COMPARATIVE LIT ESSAY:
As much of the United States and Europe heads back to lockdown, small local cider makers need us, the drinkers, now more than ever. Because this Saturday is "Buy Local Day" in the US, I just wanted to remind us that younger cideries need us to check in and help out. As a reminder of what awesome gems you might stumble across by stopping by your local cidery, I share with you two drinks I was lucky to grab recently just by checking in with a cidery. The first is Red Canyon Nan from Farmstead Cider in Jackson, Wyoming. I happened to pop in after a long day of bottling and the guys generously offered me a freshly filled bottle to take home (I needed to wait a bit to open it for more bottle conditioning). This is the most mellow farmhouse cider from Farmstead I’ve tried, and it’s outstanding. Even though it still has a bit of acidic kick, it has a soft mouthfeel with subtle nuances of tartness and a deep and refined apple essence from mature old trees. It reminded me of a good Trabanco. I was in the right place, at the right time and I scored a brand new cider before it even hit the market.
Similarly, I stopped into Haykin Family Cider the other day in A-town, Colorado where I had a brief conversation with Dan Haykin, half of the dynamic duo over there, and told him that the 2018 vintage of Scarlet Surprise was probably the best cider I’ve ever tasted (indeed, it’s the highest scoring cider I’ve reviewed to date) and he said they just sent out the 2019 vintage to their club members and he thought he had one left lying around. After looking around he came up with literally the last one, and I got it! He warned me that it was quite different from the previous year, and it was, but it was still excellent. It is a bright cider with an acidic tartness that darts across your tongue. That tartness lingers into a really long and lovely finish that is more mellow, creamy, tannic and soft. A deeply satisfying cider
The point being that good things happen to those in contact with their local cider makers! I know we all can’t go in, and maybe we shouldn’t be having a good cider drink with friends at the moment, but call your local cider maker to see what they have around, get bottles to go, use local delivery schemes, buy gift certificates and support local cider businesses so we can all enjoy them again when this is all over. Don’t let this global pandemic take any more of our neighbors’ businesses. Some of us are struggling financially as well, and maybe can’t help, but if you are able let’s share some love. For the first time ever, I am not declaring a winner, because if we support local businesses we’ll all win!