
Alex.
ps should I still keep it in the warm and what about the dark?
Hi Nollwark
I reckon the best thing about sloe gin is the sampling
Your recipe sounds like a good mix – thanks.
Hi tittytidy
A warm dark place like an airing cupboard would be perfect.
thankyou FN
Its in with the towels now thanks!
Christmas here we come.
titty tidy
No idea how my “little babies” are doing as I’m away from home at the mo, & back again tomorrow to give them all a good turning over. All in standard gin/wine bottles – (there’s only so much gin you can drink to make space for the other ingredients . . .!)
I have to decide before Xmas whether to strain & bottle individually, or just strain the whole lot into one big tub & hope that the overall result averages out just right – as ther’s been a bit of tweaking of the recipe as the seaon has gone on.
It’ll be interesting to see if the last berries on my daily dogwalk are still usable and worth collecting & processing.
Either way, I’ve got 29 bottles to strain already –
. . . & then I have to decide which recipe to use to convert the gin-infused pulp into something else.
I’ll keep you all informed . . .
Hello Nollwark
Wow 29 bottles
Please keep us up to date as to how you get on!
hi i am new at this i did my first sloe gin recipie was a round two year ago and it came out verry well couldnt do it last year becoas o lack of sloes i dont know if you had the same problem but this year was realy good i live in exeter but have to travel to get to the destonation where i have found a realy good crop of sloes me and my mate picked 4 litres of berries and i made a good load of sloe gin when do you reacon is the best time to pick them ive been told that you have to wait for the first frost before picking them but i think picking them a month early and freezing them has the same affect i would like some comments back please
Hello yep freezer is good! if I waited for the first frost near hastings in sussex it would probably be january (joking)early dec may be then no sloes which there is an abundence of a week ago.then I bashed them lightly with a rolling pin frozenthen fermented them or added them to sugar and gin in bottles.
hi thanks for that not tried it that way i shal have to next year and tell you how i got on we dont get much frost down this end so the berries would shrivel up before we had any chance of frost has anyone tried sloe and plum gin if so whats the recipe for that if its not something you wan to disclose
Hi all you Sloe and Damson gin lovers!
Does anyone know where I can buy some frozen damsons in the Kent/Sussex area?
I missed the harvest and am fast running out of previous brews!!
HI MAYBE COULD SORT YOU OUT BUT TRYING TO FIND MY LAST CROP IT COULD BE A RESULT ILL LET YOU KNOW VERRY SOON THE ONLY DOWN FALL IS THAT I LIVE IN EXETER BUT DO MY BEST FOR YOU
I am making a lot of sloe gin this year for a family party. About a dozen in the conventional way and another dozen by mixing gin with fermented sloes(sloe wine). I cannot see any advantage in not making the sloe wine in a conventional way from a simple recipe in a demijohn as this minimises the chance of the wine spoiling. Any comments? When the wine is clear (it is just about ready and v nice medium sweetness) I will mix 50:50 with gin and then experiment with additional sugar for taste. I will let you know how I get on.
If you catch a ferry to Spain, there is some very acceptable gin at Carrefour in Santander for E3.80 which means using the fermentation method a 25% strength sloe gin would cost lessthan £2
Hi Graham
Thanks for all these tips – much appreciated.
Almost worth swimming to Spain to get the gin!
I did the fermentation method by mistake a couple of years back! I ran out of gin I had about 8cm high left in the bottle. As it was late I put the sloes, sugar and cinnamon sticks in, shook the bottle and sealed it. I put it to the back of the cupboard and made a mental note to get some gin and forgot! 6 months later whilst sorting through the cupboard I found the bottle, there was quite a hiss when I undid it and the fumes well. I added the gin and left another couple of months – my husband said it was the best!
Update on my comparison of making sloe gin by traditional and by mixing sloe win and gin. Duly mixed ine and gine at 50:50. The wine mix is definitely clearer as good as you get if you put sloe gin through coffee filters. However it the smell is ginny and the taste not so good. Added 2.5 oz of sugar to mix and 5 oz to mix. Smell better after two days mixed but still ginny. At blind tasting, all agreed that traditional was best by some way. 2.5 ozs very ginny, and 5 ozs although swetter than traditional lacked character and taste. Going to try 2 parts wine and one part gin (around 20% alcoloh) next. Will report.
Sloe wine very good and another gallon made.
Further update. Made the mix 2 parts sloe wine, one part gin. Tested with 2 oz and 4oz of sugar per bottle added.
The consensus was that the 4oz mix was about right. But the mix was still not nearly fruity enough and was a pale shadow of sloe gin made in the traditional way. Further it is simply not worth wasting two thirds of a bottle of sloe wine on it. I would be interested to hear from anyone who has actually done this rather than just speculated about it. I dare say it would improve with age but so does the trad sloe gin.
The sloe wine is a revelation even with no aging this is a very tasty tipple. Our tasters prefered this to the chemically manufactured sloe gin.
Has anyone had any more recent reports on this? I have currently got two batches of Sloe Wine on the go, which I started last week.
I used 2lb of frozen sloes, 1lb of sugar (another lb to be added later) 5 oz of chopped sultanas and 4 pints of water and a campden tablet. I then added a dessert type wine yeast.
The second batch was a bit of a simpler version with smaller quanities of sloes, no sultanas and more sugar, plus dessert wine yeast. I was going to use the second batch for sloe gin, but might try both. I have also come across a slightly mad sloe champange type recipe which I will also try a bit later on in the season. And I have a big bag of Haws to get through too…
I some things which i have been wondering about were whether it is safe to use the fermented sloes strained off in Sloe Sherry? I wondered about making it richer so thought about adding extra sloes (late season so probably better quality) to the wine – spirit base. Also I really recommend trying cherry pip vodka – we got about 20kg of cherries off our tree and spent a couple of evenings destoning them. At the end i thought I’d try mixing them with some sugar and vodka – the result was amazing: pure almond flavour, but much less cloying than Amaretto and disrt cheap. Next year I’ll do it on a MUCH bigger scale. So some of that will be ging into the sloe gin as well!