I’m still dazed and amazed at my unbelievable good fortune with this
cider at last week’s Royal Bath and West Show. To win the cup for the
champion Farmhouse Cider was like a dream in itself. When that same
cider was then chosen as the Supreme Champion of the Show, I scarcely
was able to take it in. It seemed just incredible! Having had a
completely trophyless lifetime, (I was totally useless at all sports
in my schooldays), to unexpectedly win two silver pots, big ones at
that, was certainly breaking new ground. I was thrilled to bits! For
me this was not only the high point of this cidermaking year but of
all my cidermaking years and doubtless of those yet to come. A joyful,
once in a lifetime experience, thanks to the golden juice from a tiny,
18 tree, Dorset orchard!

I felt honoured to be the first cider maker to bring these two trophys
to Dorset. On coming back here with them last Saturday, I had the
curious thought that bringing the Worshipful Fruiterers Supreme Cider
Cup out of Somerset, seemed rather like stealing the Stone of Scone. I
note however that Alex Hill wrested it across the boundary into Devon,
after winning with his Bollhayes Cider in 2006. But in all other
years it has remained solidly in its home county, being won by
Somerset producers, large, medium and small (notably our Michael Cobb
in 2004).

I might have known that such braggart thoughts could elicit an ancient
Somerset curse, perhaps muttered by some old farmer on the Levels,
into his mug of scrumpy. And so it was that on Sunday morning I found
water was pouring out from under the ciderhouse door and there was an
unpleasant hissing sound coming from within. A pipe had burst during
the night, spraying water upwards and drenching everything. The
electrics had tripped due to water in the light fittings. The steel
vats had been topped up with water on top of their sealed lids.
Fortunately this was unable to penetrate into the cider held below the
seals. Most things were none the worse for a soaking but there was one
terrible exception. A few days earlier I had worked hard bottling,
corking, wiring and labelling, 150 bottles of keeved Kingston Black.
I’d then packed them into cardboard boxes and stacked them below the
table for temporary storage. This whole stack of boxes had now become
a soggy mess. It took most of Sunday to get the water out, from in and
under furnishings and equipment. Today I set to work rescuing the
bottles of Kingston from their squelchy cartons. I found that a large
number of the bottle labels had also been ruined. There is a lot of
work that now has to be done again.

It was a chore sorting out this little disaster area today, but I was
buoyed up with a new resolve. When the Kingston has been reworked I
intend to bottle the winning cider with a little sugar into heavy
weight bottles. This should then preserve it as a sparkler that can be
enjoyed as a memento of last week’s success, for a good few years to
come. I wont put any boxes of it under the table though, just in case.

Rose