If you thought Camra was just about real ale and pubs, you’d be wrong.

Camra also promotes cider and perry, and this year is celebrating 25 years of cider and perry campaigning. Real cider is a long-established traditional drink, which is produced naturally from apples and is neither carbonated nor pasteurised. However, cider and perry is in a similar situation to that which faced real ale some 30 years ago, with the number of outlets diminishing nationally. Keighley is bucking the trend with the Brown Cow joining the small group of regular real cider outlets in the town. It is unfortunate many of the most well-known ciders in the UK are cold, fizzy keg products, which have been produced artificially rather than naturally.

This year has seen a bumper crop of apples. Naylor’s Brewery in Cross Hills held its annual Cider Day in October, and it was so overwhelmed by apples it had to stop accepting deliveries.

The resulting Emporium Press cider is bottled for the people who provide apples, and is available at Naylor’s Emporium while stocks last and at Skipton Beer Festival, where it has previously won cider of the festival. The local Camra branch is not aware of any commercial cider producers in the Keighley area, but there is Grumpy John’s cider based in Shipley, and its cider is regularly on sale at the Fox pub in the town. WhatPub.com has a filter to identify pubs selling real cider. It lists 16 pubs within six miles of Keighley. An ideal opportunity to sample a range of real ciders and perries is at a Camra beer festival – Keighley had ten to choose from.

The local Camra branch also celebrated cider on a sunny Saturday in October in Appletreewick near Skipton, where both pubs sell cider on a regular basis.