slow picking of sloes for gin

According to the books, if you wait till after the first frosts to pick your sloes for gin you don't have to prick each sloe berry as the frost has softened the skins. The one time I waited, I found the berries had all dropped from the bushes.

So today, a bright, sunny September Sunday, I went to Epping Forest to get sloes for sloe gin, wondering what I would find after our rather odd Spring. Found a great long hedge of sloe bushes but very few berries - though those I did find were a good size. So I picked what I could find, and reach. Then came a few bushes that had lots of berries on, so finished filling my soya dessert tub with no problem.

I walked a little further to check the sloe bushes where I used to pick my sloes, to find separate bushes had grown and spread into a thicket - with not a single sloe.

I have just pricked all the berries and put into a jar with sugar and gin. Official quantities are 450 g (1 lb) sloes, 100g (4oz/1/2 cup) sugar. Put together in a jar, shake every day until sugar has all dissolved and then leave for 3 months. Pour off sloes into bottle. Use the gin-soaked sloes to make sloe brandy (sloes, brandy and more sugar).


I've now tried instructions from Pete F to get paragraphs in my post - fingers crossed!