Sensory descriptor
Strawberry
A soft red-fruit note from furanone and ester chemistry, arising in fermentation or from added fruit.
- Aroma family
- Berry
- Does it indicate a fault?
- It depends on the style it is met in
What causes it
The characteristic strawberry volatile is 4-hydroxy-2,5-dimethyl-3(2H)-furanone, usually called furaneol, and it is formed in cider by yeast from sugar-derived precursors as well as being present in added strawberry fruit. Ethyl butanoate and ethyl 2-methylbutanoate supply the red-fruit ester component alongside it. In a cider with no added fruit, a strawberry note therefore reports on the ferment and on the presence of furaneol at concentrations well below a gram-per-litre scale, since its threshold is extremely low. Fruit ciders reach the same perception by direct addition, which is a labelling matter as well as a sensory one.
The compounds responsible
Where the molecule is established. Some descriptors in this lexicon name a compound the compound register does not yet hold a record for; those are named in the cause above instead.
Ethyl butanoate
A short-chain ethyl ester perceived at very low concentration, giving the sweet pineapple-and-apple lift that reads as ripe fruit in a young cider.
Fructose
The dominant sugar of apple juice and the sweetest of the common sugars, which is why apple juice tastes sweeter than its total sugar figure implies and why a stuck ferment leaves sweetness behind.
Ethyl hexanoate
One of the most powerfully aromatic esters in cider, perceptible at a few micrograms per litre, contributing green apple and aniseed to the fruit complex.
What raises it
Processes that increase this character, or preserve it where it would otherwise be lost.
Fruit addition
Bringing fruit other than apple or pear into a cider as juice, purée, whole fruit or concentrate, where the timing of the addition decides whether you keep the aroma or the alcohol.
Inoculated fermentation
Starting a ferment by pitching a chosen yeast culture so that one known strain, rather than the fruit’s resident population, does the work.
Yeast selection
Choosing which cultured strain to pitch, on the basis of the temperature, nitrogen, alcohol and aroma behaviour that separates one commercial yeast from another.
Where it is usually met
Fruit and styles this character is recorded in. A record here is where the descriptor is commonly found, not a claim that every example shows it.
About Strawberry
The descriptor is common in commercial fruit cider, where its cause is straightforward addition, and occasional in unfruited cider, where it is a genuine ferment product and worth noting as such.
It should not be confused with the raspberry note of the framboise fault, which arises from bacterial metabolism and is accompanied by a distinct loss of body. Strawberry from furaneol arrives without any structural change.
Others in the berry family
Strawberry, raspberry, red-fruit notes.
Raspberry
A raspberry aroma arising in unfruited cider from bacterial spoilage — the French *framboisé* — as well as from added fruit.
Red fruit
A general soft red-berry impression from medium-chain ethyl esters, most often met in tannic ciders with some age.
Blackcurrant
A dark, slightly green berry note from sulphur-containing thiols, or from direct fruit addition.
Cherry
Dark stone-and-berry character combining benzaldehyde with heavier ethyl esters, met in aged tannic cider.
What people ask next
Questions readers ask about the things this page mentions. Each one goes to the section that answers it rather than to a page written to receive the question.
- What yeast should i use for cider — CiderHQ does not recommend brands. The choice is between a neutral, reliable strain that lets the fruit show, an aromatic wine strain that adds its own esters, and no addition at all. Alcohol tolerance, cold tolerance and nitrogen demand are the properties worth comparing.
- Can you make cider from shop bought apple juice — Yes, provided the juice contains no preservative — check for potassium sorbate or benzoate on the label. Pasteurised juice ferments perfectly well once yeast is added, because pasteurisation removes the organisms but not the sugar.
- What is fruit cider — Fruit cider is cider flavoured with another fruit, either as juice, purée or flavouring, added after fermentation. How much apple has to remain varies by jurisdiction, and in some markets very little does.
- Which sugar is most of the sugar in apple juice — Fructose, by a long way. Apple juice carries roughly twice as much fructose as glucose, with a smaller amount of sucrose, and fructose is the sweetest of the three on the tongue.
- How is fruit cider made
- What is modern american cider like
Where to go next
- The sensory model — The thirteen structural dimensions and the twenty aroma families, in full.
- Compounds — The chemistry behind the words.
- Troubleshooting — When a perception turns out to be a problem, this is where it is diagnosed.
Sources
What this page rests on. Where a source is marked as registered rather than read, CiderHQ is recording that the body is authoritative on the subject without claiming to have worked through the document itself. See our evidence policy for what each state means.
The Science of Cidermaking and associated technical writing
Andrew Lea · reference work · passage verified 2026-08-24
Written by a food chemist who worked at Long Ashton on apple phenolics. Unusual among specialist cider writing in that it is primary-research-adjacent: the author is describing work he did, and cites the literature. This is why it is registered at tier 1 for chemistry while a general cider book is not.
Washington State University cider research programme
Washington State University Northwestern Washington Research and Extension Center · university · passage verified 2026-08-24
The single most useful open cider dataset CiderHQ has found. The programme’s cultivar performance database gives juice chemistry, orchard behaviour, bloom and harvest timing and cider-maker tasting notes for 73 cultivars grown at one maritime site over fifteen years, and — unusually — publishes its classification thresholds alongside its figures, so the classification can be checked rather than taken on trust. It also states outright that its results diverge from the English ones. Read in full on 2026-08-24 and transcribed into `data/trials/wsu-mount-vernon.ts`; four published figures were found to be impossible and are withheld there with their reasons.
Food labelling and packaging guidance
Food Standards Agency / Department for Business and Trade · regulator · retrieved 2026-08-24