Description
From Unsprayed Orchards: Gluten Free – Suitable for Vegans & Coeliacs
What an amazing selection from the Ross-on-Wye Cider & Perry Company! This embodies everything that is wonderful about Cider and Perry.
Cider Selection:
2 x 750ml 2019 Ellis Bitter & Foxwhelp – 6.8% ABV
Our Ellis Bitter (82%) and Foxwhelp (18%) grow side-by-side in Hangman’s Orchard, on a steep, south-facing hillside. They ripen at the same time, and thus we often choose to blend them together. These are powerful apples, meaning that the real key to this cider is timing. Fermenting in barrel, patience during maturation, and then choosing when to bottle. The result is a silky cider, characterised by triumphant Foxwhelp-led juiciness that rolls over the palate with a wisp of smoke, and interwoven Ellis Bitter and oak tannins.
2 x 750ml 2019 HMJ + Dabinett + Reinette d’Obry – 7.4% ABV
The three varieties in this cider were pressed and fermented individually, matured and then blended for bottling by us on a cold December morning. It begins with HMJ, a full and grippy bittersweet apple. We add another: Dabinett, fruit- forward and flavoursome. To complete, Reinette d’Obry, a light, yellow, acidic variety that was fermented in oak. Together they produce a cider with balance, body and verve. There is bright juiciness that leads into a deliciously well- ordered symphony of tannins, fruit and oak cask.
2 x 750ml 2019 Dabinett + Ashton Bitter + Browns Apple – 7.4% ABV
This is the classic Herefordshire style blend: 75% bittersweet (two parts Dabinett, one part Ashton Bitter) with 25% sharp to add some juicy acidity and balance in the form of Browns Apple. We gained further complexity by fermenting the Browns and Ashton Bitter in Kentucky and Scottish oak casks respectively. This is cider at both its most simple – just use apples, barrels & time – and its most complete – full ferment tannic and acidic apples balancing dryness, fruit and wood.
Perry Selection:
A superb limited edition naturally conditioned sparkling perries, made from perry pears grown in their own orchards on trees over thirty years old:
2 x 2020 – Thorn & Flakey Bark Oak Cask Perry (5.8% ABV)
This is Thorn, but not as you know it. 90% Thorn, 10% Flakey Bark meets fermentation in ex-Raison d’Être barrels. The result is completely unique. Rather than the big acidity of Thorn, or the challenging astringency of Flakey, or even the smoke of oak casks, everything is rolled into one. One luscious, juicy, unbroken flavour that begins on the lips and fills the mouth completely. Gorgeous, quaffable, green and silky, full flavoured perry with no compromise.
2 x 2020 Yellow Huffcap S.V. (7.3% ABV)
Yellow Huffcap is a wonderful variety, but it is one of those pears that could also be described as a ‘nightmare. As a tree it is magnificent, easily growing to more than fifty foot tall. That becomes a challenge during the harvest as this is one of those pears which ‘bletts’ on the tree, meaning if you do not collect the fruit quickly enough, it will all be rotten before you can press it! But if you manage it, then the perry it produces is unique in all the world, full of crisp acidity, sweet sherbet and honeysuckle notes.
2 X 2019-2020 Green Horse S.V. (7.2% ABV)
Green Horse is an unusual pear first recorded in 1886, though where it originated or what name those first pear pickers gave it, nobody truly knows. Pears are winding, mysterious entities that, although we see them but once a year, watch us through the generations. This perry, made from just two trees, last fruited in 2013. Yet to our delight, two harvests appeared in succession. The 2020 juice, full of zingy, limey acidity blended gorgeously with the mature, malolactic fermentation influenced, soft and creamy 2019 barrel. May contain a natural sediment from bottle conditioning.
Please Note: We may change the above selection if we do not have enough stock.
