ON THE GRAPEVINE

SAM WYLIE-HARRIS ON... CIDER IN THE SUMMER

AT the core of every good cider is naturally fermented, freshly pressed juice. Sounds simple enough, but the devil is in the detail.

“As people seek more natural flavours and simple ingredients, it’s no surprise cider comes to the fore. Crisp, gently complex and 10 out of 10 for refreshment, cider satisfies a broader range of drinker than any other beverage,” says Barny Butterfield, managing director at Sandford Orchards in Devon.

The new Sandford Orchards Vintage Collection , right, is full of character and features three oak-aged ciders, so sublime they’ll appeal to cider connoisseurs and newbies alike.

There’s Apple & Oak 2020 (6.7% abv), deliciously dry with lovely bittersweet apples topped with vanilla and toasty oak; Sandford Reserve 2019 (7.4% abv), which displays peachy, appley notes and gentle sherry influence, and The General 2019 (8.4% abv), a broad shouldered cider with fantastic depth of flavour marked by plums and baked apple, and sweeter, stronger in style. From £30 for 12 x 50cl bottles, Sandfordorchards.co.uk.

Fergus Fitzgerald, head brewer at Adnams in Southwold, cites cider as much more of a winemaking process than brewing, and collaborated with his master of wine to craft

Adnams Wild Wave English Cider

(5% abv), £19.99 for 12 x 33cl cans, right.

It’s a blend of bittersweet and dessert apples, including one of his favourite varieties: “The reason I like Yarlington Mill is that variety on its own has almost everything I like to find in a cider. It has a nice acidity, a juicy fresh apple sweetness, a light earthiness and most importantly for a brewer, it has a perfect level of bitter tannin content to bring balance to the cider,” says Fergus.

Sainsbury’s TTD English Vintage Cider 2020 (6.8% abv), 50cl, £1.75, right, is another vintage cider to tantalise your taste buds. Fifth generation H Weston & Sons craft this medium bodied cider with traditional bittersweet apples from a single year’s harvest. Its appealing, fruity sweet character is laden with rich apple flavours.

Waitrose Leckford Cox’s Apple Vintage Cider 2019

(6% abv), 50cl, £2.25, right, is easy drinking with straight-up refreshing deliciousness, this medium dry cider is made with Cox’s apples grown in the Waitrose & Partners farm at Leckford, Hampshire, and made for them by Suffolk-based Aspall. Unoaked, light, crisp and bang on the money.