h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

You live and learn! I know you can make a type of champagne from pears, but cider sounds more like fun

It was really nice. But I did make myself look very dim.

A perfect hair of the dog:

Fill a regular coffe-maker with enough coffee
substitute water with vodka
turn on machine
add sugar and milk to taste

If done right, this will keeep you drunk and wide awake for a day or two...

194376

Pear cider is also known as Perry.

That's the one! It was really nice, I must try and get hold of some.

Your best bet is quality wine shops- but remember it's like Sommerset cider in taste and strength, not strongbow cr*p!

I have to say that Iced Coffee made properly is one of the most delicious drinks ever - assuming of course you like coffee! It's got to be made proper like and there's no point drinking it if it's p'ing down however much Starbucks might try and persuade you that it's a good idea

How you can confuse Perry and Cider I don't know! The only perry I've ever tasted was the sensory equivalent of swimming in slurry ... not to be recommended.

I like the 'ice cream' coffee. Abi introduced me, and now I'm addicted.

Hey KerrAvon, I like strongbow too.

I was in a cider bar, drinking various types of cider. I was and

Where was this cider bar Linda ...

*recalls 'enjoyment' derived from 2.5 litre flagon of Scrumpy selling at the staggeringly good price of £4.09p from one of the larger supermarkets ... the jubilee weekend, or rather monday night, wouldn't have been the same without it*

Incidentally - big fan of Strongbow although still get vaguely perplexed looks when asked what you want to drink ... nothing hits the mark like a strongbow ...

Ooh, mind the splinters

30 years ago I had my first taste of scrumpy, brewed at The Shallows pub, somewhere between Bath and Bristol it was a wicked wicked thing!

I suspect it would fall foul of some EU food and drink directive now, but it was mind blowingly strong, but you didn't find out till you tried to stand up!

I'm not sure how it differs from cider, scrumpy is from apples too for those unfamiliar with it, but has a higher alcohol content.

My favourite 'pub' style cider is Blackthorn.

Cider bar = A493526
Read about on h2g2, and inspected with fellow cider drinking Researchers.

Who'd've thunk it ...

*writes down name and pledges to visit next time he's in The Smell*

In case you were wanting to know, and I know you probably were, The best cider I've been able to find in a supermarket is Westons Organic ... my old flatmate had nothing to do one evening so we went to the supermarkets around us and bought every type of cider we could find and did a tasting. The taste of the Westons was indescribable - the others should have been embarrassed to call themselves cider ...

*makes notes*

Having failed miserably to find cider when I visit other European countries, I found some French cider in a Cafe Rouge. IT was reallynice, and not I nuy it in Sainsburys. Normandy cider I think.

This fact is probably no longer true due to EU directives and suchlike, but I was told once - by a rustic type from the depths of the west country - that real scrumpy is as good as it is because when they press the apples, anything lurking in the straw (rodents etc) gets pressed too...

Just thought I'd share that with you!

The difference between commercial cider and scrumpy cide is simple- commercial cider isn't made with apples- it just has low-grade apple juice added to it during fermentation. Real scrumpy cider is made from what's known as 'cheese'- the apple pulp formed in the cider press, which is then fermented, so it really is fermented apple juice. Whereas stuff like strongbow, diamond white et al is fermented sugar with apple juice addded to it.



As to rodents getting pressed, well possibly, but anything added during fermentation would end the process there and then- yeast is a delicate fungi, and any bacterial contamination while kill it off, ending the brew there and then! That's why breweries are cleaner than kitchens.

Linda, if you like perry, you'd lurrrrrve a sparking drink advertised by a baby deer that goes very well with brandy

would have to be a Pimms, floating on the Thames at Henly during the Regatta.

Preferably floating in a boat

Do you mean Babycham, Granny?

If you do I've only tried it once, and it was too dry for me. But then I think that about Champagne as well. I prefer something sweet and sparkling.