Getting started

We have the most beautiful Victoria Plum tree in our front garden. It yields so many plums - too tasty to waste. So we had a go at making some Plum Liqueur. We’d been in France a lot, enjoying a Kir or two. We wondered about a plummy Kir instead of the more traditional cassis based drink. We decided to give it a try, making it the traditional French way, soaking the plums in a deep fruity red wine first. We gave some away as gifts and when people started asking if they could buy some, we wondered…..would this have wider appeal? The were many stages to pass through, so that we could sell our drinks safely and responsibly. There’s the licensing, the food safety, the labelling and so much more. But we worked through every step.

On 12 September 2021 we packed the car (having first remembered to insure it for business use) and set off for The Garage in Nottingham with a boot full of liqueurs, our tasting platters, beautifully made for us by David Entwisle at Isle Home and Garden and our biggest smiles. Our friend Lizzie came to help at that first market and we were genuinely gobsmacked that we sold 65 bottles in 4 hours. The feedback on our range of 5 liqueurs was absolutely amazing and we were overwhelmed with the response to our bottles after so many months of hard work. Of course, we thought that first market was a fluke  so we were mightily relieved when the same thing happened the next week and the week after.