Bottle Conditioned Bottle conditioned means that the cider was bottled with either some residual sugar left from the apples or a small amount of sugar was added circa 10g/L, over time this ferments in the closed bottle and produces a good fizz. The process was developed in the UK around the 1660’s when Britten developed the technology to produce glass bottles that could take the pressure without braking. French wine makers picked up on this a number of years later and that is how Champagne came about.

Cloudy Cider Most ciders will drop clear naturally, Cloudy ciders in the past were probably due to the cider not having finished fermenting or the cider being drawn off of a barrel with a large deposit of sediment with become mixed in when a glass/jug was filled, there are technical reasons why a cider may be cloudy but these are normally considered to be a fault in the cider. Modern “cloudy ciders” are made by adding a “clouding agent” which is a starch that has been formulated to stay in suspension and not settle out.

Bitter Sweet A type of apple that has both Tannin and Sugar, normally has very little acid. Not normally a very nice apple to eat and is grown exclusively for cider production.

Bitter Sharp A type of apple that has both Tannin and Acid, not as sweet tasting as the bitter sweet and can have less sugar then the bitter sweet. Not that nice to eat and grown for cider production.

Sweet (apple) As would be expected a sweet apple with low levels of Tannin and Acid and high levels of sugar

Sharp A high Acid apple low in Tannin and often low in sugar, used in blends to add some bit or balance a high Tannin variety.

Culinary & Dessert Cooking and Eating apples, No tannin, very high in acid, can be good to use as “Sharps” or to make an “eastern counties” style cider.

Eastern Counties Style An Eastern counties style cider is made from eating and cooking apples. It is a thinner cider than one containing Tannin but can produce a very refreshing clean tasting cider.

Tannin Tannin in apples provide astringency and bitterness which provide mouth feel and body to the cider. In apples, tannins can range between hard and soft and provide infinite opportunity for blending Tannin/Acid/Sugar. Tannin produces a drying feeling in the mouth much like some red wines.

Malic Acid Malic Acid is the acid naturally found in apples in the same way citric acid is in oranges and lemons. Malic acid is the coating used in sour sweets which is why unripe apples are sour.

Dry Cider the term dry is used to signify that there is no discernible sweetness left in the cider. Unfortunately the industrial cider makers have shifted the boundary more and more to the sweet end of the spectrum and some industrial ciders labelled as “dry” are more of a medium sweet. Our dry ciders are DRY.

Wild Yeast Industrial ciders are fermented with a single variety yeast so they can get quick ferments with a consistent flavour. The only problem is they tend to produce a simplistic taste profile. Using wild yeasts that are present on and inside the fruit means the fermentation is done by a succession of different yeast strains, each one imparting their own characteristics to the cider, giving a much more complex taste profile.

Sub Micron Filtering This is a technique used to remove all residual yeast cells and small particles that prevent a cider from being crystal clear and also stops any chance of continued fermentation if any residual sugars are still present. Sounds good but this procedure also stripes out some of the flavour.

Fermentation fermentation is the action of yeast or bacteria on a substance changing it to another substance, in the case of cider the yeast takes the natural sugar in the apples and convert it to alcohol.