Six Ciders for Christmas Day - The Pre-Dinner Snifter

The 'Unexpectedly bumping into friends in the Pub and accidentally drinking the afternoon away...' is certainly one of the better 'Memorable Pints'.

How about the 'Warming winter Pint in front of the crackling log fire after a long walk in the countryside', surely everyone loves that one.

A recent addition to the 'Memorable Pint' list is the 'Gosh, we appear to be snowed in and can't get to work so might as well go to the Pub... Blimey, everyone else in the village seems to have had the same idea, Mine's a Pint'... This one is a particular favourite of ours, and one we look forward to repeating some time during this years greatly anticipated Winter freeze.

Then there's the occasion which this post is all about, the 'Christmas Day lunchtime local Pint', always a little special, and as important a part of our Christmas Day as the Turkey and Tree (actually, nothing is more important than the Tree for our Karen).

We're very lucky to have a good draught cider available at all times in our village local the Red Lion, Middleton. When our own cider has ran out, we supply a range of quality alternatives from near and far to keep the 'Real Cider' flag flying through any shortages. The current 'Guest Cider' is from Hecks of Somerset, a proper West-Country cider from an award-winning producer. I'll probably go for the smooth, dry Tremlett's Bitter straight from the cellar, rather than the sweeter blended cider on handpump. A pint or two of this 6.5% beauty should set us up nicely for the Christmas Dinner.

Now I know what you're thinking! Recommending a cider in your local pub on Christmas Day is all well and good for those of us with a Real Cider pub on our doorstep, but what about the vast majority of pubs which offer little more than a range of poor quality bottled or draught 'industrial ciders' (you know the ones I'm talking about, though if your lucky there may be something decent from Aspall or Westons available). Well don't despair, in all honesty the main point of this blog post is less about the cider itself, and more about going to the pub on this special day. If there's nothing cidery worth drinking, feel free to deviate from the theme and try a good beer or wine instead. So long as it's in a pub amongst friends and acquaintances, your not likely to regret it.

Can't get to the pub! There's probably still time to order a bag-in-box of Real Cider for home consumption. Many of the larger regional cidermakers can deliver their draught ciders to your home, and the bag-in-box method guarantees that the cider will stay fresh and tasty throughout the Christmas period and beyond. Our good friends at Ross-on Wye Cider & Perry have recently set up an online sales website which I can heartily recommend, and for a wider range of West-Country ciders you might like to try CiderPunk.com.