It used to be deeply naff, drunk only by teens and maybe your nana; so how did cider get its fizz back to be the drink of the summer, asks Nicky Pellegrino.
For years it was considered hopelessly uncool, the alcoholic beverage equivalent of waist-high knickers or John Rowles. And then suddenly cider turned into the hippest drink around, shoving beer and wine aside in supermarket chillers and prompting people all around the country to start turning apples into alcohol.
Cider, it turns out, is delicious: light, crisp, refreshing fruity. So why weren't we in love with it all along?
According to Tony Mercer maker of Monteiths Crushed Pear Cider and Crushed Apple Cider down in Greymouth, the drink had a terrible image problem.
"In England especially it was seen as cheap, low quality stuff packaged in plastic bottles," he says. "It wasn't presented properly."
But then cider had a makeover.
In the UK top brands were repackaged and the big producers began putting out limited editions in a bid to give the beverage a more sophisticated image.
And since we tend to follow the UK - at least as far as drinking is concerned - it wasn't long before cider began to catch on here in a big way too.
"People began to realise how pleasant it is to drink," says Mercer. "It's light and effervescent like champagne. The modern way to drink it is over crushed ice, which makes it the perfect drink for a hot summer's day."
Monteiths uses a secret blend of seven different apples that are picked when they're in season and kept in a cool-store so they can be crushed when the fresh juice is needed. "We experimented for a long time until we got the flavour we were looking for," says Mercer. "We were aiming for something with a residual sweetness, not too dry, with a definite flavour of apple or pear."
Monteiths knew it was on to something when last year it almost ran out of apples. This year it has doubled production.
For Gisborne's Brian Shanks, cider's coming of age feels like a vindication. He began making it back in 1988 after Cyclone Bola hit his orchard and he needed to find something to do with the fruit he could no longer sell for eating.
Enthused by his amateur efforts, he went to Britain to learn the secrets of cider-making and produced 5000 litres on his return. "Then I worried because it took me nearly a year to sell it," says Shanks. "It was an uphill struggle. Few people here had an understanding or appreciation of cider then. New Zealand was still a beer and spirits culture. Even wine was only just beginning to take off."
Shanks is now awash in cider. He produces 20,000 litres a day at his cidery and his Harvest brand, for many years the only one available nationally, competes with a growing range of ciders from major breweries and boutique producers.
DB Breweries has recently put out its subtle, refreshing Johnny Arrow brand; Mac's does an apple and a pear cider; Tauranga's Apple Tree does a delicious version with added wild elderflower and, at Redwood Cellars in Nelson - which has been making cider since 1947 - the Old Mout brand includes ciders blended with feijoa or boysenberry wine.
Merophy Hyslop has been the cider-maker at Old Mout for two years, although the former winemaker began experimenting with apples from her own small orchard several years ago. For her, one of cider's winning characteristics is its versatility when it comes to food-matching. It goes well with seafood, salads, sweet and savoury foods, meat, spicy Thai curries and cheeses. You can baste pork or marinate steak with it, too.
"And our BoysenCider is perfect for marinating strawberries overnight," Hyslop says. "They're delicious served with icecream."
Making cider is not dissimilar to winemaking in that it's all about the fruit.
"First it's crushed so you end up with a pulpy mixture," explains Hyslop. "Then it goes into the press to extract the juice. Yeast is added and it ferments to convert the sugar to alcohol. At that point you've got cider you can filter and blend."
New Zealand ciders are made with eating apples like braeburn, granny smith and cox's orange, so tend to be lighter and crisper than the ciders produced in Britain, where they use traditional bittersweet cider apples which are higher in tannins and have a more astringent flavour.
"We aren't really making ciders like that here yet," says Hyslop. "However, people are starting to grow cider apples, so small producers may begin popping up in the next year or so."
Sourcing apples is one of the cider-maker's biggest challenges. When Hannah Bower and Sam Whitmore began producing their Zeffer ciders in Matakana two years ago, they were thrilled to lay their hands on some of the remaining crops of the once-popular Victorian dessert apple sturmer pippin.
"They're similar to a granny smith but the flavour is superior," explains Bower. "It's one of those apples that went out of fashion and lots of orchards pulled out their trees, but we managed to find some."
At Zeffer the aim is to produce a drier cider, which makes starting with the right fruit critical. The results have been worth it - in the company's first year it sold out. "I think cider is a bit like wine," says Bower. "You may start drinking the sweeter ones then your palate matures and you prefer different flavours."
Cider varies in colour as well as flavour, depending on the apples used. When you're tasting it, what you should look for is effervescence rather than fizz, fruit flavour, a balance of acidity and sweetness and a good, long-lasting aftertaste.
There are some scrumpys on the market here but, generally, these are gutsier, more alcoholic versions of cider rather than the cloudy, rough-tasting scrumpys served up in the UK, where they've been brewing alcoholic apple drinks since 55BC.
Cider may be relatively young here but its future seems bright. "It's refreshing, natural, gluten-free and really appealing to women who are looking for an alternative to beer," says Hyslop. "Keeping up with the demand for it is a big challenge for us at the moment."
