{"id":780,"date":"2008-08-18T13:37:14","date_gmt":"2008-08-18T13:37:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cocktailians.com\/2008\/08\/oh-no-too-sloe.html"},"modified":"2008-08-18T13:37:14","modified_gmt":"2008-08-18T13:37:14","slug":"oh-no-too-sloe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/?p=780","title":{"rendered":"Oh No!  Too Sloe!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2008\/06\/15\/fashion\/15shake.html?_r=1&amp;oref=slogin\">introduction of Plymouth sloe gin<\/a> has raised antennae over the entire cocktailian community, and lucky indeed are the folks who&#8217;ve managed to get their hands on the stuff.&nbsp; Made with natural sloe flavor from real <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Blackthorn\">sloe berries<\/a> (unlike the foul artificiality of more downmarket sloe gins), the Plymouth is a rich deep purple and has a deep flavor to match &#8212; it&#8217;s <strong>sweet<\/strong>, but the astringency from the sloes keeps it in check.<\/p>\n<p>I finally managed to taste the new Plymouth offering a few weeks ago at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.lenells.com\">LeNell&#8217;s<\/a>, where Plymouth brand manager Simon Ford poured me &quot;a proper Sloe Gin Fizz&quot;, which was tasty indeed.&nbsp; The berry flavor is pronounced, and the liqueur&#8217;s sweetness well-balanced by the sloes&#8217; natural tartness.&nbsp; Alas, LeNell had sold out of the sloe gin, but my name is firmly on their waiting list.&nbsp; (Hopefully she won&#8217;t suffer another computer failure, like the one last year that kept a bottle of the Rothman &amp; Winter cr\u00e8me de violette out of my hands until the stock levels improved.)<\/p>\n<p>However, a <em>very<\/em> good friend brought me a present a while back from London &#8212; one of two bottles of homemade sloe gin that he made ten years ago and had never uncorked.&nbsp; This is an amazing ingredient, and I&#8217;m using it very sparingly so I don&#8217;t waste it.&nbsp; <\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Homemade sloe gin by Vidiot, on Flickr\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/vidiot\/2766926418\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"252\" height=\"500\" alt=\"Homemade sloe gin\" src=\"http:\/\/farm4.static.flickr.com\/3192\/2766926418_ac470e577a.jpg\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Sloe berries by Vidiot, on Flickr\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/vidiot\/2766079243\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"333\" alt=\"Sloe berries\" src=\"http:\/\/farm4.static.flickr.com\/3283\/2766079243_12204abcb0.jpg\" \/><\/a>\n<\/p>\n<p>So far I&#8217;ve made a Sloe Gin Fizz or two, but I really like dribbling just a drop or two on top of the foam atop a Ramos Gin Fizz.&nbsp; The Wibble (in that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2008\/06\/15\/fashion\/15shake.html?_r=2&amp;oref=slogin&amp;oref=slogin\"><em>NYT<\/em> article<\/a>) looks good too, but I&#8217;m not sure I want to mix the sloe gin with cr\u00e8me de cassis and risk covering up the sloe gin&#8217;s flavor.&nbsp; Better the approach taken at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.deathandcompany.com\/\">Death &amp; Co.<\/a>, where the &quot;Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test&quot; pairs your choice of Plymouth gin, Laird&#8217;s applejack, Scarlet Ibis rum, or Herradura Silver tequila with the Plymouth sloe gin and Luxardo Maraschino, fresh lemon juice, and blackberries, and serves the whole shebang over crushed ice:<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Vidiot, on Flickr\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/vidiot\/2766956670\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"333\" height=\"500\" alt=\"Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test\" src=\"http:\/\/farm4.static.flickr.com\/3161\/2766956670_d57a678d1c.jpg\" \/><\/a> <br \/>(This one was ordered by Chico, who took the Plymouth gin option and generously let me have a taste.)&nbsp; A lovely, summery cocktail with nice berry flavor, balancing acid, and a loooong finish.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The introduction of Plymouth sloe gin has raised antennae over the entire cocktailian community, and lucky indeed are the folks who&#8217;ve managed to get their hands on the stuff.&nbsp; Made with natural sloe flavor from real sloe berries (unlike the foul artificiality of more downmarket sloe gins), the Plymouth is a rich deep purple and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-780","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ingredients"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/780","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=780"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/780\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=780"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=780"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cocktailians.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=780"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}