More acclaim for pub's effortsto promote real cider drinking

A PUB which has won national acclaim for its cider has won yet another accolade.

Just weeks after it was named joint winner of the cider and perry pub of the year competition by the Campaign for Real Ale (Camra), local members have voted the Hop & Vine the best in the city for the second year running.

A certificate was handed over to the pub yesterday as part of the branch’s annual Cider Pub of the Year Presentation Crawl.

The pub, which is run by licensee Stewart Campbell, and which prides itself for offering “real ale, real cider and real food”, including home-baked bread, will now compete with others in the region for the Yorkshire title.

The watering hole – in a downstairs bar on Albion Street – fought off the Wellington Inn, in Russell Street which was the runner-up and Walters Bar, Scale Lane in Hull which came third.

The three pubs were nominated by local members and were then visited by judges who looked at the quality of the cider, its price, the service given and its “community focus.”

David Litten, Camra’s Hull and East Yorkshire Branch Apple Representative said: “The Hop & Vine offers a winning combination of quality, choice and perfect temperature in a cosy cellar bar atmosphere.”

Branch chairman Alan Canvess added: “The Hop & Vine actively promotes the sale of real ciders, with one of them sold on a prominently positioned hand pump.”

In the last year the Hop and Vine has served 63 different ciders and perries.

In the Middle Ages when many abbeys and monasteries brewed their own cider and today more cider is drunk in the UK than anywhere else in the world.