Red-fleshed roadside heartstopper found by @conorashleigh a couple of weeks ago 😍😍😍.

Cute article about @roadcider this week on @abcnews_au . Still some left if you’d like some before it’s all gone - get in touch! Beauty photos by @nickbannehr Link in bio

Detour: Caucasus Mountains, Georgia. I was lucky enough to visit Georgia and go hiking in the Caucasus mountains a few years back. The region is a diversity hotspot for many fruits and other now-staple food plants on that might seem placeless today (pears, apples, raspberries, blueberries, apricots, walnuts, hazelnuts, mulberries, plums and so on). Not only are lots of things endemic ( *from* ) there but lots of plants moved through the region along the Silk Road trade routes connecting East and West through the Eurasian landmass. Apple people will typically think of Malus sieversii as the wild apple parent of the modern domestic apple (Malus domestica) we know and love, but many other species have a little part to play in the domestic apple too. Malus orientalis, the Caucasus apple or Eastern Crabapple, is also a contributing parent to the common apple and can still be found wild. I worked myself into a quiet but ecstatic lather encountering wild apples while out hiking, ranging from cotton-candy-sweet little blush fruits to ultra sour and tannic crisp apples I only dream of finding by the roadside for my own cider.

Come pick some roadside apples with me and Justin. Message me if you want some of the last Roadcider maybe ever, or if you want to know where to find some roadside apples of your own!

A few more beautiful cider-making process shots by @nickbannehr . 1. Giving the roadside fruit a quick rinse (if you look closely you’ll see the tiny crabapples that take forever to pick but are worth their weight in gold) 2. Apples en route to the press with Ruby. 3 & 4. Fresh juice goes a deep golden orange almost immediately on exposure to air. We let the apples ripen fully so the juice is about 20% sweeter than what you might find in the shops. As ever, PM me for cider for your home/work/bar/restaurant/gallery, or if you want to know where to find some apples.

Do you want to make some seriously good cider from true cider variety apples and pears? Do you know anyone who does? For the last few years we’ve got some beautiful apples from Borrodell in Orange and they have a huge crop this year and are looking for people who want to use the fruit. I have no affiliation with Borrodell except as a buyer, I just want to see their amazing apples put to good use! Images 2-4 are from an email to Borrodell’s mailing list. You’ll have to act pretty fast as harvest is in the next month… And, if you’ve got the space but not the expertise get in touch, maybe we can do something together.

Little tester cider from red-fleshed lutruwita apple variety Huonville Crab. Wasn’t sure if the red would fade. Colourfast. Delicious. Really nice balance of tannin and acid in these apples. Thinner body than a classic cider apple but lovely balance acid/tannin.

@roadcider had the pleasure of picking extremely hard-to-find and beautiful cider variety apples @borrodell_vineyard for this year’s cider. Pack of absolute angels on the pick, so much fun and so grateful 🥲😭. There are plenty more apples at the orchard - do you know anyone who wants to make cider from real cider apples? The difference between these and the regular eating apples most cider is made from on this continent is the same difference between making wine from wine grapes vs table grapes from the supermarket. Incomparable. Dabinett. Kingston Black. Somerset Redstreak. Golden Harvey. Yarlington Mill. These should be as well known as any common wine grape variety. Even traditional Perry pears at the orchard too - endangered the world over and like nothing else you’ve ever drunk. Help get real cider on the map! This orchard is an absolute gem but if they can’t sell the apples they’re going to start replacing them with grapes. Seriously get in touch if you’re interested. Love to have some conversations about apples, cider, dominance of grapes etc, I’ve been thinking lots about it. Good cider is still in an IYKYK niche but I think it’s ready to bust out in a big way.

2024 incoming. Fruit out west looking really good but very very early this year. Anyone interested in helping pick apples this year for a couple of days please get in touch. Any winemakers/cidermakers in NSW interested in some real cider variety apples to play with also let me know. Thinking about how apples are a lens you can understand the world through. Bursting with things to talk about but going to keep it in for now. Here a photo of a row of Kingston Black apples a few weeks away from harvest.

How do you like them apples? 🍎  We like Fiona Apple a lot, we also really like this new division of the the Brompton St massive, known as @roadcider Topher and team at @wildflowerbeer have been producing exciting ciders from single lots of fruit sourced across NSW. Come quench your thirst with one soon!

• ROADCIDER ORANGE 2023 release • This cider has been a long time coming and @wildflowerbeer and I are delighted to announce it's available from this Friday August 4 (via Wildflower). Roadcider Orange is our first ever release to ever use apples deliberately planted and grown in an orchard. And what rare and beautiful apples, and what an orchard. After a decade making cider only from roadside fruit, I was put in touch with Borrodell Orchard by David Pickering, the only person I know who loves apples more than I do. Gaye Stuart-Nairne and the late Borry Gartrell planted and grafted hundreds of varieties of apples on their block at Borrodell just outside of Orange many years ago, including a very healthy selection of cider-variety apples almost impossible to find anywhere across the continent. This year we worked with later-harvest bittersweet, bittersharp and sharp varieties - primarily Kingston Black, Dabinett, Somerset Redstreak and Bramley. Natural fermentation kicked off with a pie de cuvee (the winemaking equivalent of a sourdough starter) and finished bone dry at 8.2%. Carbonation from secondary fermentation plays nicely with a drying, tannic finish. Wine-drinkers not familiar with dry, sparkling cider should think "skin contact pet nat". There's no sweetness, plenty of apple character shining through with a lot of complexity and depth. There is a small part of me that still feels like making cider from an orchard rather than the side of the road feels like cheating on Roadcider. We're still foraging fruit and making actual-side-of-the-road-roadcider. Being able to branch out and make cider from rare, beautiful fruit and share it with you feels like the natural next step for Roadcider.

Bottling one of two '23 ciders with @wildflowerbeer today, this one the first ever for us using apples from an orchard! All to plan coming out in Spring 🌼. It's a blend of mostly classic UK and French bittersweet, sharp and bittersharp apples: Kingston Black, Stokes Red, Dabinett, Frequin Rouge, Bramley, Somerset Redstreak, Golden Harvey, Huonville Crab and a small amount of others from Borrodell, just outside Orange. Frothing to share it with you!