On
this page, we have attempted to define various terms
- Real Cider,
Perry, Scrumpy
(Rough and Farmhouse Cider),
Apple Wine and Sweet
Cider & Hard Cider.
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Real
Cider
Real
cider
is essentially the fermented juice of the apple
with nothing added and nothing taken away. At the
moment the majority of the cider sold in the UK
is mostly made from imported apple concentrate,
is full of artificial colourings, sweeteners, and
preservatives, is filtered, is pasteurised to render
it inert and is kept and served under carbon dioxide
pressure. Don't assume that if it is served through
a hand pump that it is real cider.
To
protect traditional English varieties of cider and
perry, the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) set up
a sub-group, the Apple and Pear Produce Liaison
Executive (APPLE). APPLE publish the Good Cider
Guide which lists pubs in Britain where real cider
and perry are available. APPLE have defined two
categories of real cider (and perry), anything which
does not fall within these categories is not considered
to be real cider (or perry).
Category
'A' Ciders
A
definition agreed by APPLE to denote the very best
of cider and perry, with nothing added or taken
away. Category
'A' ciders covers the majority of cider makers but
only a small proportion of the total amount of cider
made.
Category
A - must:
- not
be pasteurised before or after fermentation
- not
be filtered
- not
receive enzyme treatment
- not
contain preservatives or colouring
- not
have the natural yeast replaced by a cultured
yeast
- not
have a nitrogen source added unless essential
to start fermentation
- not
be diluted
- only
contain sweetners if labelled Medium or
Sweet, and then only if they are shown
to be safe and do not affect the taste
- be
produced from only freshly-pressed fruit, and
- not
contain concentrate
- not
contain extraneous carbon dioxide
Category
'B' Ciders
A larger number of real ciders differ in some small
respect from Category 'A' ciders but are sufficiently
authentic to be designated real cider since the
taste and character of the cider is unaffected.
These are Category 'B' ciders.
Category
B - must:
- not
be entirely made from concentrate
- not
contain extraneous carbon dioxide
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Scrumpy,
Rough and Farmhouse Cider
Scrumpy
Cider, Farmhouse Cider and Rough Cider are terms
often used to described certain types of real cider.
It is one of those terms for which everyone has
a definition and everyone's definition is different.
Originally it referred to cider which was made from
windfalls (scrumps). For most people it means a
rough, cloudy and unsophisticated cider. It is most
often applied to young cider, i.e. that which is
only a few months old and has yet to undergo the
maturation phase (including the malo-lactic fermentation).
For other people, including some cidermakers, it
can mean the finest cider, from selected, better
apples, slowly fermented and matured for longer
than ordinary ciders.
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Apple
Wine
When
is it a cider and when an apple wine? This is a
frequently asked question. There is no definitive
answer to this. The best that can be said is that
first of all apple wine falls outside of the definitions
given above. Secondly, apple wine will almost always
be made with dessert (sweet) apples. This materially
affects the flavour of the finished drink. Cider
apples contain high levels of tannins and significant
amounts of malic acid. These are not found to significant
levels in dessert apples. Therefore a cider has
a sharpness (due to malic acid) and a bitterness
(due to tannins) which is simply not found in apple
wines. Commonly people will refer to the qualities
that these components give to the cider as the "bite".
This is not apparent in apple wine. The final distinction
is the alcohol content. Cider generally has an alcohol
content which does not exceed (about) 8 percent
by volume. Apple wines can commonly have higher
alcohol contents. These wines will inevitably have
been fermented using wine yeasts, not natural or
ale yeasts, since only wine yeasts are tolerant
to the high alcohol levels. The wine yeasts will
impart their own flavour profile to the apple wine,
moving it further away from a true cider. Note that
in some countries the distinctions may be regulated
by law on the basis of alcohol content alone.
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Perry
Real
Perry is made in a similar way to cider, but whereas
cider is made from apples, perry is made from special
varieties of pears. As with cider, inferior versions
are only available in the majority of pubs - the
current craze is to call it 'pear cider'; real perry
would never stoop so low! Real perry, like real
cider, is an excellent drink and worth seeking out.
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page
Sweet
Cider & Hard Cider
North
Americans use the term sweet cider to mean
freshly-pressed apple juice, and hard cider
to mean fermented apple juice (i.e. what in the
UK would be termed cider). Perry is generally
called pear cider in the US.
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