Neil has started planning for pressing already – the new press has to be installed and configured, plus apples and storage to be sorted out. The pressing season always looms close after the busy summer months, and needs to be thought out. It’s probably the most important part of the year for Worley’s – everything hangs on the quality of the fruit and getting the pressing stage exactly right. The best juice makes the best cider – we don’t add lots of water to our ciders, so the apples and their juice has to be the best we can press.

Best juice
It works, we’ve just won a two-star rating in the Great Taste Awards for our lovely Special Reserve. These are the Oscars of UK Food & Drink and are run by the Guild of Fine Food We’re very proud of this achievement – it’s a cracking cider and our mission this year is to tell as many people about it as possible! Why not.

Special Reserve is a ‘keeved’ cider, which means the pressed juice is specially treated to reduce the level of ‘nutrient’ in it. This nutrient is naturally occurring in apple juice and is kind of like vitamins for yeast, so its scarcity makes the yeast struggle ad results in a very slow fermentation. After a couple of months or so, the yeast will almost stop working and – if you’ve done it right – will result in a naturally sweet, lower-alcohol cider.

The trick then is to catch the very tail end of the fermentation after the cider is bottled so the cider is effectively bottle-conditioned – in other words, it makes its own fizz. We start to sell any vintage once the cider has reached a lightly-conditioned, medium sweetness, but a very gradual fermentation will always contiune in the bottle if – like us – you don’t subsequently pasteurise them. So it’s an unpasteurised, unfiltered, naturally sweet and bottle-conditoned cider that delivers a cider of balanced complexity with gentle sweetness and mellow tannin.

Not pretty: the first stages of keeving – ‘le chapeau brun’ rises to the top. A jelly-like cap gathers on top of the sweet juice at the early fermentation stage.

View from below: you can see the dark layer on top of the pure, clear juice. Back-lit like this, it looks beautiful!

Two-star award-winning cider! Available in the UK and in the USA. Best drunk well-chilled on a sunny evening. A dish of olives, charcuterie and good cheese alongside.

Worley’s Cider Special Reserve. Two stars in the Great Taste awards 2017

At the office…
On a sunny day, there’s no better place to be. Photos sum it up better than words.

Through the gabled roof to the yard beyond

Cleaning the show barrels in the sunshine

Hello from the other side

It’s a difficult job, but someone’s…

Pub of the week
The Maltings looks like the kind of place we’d settle in for a pint or two. Our Twitter friends, the Maltings in York regularly carry a box of Worley’s Cider, so if you’re in York at any point seek out this top pub, with real ciders and ales on all the time. Food available in the daytime – we particularly like the sound of the burnt bread (cheese toasties to you and me!). Cheers Shaun & all!

The Maltings freehouse in York. A proper pub. We’ve not been there yet, but will definitely visit next time we’re in York.

It’s in Tanners Moat, York. 01904 655387 info@maltings.co.uk

Chill out, Winchester here we come
Into the summer swing here at Worley’s. Plenty of outside events to keep us busy, and even though the weather’s sometimes been dodgy, the cider’s been flowing. The Cheese and Chilli Festivals have been wonderful this year – always good, they seem to have really got into their stride in 2017. Downton Brewery serve their excellent beer next door, and there’s everything you could want from a Cheese and Chilli perspective. If you’ve not been yet – there’s one more for 2017, in Winchester on 19th & 20th August. www.cheeseandchillifestival.com.

Cider, cheese, chilli and good cheer. Thanks to everyone who has been to visit us at the bar this year.

Tickets available in advance or on the door for a little bit more.

You can get a delicious pint of cider, plus we have our full range of chilled bottles including our starry Special Reserve. See you there? Say hello!