Louisa Spencer from Farnum Hill Cider came down to present her & her husband’s ciders to my law school tasting group. FYI, she’s a great speaker- we had no idea when we arranged the tasting, but she was as good as any presenter we’ve had in the last 2 years.
The ciders were great also, as always. She also presented a couple of ciders from Wandering Aengus out of Oregon, who uses some Farnum Hill apples. The Farnum Hill ciders were 1,000,000 times better.
Interestingly, Farnum Hill is sending their cider apples all over the US now. I guess since apples are a lot hardier than grapes, it’s pretty easy for orchards to ships their apples elsewhere for cidermaking.
All the ciders except the Kingston Black are in the 7.5% alc range, the Kingston Black 8.5%. I was talking to her after the tasting, and she says they get some batches in the 10%+ range but the final blends tend lower; she also said that another guy growing heirloom cider apples in their area is consistently getting ciders with alcs over 10%. They ferment with neutral champagne yeasts.
Farnum Hill Extra-Dry: Bone dry, acidic and tannic, some appley nose but also floral. Light sparkle. Practically begged for food.
Wandering Aengus Dry: A smidge of sugar in this one. Much more of an appley nose. Simpler. Less tannic. Not as good. Medium sparkle.
Farnum Hill Semi-Dry: Basically like the Extra-Dry with a dosage and a little more acidity. Easier quaff than the ED, but I prefer the ED’s complexity. This comes off as more appley. Light sparkle.
Farnum Hill Farmhouse: Gnarly stuff. Tannic, acidic, bone dry. Totally awesome, but in a winegeeky, “I love Muscadet” kind of way. Light sparkle.
Farnum Hill Summer: Clean, crisp. Bone dry, but a more accessible cider than the ED or the Farmhouse. We served all the ciders at 60 degrees at their request, but I thought this one would have benefited from a little more chill. Light sparkle.
Farnum Hill Kingston Black: From the 2007 crop; I’ve had this from previous crops and this was the best yet. Still cider. Great nose on this: melon, musk, flowers. But while this is my favorite of the Farnum Hill ciders b/c of the complexity, I wish they’d put a little sparkle in this-- as a still cider, it doesn’t have quite the grip of the ciders with a little petillant. Hardly any apple in this: I bet if you poured it blind, many people wouldn’t peg it as a cider at all.
Wandering Angus Bloom: Meh. Sweet and appley. Simple. Made with mostly (all?) Oregon apples.
All the Farnum Hill ciders go for $9-13 except for the Kingston Black, so if you see them around they’re definitely worth a try. FWIW, I think they’re the best ciders in the Northeast: much better than the Warwick Valley ciders and a a little better (but on a similar level) as the West County ciders.