I was driving along the roads around her a couple of days ago and the blackthorn was in full bloom. It struck me that I’d not posted a British Wild Flowers post for ages.

So let me introduce The Blackthorn.

This tree is in flower right now. Large areas of white are visible in every hedgerow around here (East Sussex in the south east of the UK).

It is one of the earliest trees to bloom. I’m calling them trees because they can grow to four metres. Yes, that’s a smallish tree, but I think it’s bigger than a bush! However, because they are often found in hedges, they are trimmed and I’ve not seen a really tall one for ages.

They can live for 100 years, apparently.

Image by Lenny Löwenstern from Pixabay

They are one of the earliest bushes to bloom in spring, usually around March. As such, they are very useful for insects to find nectar and pollen at this early time. The leaves are also the food for a number of butterfly caterpillars.

As the dense stems are very thorny, they provide an excellent nesting site for birds, and the caterpillars and other insects that eat it become an easy meal for them.

They have been associated with witchcraft and it was said that witches wands were made from its wood. More prosaically, it was used to make walking sticks and it is said to burn well.

In the past it was used to make tonics. Bark, flowers and fruits were used for these.

It belongs to the genus, prunus (Prunus spinosa), and is thus related to the cherry, plum, peach, nectarine, apricot and almond. Like them, it has a fruit containing a stone, but unlike them, you wouldn’t want to munch on them.

Image by Hans from Pixabay

The fruit is called a sloe. It is a small black fruit , but you wouldn’t want to eat it as it is because it’s very sour and bitter. However, when cooked, it is much more palatable. Sloes are often made into jam and sloe gin.

To make sloe gin, you need 500 ml gin, 250g of sloes and 250 g of sugar. and a 1 litre jar with a tight-fitting lid.

First prepare the sloes by cleaning them and pricking them all over with a fork. I believe that freezing them works, too. This is to break the skin so the juice can escape.

Add the sloes to the jar along with the sugar and gin. Shake it thoroughly. (Don’t forget to put the lid back on first!) Shake daily for the first couple of months, then weekly for about 3 months. Store it in a cool dark place.

The gin will have taken on a deep purple colour and the sugar will have removed the sour and bitterness from the sloes. When the time is over, decant the gin. You can filter it if you wish. Bottle it into clean dry bottles and store in a cool dry place. It continues to improve as it matures, and it’s best drunk after a year. (So prepare this year to drink next!)

Enjoy.

My mum made sloe gin from time to time, but her forte was damson gin. It was made in the same way, except she used damsons instead of sloes. I think that was even nicer!

Thanks to The Woodland Trust and Wikipedia for some of the details of this lovely plant.

There are some more unusual drink recipes in my recipe book, Viv’s Family Recipes, which you can get by clicking on the cover of the book in the sidebar. This book has some recipes dating as far back as 1909 and came from my grandma. Although not things we eat nowadays, long cooking and probably too much fat, it’s interesting to see what kind of things people used to eat.

Have you ever made sloe gin, or any other kind of unusual drinks? I would be interested to find out.