Iford Wild Fermented Cider

Iford Wild Fermented Cider is made by a 1-man team of cider makers from southeast of Bath in Somerset. As they say, “it’s just wild fermented fresh apples”.

Iford cider has a pretty cool mission, stick it to the big players with the big budgets who indulge in a bit of craft washing and pretend to be micro-cider houses with a bit of wood grain on the label (I’m looking at you pinnacle brands).

Iford keeps it simple, local fresh apples, ferment them with wild yeast. Wild ferments can have incredibly complex flavours, herding those wild yeast in the right direction is nearly as hard as herding budgies. The real skill is making a consistent cider, batch after batch. So how does it go?

The Nose

It smells great, there is chocolate and Port. A drop of molasses and even something a little nutty. So many different elements that are easy enough to spot even outside on a windy afternoon.

The Taste

Again, there is so much going on here. It packs a big fruit punch but still manages to have a dry, tannin finish. It’s a hard one to describe. It has a lot in common with the other Somerset ciders I’ve been drinking over the last few weeks but somehow stands out on its own as a raspberry and cherry hum. The whole wild ferment isn’t doing anything too extreme; it’s not taking it in a barnyard direction. It’s right in the goldilocks zone.

Final Thoughts on the Iford Wild Fermented Cider

If Iford set out to prove that you don’t need to add the stuff that’s too hard to spell into a cider to make it taste like an interesting Cider, they have succeeded. For Iford it’s just local apples and the yeast that comes in on them and you know what? It’s a bloody tasty cider.

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