Talk given to Go Carterton business group 27th May 2021

Welcome to TeePee Cider  Housekeeping notes. If there is an earthquake stand inside the cider barn till quaking over, do not stand under the big pine. And please sign in on the Covid sign and app on your phone. Hand sanitiser by the sink.

Frances and I have been developing this company for many years but needed time to commercialise it. 

I retired from clinical medical practice last year in August creating that opportunity.

The trees were planted in 2004 and company started

Our first satisfactory vintage was in 2010.

What makes TeePee Cider unique? 

Firstly we are small. Only Frances and I work the land with a little help from friends

We make only one product The Earl’s Drop

Why? 

The cider market is monopolised by the big boys who have an idea of what cider is. RTDs or Seltzers.  

This is not the cider we make. 

Cider in NZ follows mainly UK legislation. A minimum of 35% of the cider must come from apples. Often culinary apples and concentrate overseas . Imagine if wine was made with 35% concentrate from California table grapes or worse concentrate from China? 

It can have other fruit additives hence the craze for adding strawberries etc. 

Given  “cider”   made this way can be “brewed” in 6 weeks, multiple times a year, it is cheap to make and given the buying power of Supermarkets the price is heading to the lowest common denominator 

At TeePee cider we decided not to compete in this market. Our vision is re create cider at its finest. We make "season based cider". We only use cider apples from our orchard. We do not use pesticides fungicides or any other -cides. We use minimal intervention. A little sulphur to kill spoiler bacteria. We do not filter or pasteurise. We do use lots of time however.

To find cider at its zenith you have to go back in history to 1640-1700. 

Frances made me promise this talk is not a history lesson. But briefly we know this because in 1660 the Royal Society, the oldest in the world, was formed. We have a branch in Wellington still going strong. The Royal Society liked to keep minutes of its meetings. Boyle, Hooke and other luminaries of the day such as Newton were founding members. Many of them were wealthy and enjoyed the Entitlement to experiment with science philosophy, and some grew orchards, made cider and this too was documented. 

Prior to 1640 cider was a farm labourer’s drink in areas were apple trees grew well. Beer in other parts. Why? because fermentation destroyed bacteria. It was safe. 

So you ask why was this humble drink elevated? And the answer was British pride. It competed with the best French wine. And Britain and France were at war in the period. 

Another major reason was that Britain developed a strong glass . Strong enough to withstand pressure. It did not take long for these gentry to realise that sometimes bottled,( rather than kept in barrels), the cider remained fresh and more importantly began to fizz. Brits have always liked “bubbly” and soon were adding sugar to make it more fizzy. 

(As an aside they then started adding it to Champagne in London, previously a still wine to make the champagne of today. Yes the Brits invented champagne 80 years before Dom Perignon. First reference Dr Christopher Merret. Royal Society 1664. First lay reference poem/play George Etherege The Man of Mode 1676. )

To be pedantic the Brits invented method ancestrale, the yeast lees were still in the bottle. It took Madame Cliquot to make the final change of disgorgement 

So this is what we decided upon. We call it Method Albion. We make it only in 750 ml bottles of Verre Anglais -the green champagne bottle. 

A little about the process. 

As I have already said. We use only the cider apples we grow. We use authentic West Country varieties such as Kingston Black. 

We do not use any chemicals that are not allowed organically. 

We collect the apples as they fall to the ground for peak ripeness and flavour development-tumping

We do this just one a year at harvest in March/April

We crush and press the apples and ferment the juice with wild yeasts here in the cider barn. 

Traditional cider makers don’t disturb cobwebs the yeast spores survive year to year there. 

We Cool ferment the juice for 6 months to a year before placing into the bottle with a nutmeg of sugar and a champagne yeast. The cider is on the lees in the bottle for a minimum of 2 yeast before disgorging and recapping. 

A long process to make the finest cider.

You may ask why the Earl’s Drop? Well it was perfected by the nobility. Lord Scudamore was a major player. And Earle is Frances’ father’s name. Drop because the apples literally drop, and thirdly "drop" as in a nice drop. 

So to the cider. Its bubbly. 10 million of them in each bottle. A fine mousse from the non forced carbonation. 

It’s dry. No residual sugar and no artificial sweeteners. It’s tannic, as cider should be. This gives an aroma on the nose, mouth feel and a clean finish. The acid in balanced with the tannins. And there is a biscuity taste to the finish from the autolysis. 

I could go on about Perry pears to but please questions.