Submitted by Julian on Wed, 07/10/2009 - 09:12
Posted in
Alan Stone will be leading a tasting of local Somerset ciders whilst talking about some of the adventures he had and characters he met whilst researching his Somerset Cider Handbook earlier this year, Copies of the book will be on sale.
The event is at the Swan Inn in Shepton Mallet on Thursday, 8th October at 8pm. For further information see the Shepton Life site.
Cider Tasting
This was a very interesting talk. Alan told us about the different types of cider made in Somerset ranging from rough farmhouse cider to mass produced products. In my view the most interesting are the high quality artisan ciders. We started of by tasting Heck's (from Street) vintage cider, a good example of a farmhouse cider from a blend of apples. We moved on to Heck's Kingston Black single variety cider and Heck's Port Wine of Glastonbury (made from Harry Master's Jersey apples and matured in red wine barrels). Thatchers are a larger cider maker and we tasted their Cheddar Valley with it's unique bright orange colour. Finally we tasted Gaymer's (from Shepton Mallet) Stewley Orchard cider, a bottled carbonated cider from a single orchard. All the ciders were good in their own way but my preference was for the Heck's single variety ciders.