Three to four times longer than most producers allow. That is the maceration this sloe gin gets, and the extra months are what pull more than colour and tart juice out of the fruit: given enough contact, the stones give up an almond character that a short steep never reaches. Maral works in Belgium at 27%, on a bespoke craft gin base and hand-picked wild sloes.

Starting from a finished gin rather than a neutral spirit is the other decision that shapes it. The base brings a juniper-led frame with its own citrus and herbal notes, so the fruit arrives on top of a structure instead of into an empty glass, and that structure is what keeps the result from collapsing into liqueur. Sugar is added in measured quantity, enough to balance the acidity and the bitterness of wild fruit and not enough to smother either.

The nose is ripe dark berry over a quiet juniper floor, with plum and black cherry alongside and the almond hint from the stones showing behind. The attack is soft and rounded, briefly sweet, and then the characteristic sloe tang takes over. Red and dark berries fill the middle while the gin underneath keeps supplying citrus and botanical notes that stop the sweetness from settling. The texture is smooth and coating, and the close runs long and gently warming, with a dryness that returns at the very end.

Neat at cool room temperature or over ice shows the fruit and the almond most clearly. Tonic or sparkling water makes the long version, and it works wherever a recipe calls for a sloe gin, a Sloe Gin Fizz among them, provided nothing else in the glass adds sugar. Twenty-seven percent is a liqueur strength carrying a gin frame, and the length of the maceration is what earns the second half of that sentence.