Alpenfire Cider‘s Steve and Nancy Bishop credit their original awareness of cider to underage drinking in Canada. Well, technically, drinking at 19 is legal in Canada, so the college-aged couple was off the hook when falling for cider in the 1970s, courtesy of a wine shop that imported traditional French ciders as well. Bewitched by the beverage, the Bishops journeyed to England, France and Spain at the turn of the century to dig in and discover cider; returning home to promptly start their own venture.
With certified organic orchards in 2005 and certified organic as a producer in 2009, Alpenfire ciders are also bottle conditioned, pure apple and unfiltered. Offering some bone-dry, others sparkling and, like this week’s sip, barrel-aged. The Calypso Blackberry Cider, named for the Greek sea nymph as well as for Captain Jacques Cousteau’s precious ship, is semi-sweet, slightly sparkling and aged in Portland’s Bull Run Distilling’s rum barrels them bottled aged for a secondary level of complexity. Floral and full of blackberry and bramble fruit aromas, the heirloom apple is still the core of flavor while the blackberry and bottle conditioned spark and acidity lifts up the juicy, viscous cider.
