A HEREFORDSHIRE cider company is sparkling with success after winning an award for its cider.

The Cheyney Lodge Cider Company, in Bishop's Frome, near Bromyard, won the accolade in the annual Flavours of Herefordshire awards.

The award recognises the quality of the product, its prominent links with Herefordshire and the way the produce is marketed locally and nationally.

Cider-makers Mike Henney and Beth Leadbeater have been selling a sparkling dry cider, called Frome Valley, through local off-licences and pubs for the past 18 months.

Recently, however, the product, has been listed by Tesco and will appear on supermarket shelves throughout Herefordshire and Worcestershire.

Another variety is the Dabinett & Bramley cider.

To create the wine-style cider, the couple blend the cider apple, Dabinett, with Bramley cooking apples.

The product even comes packaged in a corked, wine-style, bottle and is best served with a meal.

All the apples are sourced locally from Herefordshire orchards and harvested between September and December.

The Cheney Lodge press processes around half-a-tonne of apples an hour, the juice from which is fermented for up to three months in storage tanks.

It is then left to mature for a further six months before being transported to the bottling plant.

"The process we use isn't too dissimilar to making wine," said Mr Henney.

"Next May and June, this autumn's vintage cider will be ready to drink. We don't like to rush the process. We like to keep it as natural as we can to produce such a distinctive flavour."

Flavours of Herefordshire, now in its third year, is an award scheme made up of several categories that aims to encourage catering and food outlets to find their supplies locally wherever possible.

The awards are sponsored by Herefordshire Council and Heart of England Fine Foods (HEFF).

HEFF chief executive Karen Davies said this year had been "an exceptionally difficult one" for local food producers.

"These awards recognise the resilience of many of our local producers, who have continued to reinforce the distinctiveness of local products, and identifies the increasing number of cafes, shops, pubs, restaurants and food producers that have got on board with the scheme by buying locally," she said.