Cider for all Seasons

Pubs and bottle shops up and down the land are joining Little Pomona in its Cider For All Seasons campaign. Designed to illustrate why cider deserves to be enjoyed all year, the campaign kicks off with the first stop on the 2023 Disco Nouveau roadshow at The Yew Tree in Peterstow on Thursday 22 February.

Continuing for two months with meet the maker events, tap takeovers and cider club appearances, the roadshow takes in local hero Hereford Beer House, before journeying north to Manchester, Sheffield and Chester, west to Cardiff, and east to London, finishing back in the Shire, at Little Pomona’s Spring Open Day, on 13 April. 

Whether farm shop or deli, restaurant or pub, off license or local market, all involved with food and drink are invited to get involved. 

Feeling Alive

With its trademark tang, wild strawberry notes and racy, ripe apple notes, Disco Nouveau wakes the senses. 

From 6pm on 22 February, The Yew Tree will tap a keg for its Shire debut, alongside specially matched pizza from resident sour dough specialists, The Firebird Kitchen. 

Then it’s north to farmhouse brewery Rigg & Furrow in Northumberland. “We love the excitement of the first cider of the year from Little Pomona,” says Rigg & Furrow’s Harriet Edgar. “It’s the first glimpse of the rewards to come after everyone’s hard work during harvest,” she says. Harriet will be sharing Disco Nouveau at the brewery’s 7th birthday celebrations on Saturday 24 February.

Next stop is Hereford Beer House, and for proprietor Sion Harris, it’s the palate-awakening flavour that excites. “As winter turns to spring, Disco Nouveau is the perfect accompaniment to the change of season, as its sherbety fruit flavours come alive in your mouth. There really is no reason to wait until summer!” 

Grant Hutchison, co-owner of Aeble in Anstruther, has already cracked open Disco Nouveau for his customers. For him, it’s the fruit. “Discovery apples are really stealing the limelight when it comes to cider in my opinion,” he says. “I’m a sucker for anything made with them.”  

Taking Inspiration

While Disco Nouveau is a youthful drink, it’s the ability of the craft cider sector to draw from tradition and pursue new paths that adds complexity and interest to today’s drinks. The appeal for flavour explorers becomes ever more apparent, Grant says, with cider’s “ability to take influence from other worlds and thread those seamlessly into its own”.

“I initially got interested in Little Pomona due to the similarity of our names,” says Nick Greenhalgh, of Manchester’s award-winning brewery Pomona Island. “A happy coincidence because it turns out their cider is incredible! When we were looking for a cider company for lines in our two bars, they were the first and only call we made. 

“The creativity in the cider world sometimes goes under the radar, with all the noise about craft beer or natural wine but they’re making unbelievable drinks, which are properly diverse, exciting and really push boundaries,” Nick says. This creativity will be celebrated with a tap takeover at Pomona Island’s new craft beer bar, North Westward Ho.

Dissolving Boundaries

For Mike Pomranz, owner of The Old Shoe, Sheffield, it’s the chance to explore uncharted territory. “Counterintuitively, part of Little Pomona’s push to raise cider’s profile has been their willingness to crossover – to reach out to wine drinkers and beer drinkers, highbrow cider drinkers but also casual cider drinkers – and Disco Nouveau handles it all: pure and delicious, intellectual but broadly appealing. 

“There seems to be a temptation at the moment for bar owners to revert to ‘safer’ more established brands, but we’ve found the opposite. When you give people quality stuff at a fair price they’re more engaged and excited to come back and try more.”

Mike will be sharing tastes of the live keg conditioned version – “my preferred method” – in late March.

Don’t Miss Out

“What orchard-driven cider offers is flavour, quality and depth all year round,” says co-founder Susanna Forbes, a point highlighted by Doug Wregg, co-founder of distributor Les Caves de Pyrene, in his recent blog post, The Alternative Perspective: A Question of Taste.

“The small-batch cider-making approach allows them [Little Pomona] to be inventive and take risks,” he wrote. “As a result, they produce so many different styles, demonstrating the sheer versatility of cider.

“If you are prone to slot cider into the ‘it’s-only-apples’ box, view it purely as a non-wine beverage for immature palates, or one incapable of exhibiting great quality, then you will never taste the true qualities that these ciders exhibit.

“Ciders are usually hived off to some hidden part of the list and may be found in an ‘other drinks’ section or possibly as an aperitif, both of which totally ignores their gastronomic potential.”

And the gastronomic possibilities will be explored on the campaign trail. Following on from The Firebird Kitchen pizza pairing, there’ll be posh bar snack matching at Hereford Beer House, glorious Venetian small plates at Bacareto in Cardiff, with That Beer Place in Chester reaching out to their favourite local cheesemonger for some classic cider matches.

Get Involved

All retailers, pubs, bars and restaurants are invited to join the campaign. Disco Nouveau is available through Little Pomona’s key distributors (see Notes), posters are available to support, and the team welcome invites to join to share tastes and tales.

Notes to Editors

1. Available in keykeg and 75cl bottle format, Disco Nouveau is available with the rest of the Little Pomona portfolio from The Fine Cider Co, Les Caves de Pyrene, Pigs Ears Beer, Dunns in Scotland, and Eebria Trade. Because of its nature, supplies are limited.
   Available direct via the cidery’s Tasting Room and webshop.
2. Founded in 2015, Little Pomona is based near Bromyard, north Herefordshire. Its expansion and move to Brook House Farm in 2019 was supported by an RDPE grant from the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development.
3. Trade and media visits are always welcome. Please get in touch to arrange.
4. From April to September Little Pomona’s Tasting Room and Cider Garden are open Saturdays and Thursday evenings, and by appointment. Between October and March, the cidery Bottle Shop is open Saturdays, 12-3pm. 
5. Behind the scenes tours run every fortnight between April and September.
6. Little Pomona exports to a half-a-dozen countries, including USA, Germany, Belgium and Japan, and most recently, Singapore.
7. Further information on Disco Nouveau tour is available on the cidery website.

Further information, comment and images available from Susanna Forbes, susanna@littlepomona.com

littlepomona.com, instagram, facebook, X: @littlepomona

Photo credit: Will Leszczynski

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Further information, comment and images available from Susanna Forbes, susanna@littlepomona.com