cider

La Roche (The Rock) is a cider from Antoine Marois from the heart of the Pays d'Auge in Normandy, France. La Roche is a Brut Cidre de Normandie - a dry French cider made in the traditional methods common to the region. Made with a blend of traditional French cider apples from a south facing orchard on their estate. This cider is dry-to-semi-dry, rich, and with a pleasant body to support a tannic bitter quality. Tasting notes include rich apple and hints of spice and orchard floor. Medium-plus tannins with medium acidity. 6.5% abv.

A blend of apple varieties– primarly Astarbe (the same name as the 15th-generation family running the estate) and Mendiola (the same name as their farmhouse) are selected and put through the grinder or ‘matxaka’. After grinding and pressing the fruit, the must sits in stainless steel tanks for 24 hours. Under strict temperature controls, the must is then transferred into wooden casks or ‘kupelas’, where alcoholic fermentation — and subsequently malolactic fermentation — take place. The cider rests and ages in casks on lees for two months before it is ready to be drunk, straight from the barrel in the traditional ‘txotx’ ritual. The cider is bottled, unfiltered, in June. 6.5% abv.

Arlo is our take on Basque cider - tart and complex but delightfully drinkable, and a longtime industry favorite. We partner with our longtime friends at Petritegi Sagardoa, located just outside of San Sebastian in Spain, to source European apple varieties unavailable in commercial quantities in the United States. Petritegi presses and ferments their apples in enormous, decades-old chestnut barrels; we then ship this fermented cider to Vermont where we blend it with fruit we source from New England. This unusual blend of European and New England fruit creates a one-of-a-kind dry, complex cider without any additional flavorings or sweeteners. 5.5% abv