Blackthorn aka Sloe

 Blackthorn or Sloe (Prunus Spinosa) 

Blackthorn is a popular plant to use as a hedge; it's got sharp thorns. It was likely used as a protective barrier for livestock. But actually left to grow in its own way. Blackthorn is a tree that can grow up to 7 m tall. It’s part of the plum family. It has small plum-like fruits in the autumn which have the typical heart plum stone in the middle.

There are two great edible parts of a blackthorn tree late winter to early spring. You can collect the flowers. They have a lovely almond flavour that comes from a cyanide inducing glycoside, but don’t worry, you will need to eat an awful lot of raw flowers to give yourself cyanide poisoning, heat destroys this compound, so I make a lovely syrup for them.

The other edible use is the fruit in the autumn, which get called sloes, a small roundabout, the size of marble, the large stone in the middle and very very sharp contain quite a bit of tannin so make your mouth dry out, however, a little bit of processing and they are fantastic if you pop them in a bottle of gin after an evening in the freezer which helps break down the cells in the flesh and sweetens them you make sloe gin which is one of my favourite gins. But you can also use them as she would any other berry to make jam, jelly or a really nice reduction to go with red meat.

Identifying features for sloes

• Small, white flowers that look star shape appear February to March before the leaves emerge on the tree

• The leaves are green, elongated oval-shaped with a slightly serrated edge

• The bark is quite dark green and along the branches are long over 3 cm spikes

• The flowers and fruit usually grow along the spikes

• The fruit start off green and eventually turn black. However, they will look blue due to natural yeast that collects on the fruit.

• The fruit has a rounded stone in the middle

If you have all of these features, it’s likely you have a blackthorn tree

Lookalikes for blackthorn 

Bullace, this has slightly larger fruit and leaves. It’s equally as edible as the slow, and quite often they hybridise.

Cherry Plums These are usually much larger leaved and fruit which is different colours, a lot sweeter and tastier and also edible