Breweries, cider and perry makers

The Marches area contains an increasingly large number of small breweries that produce some excellent quality real ale and stout - much of it found only in the local area - and the emphasis is often on using local hops from Hereford and Worcester. As well as traditional brews, made with care and only pure ingredients, there's much innovation going on, and the Food Festival helps to recognise and highlight this important (and tasty) field of activity. And the Festival's new offspring, Ludlow Spring Festival, held in May, focuses on the three very important subjects of beer, bread and sausages - see the Spring Festival website for more information.

In Ludlow itself, Ludlow Brewing Company is to be found in Corve Street. Visitors are welcome to sample and buy its beers, which include the very popular Gold and the curiously named Boiling Well, as well as Ludlow Bitter, and more. Their beers can be found in many local pubs.

Other nearby breweries include Hobsons of Cleobury Mortimer, whose association with, and support for, the Food Festival dates back to 1995, our first year. They are particularly well known for their Best Bitter, the Mild (a beautiful and surprisingly tasty dark ale which won Camra's Best Beer of Britain award in 2007), and Town Crier, but there are others too, such as Old Henry, Twisted Spire and Manor Ale.

At the Sun Inn at Corfton, around five miles from Ludlow in the Corve Dale, Norman Pearce presides over the Corvedale Brewery which produces Norman's Pride and a variety of other interesting beers. Another pub brewing some distinctively good beers, some of which are on sale elsewhere, is the Six Bells pub and adjoining micro-brewery at Bishops Castle.

Also in Bishops Castle is the renowned Three Tuns Brewery, situated next to the pub of the same name (though now the pub is in separate ownership). The Three Tuns has had a brewing licence since 1642, making it the oldest licensed brewery in the UK. At the advent of the Campaign for Real Ale in the 1970s, the Three Tuns Brewery, with the adjacent Three Tuns Inn, was one of only four home-brew pubs still operating in the whole of Britain. Its survival can be attributed to the custodianship of the John Roberts family, who bought the pub and brewery sometime in the 1880s, and who built the tower. John Roberts' son, Erskine Roberts, and his grandson, John Roberts, continued brewing into the mid-1970s. The brewery went through an uncertain time at the end of the 20th century and closed for a period, but its current enthusiastic owners took over in 2003 and have invested a considerable amount of money in the building and equipment. The Three Tuns Brewery's beers, including Cleric's Cure and 1642 Bitter are now to be found in many pubs throughout the Marches - as well as in the pub next door - and the future looks bright.

Wood's of Wistanstow, near Craven Arms is another long-established micro-brewery with an excellent reputation, brewing Shropshire Lad and Parish Bitter as well as a series of seasonal and one-off brews. Going north, Salopian Brewery in Shrewsbury produces the very popular Darwin's Origin as part of a distinctive range of brews, whilst in the opposite direction Wye Valley Brewery at Stoke Prior in Herefordshire, one of the Festival's sponsors, is perhaps the largest brewer in the area: its products include Wye Valley Bitter, Butty Bach, HPA, and a variety of Dorothy Goodbody ales.

Moving across the border, the Breconshire Brewery in Brecon produces an interesting range including Golden Valley, Cribyn and Red Dragon.

Cider and perry

A few miles south of Ludlow you enter Herefordshire, famous for cider and perry. Worcestershire, very close by, also produces cider and perry; but you don't even have to leave Shropshire - Mahorall Farm Cider at Nash, near Ludlow makes some splendid traditional cider and apple juice that is free from additives, and they have a stand at the Food and Drink Festival.

Bulmer's, based in Hereford and now part of Heineken, is the largest cider manufacturer in the world, but it is the traditional artisan ciders and perries that can be found throughout the 'three counties' (Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Gloucestershire) that interest us the most. Westons, based at Much Marcle, is probably the largest of the independent producers, and their products are almost entirely traditionally made but nevertheless are widely distributed throughout the UK. Most of the remaining producers are very small enterprises, often one-man bands - but some of these artisan producers make the best quality cider and perry that you will find anywhere in the world. Good cider and perry shouldn't be confused with 'rough' or 'scrumpy'.

Traditional perry, which not so long ago had a very uncertain future is undergoing a renaissance. Please don't get confused by the recent outbreak of commercial products called "pear cider" - the name itself is a contradiction in terms and it's not at all clear what "pear cider" contains!

Real perry is made only from perry pears, an astringent-tasting fruit (you wouldn't want to eat one) that is not the same as the dessert pears we happily eat. The trees grow almost exclusively in the "three counties" area, also extending across the border into Wales, especially Monmouthshire, and many of them are very old indeed (200 or 300 years old is not unusual), so little real perry is made anywhere else in Britain. Perry, although made in much the same way as cider, is an entirely different drink with much more subtlety. Some would argue that the finest perries should be treated as seriously as a fine wine.

Here are some of the leading perry and cider producers that are nearest to Ludlow, many of whom are present at the Food and Drink Festival:
Butford Organics, Bodenham, Herefordshire
Oliver's Cider and Perry, Ocle Pychard, Herefordshire
Ralph's Cider and Perry, Old Badland, New Radnor, Powys
Greggs Pit Cider and Perry, Much Marcle, Herefordshire
Gwatkin Cider, Abbey Dore, Herefordshire
Barbourne Cider, Worcester
Norbury's Norrest Farm and Cider Co, Storridge, nr Malvern
Mahorall Farm Cider, Nash, nr Ludlow
Brook Farm Cider and Perry, Wigmore, nr Leominster
Ross-on-Wye Cider and Perry (Mike Johnston), Broome Farm, Peterstowe, Ross-on-Wye
Dunkerton's, Pembridge, Herefordshire
Newton Court Cider, Newton, Leominster