—Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard’s Almanack
When the first edition of this book appeared way back in 1999, it contained some rather audacious claims concerning a “cider renaissance” that I felt was building throughout North America. Readers at the time could be excused for not believing me. After all, the growth in public awareness and consumption of alcoholic (“hard”) cider was still glacially slow, and marketing the unfamiliar beverage to consumers remained an uphill battle.
Fast-forward, then, to 2013, as I prepare this updated and revised edition. Sales of hard cider have skyrocketed in the past few years, increasing 65 percent between 2011 and 2012 in supermarket sales alone, and far outpacing the growth of wine (5.6 percent) and craft beer (13 percent). As a category, hard cider still represents only around 0.3 percent of the overall beer and alcoholic beverage market, but this is triple the sales of only a few years ago. Cider, suddenly, is almost everywhere. Many of the new cider drinkers are young, and about half of them are women. The future looks bright.
Granted, much of this growth has been driven by the large national or multinational brands, whose owners have the capital and the distribution channels to get bottles (and now cans) of their product onto store shelves. But at the same time, the number of small, regionally focused craft cideries has continued to increase: there are now around 150 producers in the United States alone, compared to maybe a couple dozen when I first started writing about cider in the late 1990s. And their geographic range continues to spread outside the traditional cider “incubators” of the Northeast and Northwest. From the Great Lakes region to the South and Southwest—it takes real dedication to keep track of all the enthusiasts who are now going commercial, many producing good cider from the get-go. The growth and innovation in the cider world has been compared to the craft beer explosion of the 1980s, which continues to this day.
What’s more, the recent focus on cider has spurred interest around the globe. From cider’s traditional hot spots like southwest England, northwest France, and northern Spain, to less well known producing areas like Poland, Mexico, and New Zealand, there is a growing appreciation for the fermented essence of the apple, and as the craft matures, many producers and consumers are learning more: rediscovering and replanting classic old apples that make good cider; appreciating and redefining regional and national styles; and demanding (or making) sophisticated products that challenge the stereotype of hard cider as simply a wine-cooler clone.
In February 2013, around one hundred commercial cider producers gathered in Chicago for CiderCon, the third such national conference for the trade. Large and small producers from all parts of the U.S. (and a few from Canada) were in attendance, and among other business they voted to form the United States Association of Cider Makers (USACM). For people like me, who have been around long enough to participate in most of the lively debates and false starts leading up to this decision, the vote represented a truly watershed moment for cider culture in North America.
Unfortunately, the prospects for real (raw) sweet cider are not so rosy. State and federal regulatory agencies continue to strongly discourage the production of unpasteurized juice due to stated health concerns. As a result, many small local orchards have stopped pressing cider altogether, breaking a decades-old fall tradition. Although the legality of direct-to-consumer farm sales of raw cider vary from state to state, with a strong but largely “underground” demand for real sweet cider the result, it is becoming clearer with each passing year that the best defense against the permanent loss of real cider is to learn how to press it yourself. And that remains one of the principal aims of this book.
One benefit of the reemergent cider culture worldwide is the attention it has brought to the apple itself, and more importantly to fruit growers. Many heirloom varieties are now becoming more widely planted in orchards, both classic American apples and bitter European cider apples that are generally worthless for eating or cooking, but that make some of the best and most complex ciders. It is my hope that the growing demand for high-quality cider fruit will benefit fruit growers, by creating a wholesale market for their specialty cider apples—one that actually supports the costs of production.
Cider, Hard and Sweet was never designed to be a complete guide for budding commercial producers of cider, but rather a history, a celebration, and an entry point for individuals who either want to try their hand at making their own hard or sweet cider, or who simply enjoy and appreciate cider culture. Fortunately, for people who are serious about going further in their cidermaking studies, there are lots of excellent resources, both in print and online, providing mountains of information to feed a lifetime hobby. Two excellent works that have appeared since the second edition of this book are Craft Cider Making by Andrew Lea, and The New Cider Maker’s Handbook by Claude Jolicoeur (see Bibliography). I recommend both, for readers who have made their first few batches of cider based on this book and who are anxious to delve more deeply into the science of cidermaking.
So, as always, with a mixture of goodwill and humility, I wish you, dear reader, all the pleasures of the orchard and the cider house. Wassail!
FRANCESTOWN, NEW HAMPSHIRE
MARCH 2013