Its been very quiet on here recently, so by way of conversation I thought some of you might like my recipe for Blackberry gin

First pick your blackberries when ripe (about September time) and separate them into usable amounts (I usually weigh them and bag them in one pound lots) this makes them easier to handle when frozen............the next step is to bung them in the freezer.

Freezing them not only preserves them but allows the juice to expand and break the skin on the little nodules.............(much easier than pricking sloe's with a needle)

When you are ready to make it fill normal sized kilner jars 1\2 full of berries add some sugar (I usually add 4 oz per jar) you can add this at the end if you like a little at a time and taste it as you go until you are happy with the flavour (you can always add more but you can't take it back out)

Note if you are going to add the sugar afterwards and keep tasting .........wash up first ...........or you might drop something

Next top up to almost full with gin ..........any make will do as it all tastes the same afterwards..............
Give the jars a shake once a day or so for the first few days and its ready in 2 to 3 weeks (not like sloe's which take ages)
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Then place a fine mesh sieve over a large bowl and empty the first jar into the sieve once the liquid has drained through you can attack the blackberries with a blunt instrument to squeeze the juice into the bowl.................then bin the remains and continue till all jars are empty or the bowl is full then pass the liquid through the empty fine sieve again just in case some pulp got through while mashing the berries.
Then using a cup (not er indoors best china) and a funnel pour it into bottles ................note because of the added sugar and the juice from the berries you will need an extra bottle because you get more liquid than you started with.
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Well that's about it except to say if you spill a few drops on the worktop kindly don't lick the worktop unless you cleaned it before you started

Handy top tip
If you like blackberry and apple crumble don't crush the berries make a crumble instead .....................
but don't drive after eating it

Another interesting "how to" brought to you by hobgoblin enterprises ..................

I can say, from experience, that we have done the 'blackberry crumble' and it's b***dy lethal!! but it's at least edible! I did sloe gin crumble once and that - even to my 'untrained and unsophisticated' palette, was bl**dy inedible!!!

Any fruit used with spirits do not discard, place on a tray and coat with melted chocolate.
Allow to cool then break up into bite sized pieces.

Anything with gin in it is my sort of thing but making it -forget it. The newish Bombay distillery is quite near us and planing to go for a tour

Yes it's apparently transferred in huge plain containers, there and back. Not sure why, will find out when we do a tour.

We do this too. Most years we pick sloes from the hedgerows round here and make a Polish drink called tarniowka, which is essentially Polish spirit, sloes and whole almonds. This year the seasons were all over the place and the birds got to the sloes before me though.

It's made just like sloe gin, and then we put the chopped alcoholic sloes and almonds in moulds, and fill them with dark chocolate.

Martyn

My contribution to this thread.........

I give you........



Christmas Pudding Vodka......
Last year's pudding leftovers dumped into a bottle of Vodka and bunged in the garage for a year.

....absolutely gorgeous!

I should explain that Carole has been known to make sloe gin, but I have nohing to do with it apart from slurp it down with a piece of her lovely cake and it's not annually,