My name is Chris, from Newdigate, a small village surrounded by woodlands on the edges of Surrey and West Sussex; and Elfie is my baby.
I was raised on home-made Bramble jelly, hedgerow-lemonade and, (later!) my mum’s deceptively alcoholic Apple and Plum wine,
– all made from fruits, herbs, hips and flowers foraged from our trees and hedgerows of Surrey and Sussex.
Of course, my mum never wrote down her recipes. To be fair, I think she made up most of them as she went along – depending on available ingredients; so it’s been a bit of a detective story to rediscover some of her folklore recipes, and to develop a new range of drinks inspired by her ..um “creativity” in the kitchen.
After 25 years working as a Marketer, in some very well known international food and drinks companies, I realised that the only way to launch my perfect adult-soft-drink; – 100% natural, with no alcohol or added sugar -, was to do it myself.
Time for a grown-up drink
Jackie and I knew we wanted a grown-up drink, something for those moments when you’re not drinking alcohol. “Sharing the driving” shouldn’t have to mean compromising.
With a little help from our friends, a copy of Nicholas Culpeper’s 1653 complete herbal, and quite a lot of trial and error, we launched our first two drinks in 2018*.
They’re not sweet or fizzy, but complex and multi-layered, with a floral nose and a long dry finish.
They’re about feeling like an adult on those occasions when you’re avoiding alcohol, which is why we call Elfie drinks “Grown-up drinks from the countryside”.
We hope you’ll love them as much as we do.
*Of course, to launch a drink in the 21st century, we can’t rely on foraging in our local woodland, – it would be stripped bare in weeks; so we use professionally and ethically farmed juices, botanicals and herbal extracts; and we have our drinks blended and bottled in an independent UK bottling facility which has passed all of the correct Health and Safety audits [SALSA]