Whilst recovering from a Triple IPA Festival late last year, I remembered the palate-wrecking activity with rose-colored glasses and desired greatly to claim those beverages as my own. A good triple IPA is dominated by three competing sensory experiences: a massive west-coast aromatic hop nose and bitterness, a shockingly high level of residual sweetness to counteract the bitterness, and a boozy high-alcohol finish. So the next day I began trials on an extremely hoppy apple juice based liquor. I hesitated to call this a cider because it tasted very nearly like a beer with nearly no apple character. Over the course of eight months, I made more than a dozen trials (and spent plenty of time with the biggest baddest IPAs I could find) and the result became Envy, the first release in our 7 Deadly Sins project. Since then I have produced nearly 10 more ciders in the Hopland project including the award-winning Hopland in Space, a collaboration with Coalition Brewery.

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2016, Bronze, International Women's Wine Competition

What happens when you dump a bunch of cold-pressed coffee and orange peels into our Ciderkin collaboration with Cider Riot? It ends up tasting a bit like hot sauce and buffalo wings, apparently. I don't get that flavor from this odd concoction, but I do get a deeply rich treat, like nothing I've ever had before. It has been widely recounted that the second president of our young country, John Adams, took a tankard of hard cider every morning with his breakfast. Undoubtedly, this was a low alcohol Ciderkin, made by wetting the dried, spent apple pulp after the first runnings of juice was collected, waiting a day or more, then re-pressing the pulp. Less sugars are extracted by this second pressing, but the prolonged period of rest results in deeper flavors. We have added mandarin orange zest and 5 gallons of cold-brew coffee made for us by Extracto in Portland. The result is bitter, complex, somewhat abrasive and not for the novice cider drinker. A single batch of 8 halves and 4 sixths were made.

This cider grew out of an experiment I did to find new yeasts. After a large trial of 14 different yeasts, I blended together each of the small batches and determined that the blend was much better than any single yeast. As another first, I sourced 14 different sugars to back sweeten this cider, just a pinch of each to keep it off-dry. And I’m pretty certain I used at least 14 different varieties of apples in the blend, even though I lost count. So there you go: 14-way. This cider will not be repeated and only 250 gallons made.

What to do with 275 gallons of Bartlett Pear Juice? Traditional perry is a delicate and subtle beverage and is made using only perry pears; that is, pears grown specifically to make perry, not for eating. We were gifted this juice, scratched our heads a bit, then added a new tropical and fruity white wine yeast strain, “Vin-13”. The fermentation stalled with a high residual sweetness, but it had great potential. The addition of Simcoe hops, noted for earthy and piney aromas with a hint of passionfruit and citrus blew us away. Very limited quantity.

Basque-style sidras are known for being acetic, complex and tart. I have achieved this flavor profile by inoculating a blend of fifty varieties of heirloom apples with the yeast from a half-dozen bottles of Basque cider. The fermentation occurred in an open-top tank to allow the natural flora of Portland to blend with the foreign yeasts. To add to the complexity and unpredictability, I added over a hundred pounds of local wild blackberries during the initial fermentation. The result is a vinegary, tart and full-bodied, fully-dry cider. Available in extremely limited quantities.

This is the second release in my single variety pear/hop series. The d’Anjou pear is a French variety somewhat akin to the Williams/Bartlett pear but more aromatic and delicate. I used the same exotic South African white wine yeast used as in our first hopped perry (Anchor Vin-13) but changed the hops to the Mosaic hop, a new variety much sought after by breweries nationwide for its mango, lemon and tropical fruit notes. Being a perry, not a cider, this drink contains no apples.

Making ciderkin is the traditional cidermaking technique of re-wetting the spent pomace after the first pressing of juice is extracted from the apple. This batch of apples came from the legendary White Oak Cider orchard in Yamhill County Oregon and consists of the varieties: Yarlington Mill, Kingston Black, Dabinett, Harry Master’s Jersey, Muscadet de Lense and Muscadet de Bernay.

I enjoyed my d'Anjou Mosaic hopped perry so much that I just had to spend some more time with the d'Anjou pear. So I went back to my pear farmer and got another round of pears, used the same great exotic aromatic yeast but this time used the Sauvignon Blanc of hops: Nelson Sauvin. Extremely difficult to procure, this hop produces aromas of white wine, crushed white grapes, gooseberries and a touch of tangerine.

This is my flagship cider, the cider I love to love. Oregon-grown Cascade hops combine with a touch of apricot juice. More…

For Deliverance Ginger, I made hard cider made with American dessert apples, and added fresh ginger juice along with just hint of pure cane sugar. It’s not sweet though; it’s off-dry. So much ginger flavor explodes in your mouth that it’s a far cry from a wine cooler. Fermented using white wine yeasts with light carbonation.

Behold! The cider in this bottles contains the quiescent remains of some half-dozen apples including the likes of such American stalwarts as Newtown Pippin, Winesap and Esopus Spitzenberg blended with their cousins, the English bittersweets from across the pond. More…

A memorial cider for my friend and hard cider pioneer, Lorrie Skurdahl. Dry, tannic, still and unapologetically full of attitude while remaining humble and friendly. More…

Praise Be! I have unified the juice of the finest apple varieties, choice fresh ginger root, fresh lemongrass, lime juice, lime zest, and quinine to deliver this message in a bottle: May it lift your spirit whilst quenching your thirst. More…

Fermented carrot and apple juice, back sweetened with fresh-pressed carrot juice creates a flavor neverbefore experienced. More…

I have soaked my multiple award winning Revelation Newtown Pippin cider with a helping of wild raspberries in repurposed Burnside Bourbon barrels for a full nine months. More…

Laying bare the naked soul of the apple is the mission of the Revelation lineup. Each variety is naturally fermented to utter dryness and then receives a touch of apple juice. I have prohibited any alteration and expelled any further additions so you are tasting only the apple. The consummation is pure and expressly for your pleasure. More…