Barrel-aging is a finnicky art. We don’t do it often, and when we have in the past, the results weren’t quite what we’d hoped.
Until now. We’re finally on to something with Bird & Bee and this new vintage of Rocky Ridge Reserve…
The first Rocky vintage in 2013-14 aged in an apple brandy barrel for about five months. Courtney forgot about it entirely. As our cider reserves rapidly dwindled in the tasting room, we had no money to buy bottles to move cider out of tanks to make more products to sell. Wandering around the cidery looking for opportunities, Courtney stumbled upon the fateful apple brandy barrel in the fermentation room. Eureka!
We sampled the barrel-aged cider every couple of weeks, waiting for it to pick up notes of the oak and spirit. And waiting and waiting. When we made the call to siphon the cider from the barrel to kegs and then to our last remaining bottles, I honestly think we were just sick. Of. Waiting.
We figured, hey – we’ll end up having a tiny batch of about 300 bottles. Let’s try to have a limited release party! We set a date of February 2 and for the very first time, attempted what the kids call “marketing.” We reached out to news publications, posted on social media and online calendars, booked a food truck, invited our peers and neighbors…
We expected maybe 200 people at the release party. But blessed with one of those random 65-degree February afternoons after a week of snow & freeze, we ended up with probably 1,500 attendees – and at that point in time, our entire tasting room staff was four people (including Courtney). We had precisely zero concept of how to run an event or crowd-manage. Very understanding & patient patrons waited 45 minutes to do full tastings. Having only stocked our outdoor tent with Rocky bottles, I kept running back into the cidery to grab armfuls of other bottles for tastings & sales. The food truck ran out of vittles within two hours. Rocky Ridge Reserve vanished.
It was the biggest sales day in our history (until our move to Scott’s Addition).
Tragically, one standard procedure we failed to consider was cellaring any of that original Rocky Ridge Reserve in our cider library. As far as we know, no bottles still exist. All we have are our admittedly hazy memories.
That’s why I’m so excited to share this new vintage, which hearkens back to the essence of the original. We haven’t produced Rocky Ridge Reserve since 2016, and that vintage was aged on fresh oak spirals rather than in spirit-soaked barrels. That translated to a nuanced cider with subtle notes of vanilla, one that seemed to get lost in the shuffle of our now boisterous & varied lineup.
New Rocky (vintage created from the 2019 harvest) spent a full year in rye whisky barrels from Catoctin Creek Distilling Company, also our collaborative partner for Harvest Ration & Firecracker. We’re finding that yearlong aging duration to be a sweet spot, imparting powerful aroma & flavor characteristics of oak and whisky without overwhelming the Virginia apple, which shines through the lingering finish. The spirit increased the ABV to 10%, perfect for the campfire or hearthside in these dark and frigid winter weeks to come.
We invite you to taste the fruits of our failures – and lessons learned over time. Rocky Ridge Reserve will be available (draft only) this Saturday, February 6. A bottle release will follow later in the month.
-Brian Ahnmark
