Hillbilly cider has a track record of making some very good cider. They have had 2 new releases this season. Previously I looked at the Sweet Julie a few months back but now it’s time to get a little funky as things are getting a bit cloudy. Introducing the Hillbilly Scrumpy Cloudy Apple Cider.
Hillbilly had taken inspiration from the guys over in Somerset scrumpy. Scrumpy was typically homemade ciders on small farms used to pay the workers on the farms. The quality of the scrumpy differed wildly but a good scrumpy attracted good staff.
The Hillbilly Scrumpy like the Somerset scrumpy uses old English cider apples. Hillbilly has added a little bit of an Aussie twist with a helping of Aussie eating apples. Being in the foothills of the Blue Mountains the apple growing conditions are pretty ideal so of course, all the apples being used are grown on Hillbilly’s home orchards or are locally sourced. One of the key traits of a good scrumpy is the smell of a barnyard often where they are made. Again Hillbilly has sought to recreate some of that barnyard smell.
The Nose
Earthy yeast dominates smell early on. That’s the beginnings barnyard smell. I think it a wise choice to dial it back and just go for the friending earthy notes rather than the full-on exhausted stock horse smell, as, as it warms more apples come through. More on the temperature soon.
The Taste
The Hillbilly Scrumpy Cloudy Apple Medium dry. Nice bright lots of crunchy green apple flavour. The pint is ferociously bubbly making sure the cider hits every corner of your mouth. Right at the tail end, there is a some of that funky yeast coming in, it’s not too heavy and you would find it hard to be put off by it. Again, like the smell, as it warms more and more apple flavours come out.
Again, like the smell, as it warms more and more apple flavours come out.
Final Thoughts on the Hillbilly Scrumpy
This has been a hard review, the problem being that I kept drinking the bottle before I could write about it. I’ve had to go back to the bottle shop at least 3 times. It just goes down too easily. With the ridiculous heat that’s been hitting Sydney its good to have a full-bodied cider that can stand up to being served ice-cold. The Hillbilly Scrumpy is close to being the perfect it’s-a-stinking-hot-day-I-need-an-ice-cold-cider-now type of cider.
| Product | Scrumpy Cloudy Apple Cider |
| Company | Hillbilly |
| Sweetness | Off Dry |
| Alc/Vol | 6% |
| Website | hillbillycider.com.au |
| Country of Origin | Australia |
| Region | Bilpin, Blue Mountains, New South Wales |
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April 24, 2019
This is very quickly becoming my favourite cider to top up my 2L growers. Top drop. Their pear cider is back on tap and is just as good.
November 11, 2019
Drinking this one now. There’s not much else worth trying in the fridge at the local bottles hop. This is a genuinely pleasant surprise. There’s some clear artifice at play in terms of Old World and New world ciders – it’s still as clean as you’d expect from a commercial cider at first and then you’re right, in kicks this hint of barnyard that’s almost hidden under the clean fruit. It’s drier than expected in the end too which is a massive relief in an ocean of sickly ciders. There’s this lovely champagne like dryness that I think matches that carbonation you mentioned.