SLOE GIN

[filfoster]

Gin up

Sounds quite excellent, especially the brandy . Lots of the early bar/cocktail/drinks books contain recipes for making your own flavoured spirits and liqueurs, I imagine these were cheaper and there were less large spirit-producing corporations. Making your own pre-mix bottled cocktails seemed to be quite popular too.

Nice, and slightly unusual for a UK resident, choice of favoured Gin. I really like Seagrams but know hardly anyone else who's a fan. I believe it is one of the best selling gins in the USA.

I love to read/her gin enthusiasts wax on about the bouquet and botanicals of the premium gins but I agree with your general implication, re Seagram's, that the differences between most gins are not worth a premium price tag, and of course, drink what you like. (Except for sloe gin, of course because it's hideous proof of evil in the world).

 

[Absinthe_1900]

Sounds quite excellent, especially the brandy . Lots of the early bar/cocktail/drinks books contain recipes for making your own flavoured spirits and liqueurs, I imagine these were cheaper and there were less large spirit-producing corporations. Making your own pre-mix bottled cocktails seemed to be quite popular too.

Historically there were quite a large number of distilleries making liqueurs and cordials, they were very popular until prohibition, then post repeal, the public's tastes changed and WW II shortages helped cripple the survivors further.

During prohibition one could buy non alcoholic cordials at your druggist, where you could get your prescription alcohol for your sore throat. "cough" "cough"

One can get a nice reprint of Duplais text if you look in google, or any other well known search engine.

 

[Medvssa]

It shows how much difference there is from one country to another, I see so many hawthorns round here you could literally harvest tons of them if it was done commercially.

Oh, there are plenty here too. Well, there would be more if Belgium wouldn't be so urbanised... but the climate is very similar to England I think. In fact there are many hawthorns in many areas of Spain as well.

 

[Ethan Bentley]

... and of course, drink what you like.

Well said Sir! :eusa_clap

One of my favourite Gins, and certainly the best value for money is Gordon's Export (Yellow Label), a kind relative picked me up a bottle in Milan, €11 for I litre @ 47% .

I always find a nice blind-tasting helps to iron-out any label-bias that I may have developed.

 

[filfoster]

Confession

Well said Sir! :eusa_clap

One of my favourite Gins, and certainly the best value for money is Gordon's Export (Yellow Label), a kind relative picked me up a bottle in Milan, €11 for I litre @ 47% .

I always find a nice blind-tasting helps to iron-out any label-bias that I may have developed.

When I make my own Martinis, Gordon's is the poison of choice. Good enough for any man, and better than many of us deserve.

 

[Missy Hellfire]

I'm not over keen on Gordons, I prefer Bombay Sapphire or Plymouth for cocktails or Hendricks for a good old G&T.

 

[Ethan Bentley]

I'm not over keen on Gordons, I prefer Bombay Sapphire or Plymouth for cocktails or Hendricks for a good old G&T.

Missy Hellfire, Hendrick's does indeed make a fine Gin and Tonic.
Is it the Green Gordon's you don't like? i.e. the one we get in the UK.
Have you tried the yellow label/export version? I think this so much better and this is what our lucky cousins across-the-pond enjoy.

 

[Methuselah]

Sounds quite excellent, especially the brandy .

Although rosehip brandy does sound lovely, I decided on rosehip gin in the end. As it's an experiment, I wanted a clear spirit, as presumably the colour change will also be an indicator of how much flavour is going into the drink??? Just a guess, but it also be an easy comparison to the homemade sloe gin.

I used 1/2 a bottle of gin to about 300g of rosehips & about 100g of sugar.
I also put the other half bottle in with about 200g of candied ginger as another test - ginger seems appropriate, but I've no idea what it'll be like...

 

[Ethan Bentley]

So that time of year has come around again, Sloe Gin time. I recently has the fortune to take part in a Taste test of 17 Sloe Gins, which got me wondering what is commercial available in the US and other parts of the world. I was surprised we managed to find as much as we did but some were really good and not too sweet and cloying at all.

If you're interested here is a write-up: http://summerfruitcup.wordpress.com/2010/11/25/sloe-gin-tasting-a-comparison-of-17-sloe-gins/

Unfortuantley we didn't have time to make our own. Has anyone ever tried Sloe Brandy or Whisky I had some the other day now that was tasty!

 

[Methuselah]

It is indeed that time of year again.
I only made 2 bottles this year though.
Last year (2 posts back!) I posted about making rosehip gin.
This was a failure, even after 8months it smelled like silage so I binned it :-(

I'll have to read your blog properly soon, I only skim read the sloe gin post as Im still at work, always paranoid about my browsing habits being monitored!

 

[Puzzicato]

I've looked around, but I can't find any sloes in our local hedgerows.

 

[Methuselah]

They may be past their best by now anyway.
The ones I used this year were ripe in early Oct.
They do seem rather location-specific.

The South West coast path in Cornwall was heaving with them!!!

EDIT: I did see some today, but not enough good ones to be worth picking.

Damson gin is nice too, so maybe you can find an alternative fruit. For example, I've always wondered what prune gin would be like!

 

[Ethan Bentley]

I found some 2007 Sloe gin in the cellar today, I opened it and was surprised it was still drinkable, not bad.
I like Damson Gin and I've got a bottle of blackcurrant gin to try too.

I'm sure prune gin would have good health properties! What with the stomach settling juniper too.