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I think we should get back to mixing more drinks with sloe gin. It's a much neglected and delicious beverage component.

But, these days, few people have even heard of it. I mentioned to a friend last night that it was made from sloe berries, and she didn't even believe me. Which is fine, because everything I say is a lie.

The Girl Was Fast; the Gin Was Sloe - washingtonpost.com

Most of us in this country don't know real sloe gin, only the syrupy facsimile liqueur: something you'd find in embarrassing drinks with unprintable names. Real sloe gin is made with real sloe berries -- the sour, inedible fruit of the blackthorn, which is a relative of the plum -- that are macerated for several months in real gin.

Both Plymouth and Gordon's make commercial sloe gin, but in England, it is made mostly in family kitchens in autumn and carried in flasks during hunting season. "Sloe gin, to the English, is a little bit like limoncello is to the Italians," Ford says. "In the countryside, everyone makes their own. The problem of selling sloe gin in England is that someone will taste it and say, "It's not as good as mine.' "