Ice cider (13%)

Burrow Hill, Somerset

This is a bit of a departure from the kind of drinks I usually blog about, but having found out a little more about this particular product it’s not what the name might suggest, and interesting enough to be worth a look.
There’s a bit of science at play here: apples are 85% water, so pressed juice has quite a bit of water in it too.  The other 15% is made up of various sugars, different types of acid, pectin, tannin and potassium.  The exact amounts vary by variety as you might expect.  (McKenzie, 1983)  Yes, I really did just cite a scientific paper in a cider review!

So, all of these components have different freezing points.  Burrow Hill leave vats of fermenting juice outside in the winter and the water turns to ice first.  Discard that and you are left with a concentrated apple juice.

Ferment that – without reconstituting it – and you get what I imagine (without having tasted it yet) is something along the lines of an apple liqueur.  The tasing notes suggest it retains the bittersweet and sharp notes associated with Somerset cider, but they are intensified.

That description certainly fits the nose, it’s very much what I would expect from a cider from this region, just much stronger.  The taste is amazing, and the notes on the bottle are spot on.  Initially quite sweet, then developing sharpness and a little bitterness – and that’s just one sip.  There are dryer, deeper notes that develop in the finish along with the sharpness.  It’s complex with a balance works beautifully, complimented by a warming spirit quality as you might expect from something that has as much in common with spirits as it does with cider.  Also as you might expect, the mouthfeel is different from a regular cider, it’s a little bit more viscous, with a distinct lack of tannins.

This is probably the only cider product made from concentrate that I will heartily endorse, it’s been done for the right reasons in a very natural way.  And the result is spectacular.  I could very happily enjoy a glass or two beside a roaring fire on a cold winter’s night.  It’s got an alternative name of Chrsitmas Cider, but I can’t imagine this bottle will see December, let alone the 25th!