johnl, Finally made some Damson gin with the last of the frozen Damsons we picked in September. I had already cooked them and remove the stones when I decided to give gin a try, so it's rather an unorthodox way of doing it. Will see how it goes in a few months. Thanks to @derickr for the suggestion and to my mate Steven who shared some very good damson gin with me which clinched it (and then contributed a spare bottle of gin for this!)