There is no season I love more than autumn. Although I love the weather, my favorite part is probably the tastes of the season. I’m not big into pumpkin spice flavored things, but I am a massive fan of apple-flavored everything. So, obviously this fall I wanted to chat with you all about cider.
I found myself at Brooklyn Cider House recently, and it opened my eyes to the world of ciders. Prior to my experience at the Brooklyn Cider house, my experience with ciders was tied to non-alcoholic variety. These ciders, however, are produced in the back of the building. Brooklyn Cider House is a triple threat — a bar, restaurant, and a cidery.
I sat down with Peter Yi, one of the founders of Brooklyn Cider House to learn all about the autumnal beverage. The first lesson, I learned was that Brooklyn Cider focuses on creating natural ciders, produced similarly to how Americans created the drink many moons ago.
The process is long to ferment the ciders and takes around a year in a half to produce. Brooklyn Cider House only produces cider once a year, when it is in season. Although Yi got inspired by the Basque-style cider, he produces “New York Cider.”
To make natural cider, the ciders at Brooklyn Cider House go through three fermentations. They go through an alcoholic fermentation, a malolactic fermentation and finally, they go through a microbial one. The microbial one makes the drink a little healthier for you than most booze. This process adds some healthy probiotics to drink, so you can enjoy the beverage a little bit more and wake up the next day feeling great.
Although the beverage skews dry, as someone with a sweet palette, I really enjoyed the refreshing flavors. When it comes to pairing cider with food, Yi explained that “It cleanses the palette, so it pairs really great with a wide range of food.”
Even though, they focus on their natural ciders; they also produce the sweet variety which most cider drinkers are accustomed too. Natural ciders taste way different than your run of the mill, “hard ciders.” Yi wants you to give natural ciders a chance.
During your visit, you can learn how to catch cider, which is a super fun experience. Catching cider is exactly what it sounds like, you learn how catch cider straight from a barrel. Catching cider gives the experience an educational element, a social element, and something fun for you to share on social media. Catching cider is a new skill for me (one that I won’t be adding my resume anytime soon). What I do have to tell you is that it’s something else trying cider fresh from the barrel.
Additionally, they have a ton of delicious menu items from their Prix-Fix menu that add to their cocktails, it’s easy to find something to fall in love with this autumn and year-round.
Yi told me that, “I feel like I was born put cider on the map in Brooklyn,” and he is doing a great job of putting it on the map. To check out the Brooklyn Cider House in person, it is located at 1100 Flushing Ave, Brooklyn.
