Cider
Cider ( ) is an alcoholic beverage made from the fermented juice of apples. Cider is popular in the United Kingdom, especially in the West Country, and widely available. The UK has the world's highest per capita consumption, as well as its largest cider-producing companies. Cider is also popular in many Commonwealth countries, such as India, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Aside from the UK and its former colonies, cider is popular in other European countries including Ireland, Portugal (mainly in Minho and Madeira), France (particularly Brittany and Normandy), northern Italy (Piedmont and Friuli), and Spain (especially Asturias and the Basque Country). Central Europe also has its own types of cider with Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse producing a particularly tart version known as Apfelwein. In the U.S. and parts of Canada, varieties of fermented cider are often called "hard cider" to distinguish alcoholic cider from non-alcoholic "cider" or "sweet cider", also made from apples.
Cider in the United Kingdom
Further final evidence from an archaeological dig in Gloucester in 2002 suggests that crab apples, in addition to their traditional use as a foodstuff, were also being pressed into an alcohol sweetened with honey. With the invasion of 1066 the natural sugar in the Norman apples slowly displaced the need for honey as a sweetening agent and so began the love affair between the English and their apples and cider. Increased planting of apple trees began in earnest as soon as the feudal system introduced by William of Normandy could be secured, and continued down over what is becoming close to a thousand years.