The best restaurant in London is St John and the best time to visit St John is around 2pm on a weekday, alone, when you can order a middlewhite pork sandwich - or potted beef, kippers; whatever - and a litre of Kerisac Breton cider. 1000ml of soft, sweet perfection, seems like a lot for one person, the girthy bottle landing on the table like a lunar module, but is in fact less than two pints. And it's only 5.5%, so you could probably do a second round, if you absolutely had to.
Breton cider, characterised by it being made in Brittany in northern France from unsweetened apples of the region, is not like the cider you know from British pubs. Barely any fizz - perhaps maybe just an effervescent whisper - its rich, caramel sweetness and golden colour lend it a wholesome, unpretentious vibe. The kind of thing you quaff with brothers of the plough after a day of toil in the hazy fields of the Vannetais.
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Until now, Breton cider has been somewhat overlooked, existing as the order of a learned-few - a discerning people who want the Gallic elegance of a bottle of wine and the stoic charm of a beer, for the price of a Zone 1 Guinness. But momentum is slowly building. this, I suggest, could be our Breton summer.
"We've had it since day one," says Brodie Meah, co-founder of natural wine bar and merchant Top Cuvée, which stocks Kerisac cider alongside pet-nats, orange wines etc. "It's a funny one, because I think it's made from organic orchards, but you wouldn't think so because the price point is pretty approachable [compared to organic or natural wines - a litre of Kerisac is £7 at Shop Cuvée]. In that respect it's similar to Chin-Chin [the hyper-popular vinho verde] - it's just really popular but also fits in with the flavour profile of what we do."
Cider, on the whole, is on the cusp of making a breakthrough. Traditionally, just the word 'cider' has provoked giggles of a gentle anti-rural sentiment, but the landscape is changing. Quite literally in some cases. Across the southern half of the UK, people are doing weird, exciting, artisanal things with apple juice, and rebranding a charming, unsexy pub drink into something much more slick. And since Brexit, and shifting nature of climate, producers have been turning their gaze to domestic ingredients, and, boy, have we got a lot of apples.
As for Breton, specifically, Meah thinks it (or new, British products just like it) will likely spearhead the burgeoning cider revolution. Partly for the fact that it's delicious, but still complex, and it's lower in alcohol than wine, which appeals to our new sense of measured sobriety. And partly because a strong, buoyant natural-booze market has been well-established, and cider can placate people looking for the next big thing. (It also helps that the hokey, illustrated label of a bottle of Kerisac - the predominant brand found in London - will look especially good on social media.) Add all that to the arrival of a new piece of legislation that offers UK cider makers a tax break for products brewed under 8.5% strength, and it's a perfect storm. Cloudy, with a chance of hangovers.