The Similkameen Valley in British Columbia is renowned for its vast and beautiful wine country. But in 2008, Kaylan Madeira and her husband, Jo Schneider, planted the first of their cider-fruit crops at their orchard in Cawston. Fast-forward four years later and the couple is operating Twisted Hills Cider, the first and only only cidery in the valley.
“We have an amazing natural area in the valley and a large wine country with amazing wines being produced,” Madeira says on why they choice to set up camp in the Similkameen, an area known for its soil diversity and sunny weather. “These reasons alone bring in a lot of tourists from Vancouver, who then see our signs and check out our cidery.”
The valley already boasts 600 plus acres of vineyards so the couple knew it would be the perfect place to grow their own endeavors in Canada’s wild west. Not to mention Schneider is a fifth-generation orchardist and most people in the 900-person town of Cawston know him as a member of one of the community’s prominent orcharding families.
“The craft cider trade is still fairly new to Canada and lots of cider drinkers are still developing their palates for [it],” Madeira says. Because of this, Twisted Hills offers ciders that are smooth and easily sippable to ciders more on the drier, traditional side. Her favorite cider is the Pippin’s Fate Cider, a crisp, dry bittersweet apple cider recommended for a hot day.
In addition to Pippin’s Fate, Twisted Hill has four other ciders in their repertoire: The Kingston’s Twist, Calville’s Winter, Paradise Pear and Tangled Rose. “The Kingston’s Twist and Calville’s Winter are the most palatable of our ciders,” Madeira says. “They are really juicy tasting ciders and I feel like anyone can enjoy them.”
She experimented with cidermaking for the first time in 2011, just three years after they planted the first fruit-bearing trees in their orchard. What started as a hobby, with just a few carboys to produce small batches, blossomed into sharing her creation with friends and family. Her supporters encouraged the couple to go for it — they believed the product was good enough to be enjoyed by many. Shortly after, Madeira and Schneider traveled to Washington State in order to take the cider and perry production classes taught by esteemed cider master Peter Mitchell through the Northwest Agriculture Business Center.
After taking the course, the two opened Twisted Hill’s doors in the fall 2012. Since the inception of the cidery, Madeira and Schneider are proud to offer estate-grown organic apples. To date, they are the only cidery in Canada to have organic ciders crafted from organic estate-grown fruit.
“We want to keep it clean, it is important to us to not add a bunch of additional chemicals and flavorings to our products,” Madeira says. “We want our cider to be as fresh as possible. We want you to taste the apples we grow.”
