Seven Oaks Farmhouse Rous Latour Cider

Seven Oak Farmhouse Cider are a bit of a rare breed in Australia’s cider scene. We’re starting to see a few single variety ciders on the shelves. Most of these are made with eating apples; one or two might be English cider apples. Seven Oaks are making a single variety cider with the French “Rous Latour” cider apple.

Seven Oaks try to keep their ciders pretty natural and traditional. Their orchards are free from pesticides. Apple pulp is pressed in old fashion cloth racks. The juice ferments slowly for up to 9 months, creating a complex flavour. Finally the ciders are not over loaded with preservatives, with a minimum amount added.

The Looks

The Rous Latour I tasted was in a 500ml bottle, all of the Seven Oaks Ciders have similar bottles running on the same theme.

When I poured a pint of the Rous Latour, a mostly clear dark golden cider came out. The photos don’t do the darkness justice. There was some sediment in the bottom, now it’s much more cloudy.

The Nose

The Seven Oaks cider has a nose full of honey and apple crumble. It’s pretty subtle with not a lot of fizz to carry the aromas.

The Taste

The Rous Latour apple is a small sweet apple often used in French ciders. Sweet apples either makes dry high alcohol ciders or low alcohol sweet ciders. Seven Oaks has gone down the sweet path

A very small bead of bubbles push a thick and luxurious layer of dark cooked apples all over your tongue. At 3% there is plenty of sugar left over to make a nice round sweetness. The flavour hangs around long enough to soak it all up. In the background there is a little bit spice.

With French influences, I was expecting more astringency but its pretty smooth and round.

Final Thoughts on Rous Latour

This cider has been siting in the back of my fridge for a while now, at least 6 month. I don’t know why I didn’t try it sooner, maybe I was saving it for a rainy day.  Tonight was cold and wet, wet might be an understatement, some are calling it the biggest storm in 10 years to hit Sydney.  Somehow with a beef and red wine pie in the oven I thought this would be the night to open it. While the flavours may not be the perfect match, the textures were. The thick mouth feel of the Rous Latour cider match the pies gravy. I was glad i wasn’t drinking something light and crisp tonight.

Now that I’ve read more about Seven Oak’s there are some other single variety ciders they make that I’d like to try.  The Rous Latour is not a full on smelly french style cider by any stretch but it is very comfortable on a cold night.

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