Time of the Season

Amid the fall Appalachian harvest, comes an array of artisan beverages

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Around Labor Day, when the first cool breeze rolls through the ancient mountains of Southern Appalachia, so, too, is the indication that fall is just around corner. It’s also the signal to harvest the bounty of another growing season. 

Farmers and field workers from every holler and tucked away field in these hills rev up tractor engines, reach for the large baskets, or simply pull down the truck tailgate, readying themselves for the long days ahead—plucking, pulling and picking the fruits of their labor. 

In terms of artisan beverages, this time of year also symbolizes a wide-array of local ingredients that result in cherished products at the heart of these companies, whether it be breweries, wineries, cideries or meaderies. 

Noble Cider 

Asheville, North Carolina

“Fall is a big deal for us because it’s apple season,” said Lief Stevens, Noble Cider co-founder/production manager. “That’s when the apples are ready to be harvested—everything we do is directly tied to those apples. So, when we think about the ‘beginning of the year’ at Noble, it’s fall when the apples come in.” 

Based out of Asheville, Noble teams up each year with Lewis Creek Farm in nearby Hendersonville. With Henderson County one of the apple meccas of the United States, Noble gets its supply of the delicious fruit from the farm. It’s another storied partnership in the name of genuine collaboration within the massive Western North Carolina beverage industry. 

“The apples start to come in around September/October, and then it’s an ongoing process of storing the apples, pressing the apples, and starting to transition of the apples into cider,” Stevens said. 

For Noble, the signature fall flavor is the “Journeyman,” a cranberry/orange cider with habanero peppers and other spices added. The product is described as “the perfect balance between tart, sweet and warming heart, kick off your Thanksgiving dinner with a twist.”  

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“With fall, you have Halloween and Thanksgiving in this time period. So, we were thinking about cranberry sauce, and a little bit of habanero to give it a little heat,” Stevens said. “We start off with apple and cranberry juice in the tank, ferment that together, then a secondary fermentation with the orange and habanero peppers.” 

Fall is now knocking on the door at Noble. The leaves are beginning to change, with Stevens and his crew ready and roaring to start the “new year” of apples and fermentation. 

“For me, fall is my favorite time of year,” Stevens said. “It’s that incredible transition from summer to winter. Part of that has to do with the apples, but also it’s so beautiful here in Western North Carolina.”

Burial Beer Co.

Asheville, North Carolina

“Fall? It’s when my favorite craft beer styles arrive,” said Jeff McGuire, director of brewing operations for Burial Beer Co. “It’s also when we really use ingredients from the land, local blueberries for ‘The Fortress of Immaculate Thought,’ and we’re currently separating 2,000 pounds of local peaches for ‘The Separation of Light and Darkness,’ both mixed culture ales.” 

Aside from its world-renowned signature seasonal ales, Burial also specializes in ciders, gathering apples from local/regional orchards. And as another whirlwind summer winds down for most, Burial is just getting started in harvesting and fermenting its wares that will serve as the products for the impending year. 

“We get the local apples and start juicing at the beginning of September, a process that will go all the way into December,” McGuire said. “Especially with the mixed culture ciders, we don’t have pasteurize or filter out anything—we just let the yeast or anything that’s living in the juice do its thing.” 

Each fall, Burial also hosts the “Burnpile,” an end of the harvest season gathering of industry folks, craft beverage connoisseurs and the curious alike. And it’s also this time of year when the Burial operations staff head out west to the Yakima Valley in Washington to select the choicest of hops for the upcoming brewing schedule. 

“We try to get the hops that can help us make the best beer,” McGuire said. “As soon as the harvest season comes up for hops, everyone is started to do these fresh hop, or ‘wet hop,’ IPAs (India Pale Ale), where the hops aren’t getting as processed—the hops are coming right off the fields and into a beer.” 

And though the focus right now is on fall and ingredients associated with the beloved season, McGuire also pointed to the other three seasons and how each is as unique and important to local agriculture and artisan beverages as the subsequent one. 

“We’re bringing out everything with each season—for us at Burial, for the agricultural community, and for the beer drinkers,” McGuire said. “It’s about showcasing all kinds of incredible things that are harvested throughout the year.” 

Abingdon Vineyards

Abingdon, Virginia

“My daughter’s birthday is on Halloween, so fall here is really special,” said Elizabeth Gardner. “We grow all of our own pumpkins, and we always have this big party at the vineyard on Halloween. Everyone shows up in their costumes and we celebrate the fall harvest—all of this time and preparation, growing grapes and coming together as a family.” 

Co-owner of Abingdon Vineyards, Gardner noted that the hope is always for a warm, dry August, when the sugars are developing in the grapes (the vineyard grows nine varietals), which will then be harvested from the 13-acre property in September and October. From there, the grapes are then fermented through the late fall onward.

“It’s an enormous amount of work. It’s not easy to grow grapes in Virginia—we’re constantly checking the sugar levels in the grapes,” Gardner said. “Then, we gather up our staff and several volunteers to go out into the vineyard and begin to pick the grapes—come have a glass of wine and help us harvest.” 

For its fall flavors, the vineyard focuses on a semi-sweet Riesling. 

“The Riesling would be a perfect pairing for any sort of Thanksgiving food,” Gardner said. “It goes with apple pie, pumpkin pie, turkey and cranberry sauce. All of those fantastic flavors complemented by the wine. Then, when you move into winter, we recommend the tawny red wine (aka: port)—fireside with dark chocolate or blue cheese.” 

Wise Bird Cider Co.

Lexington, Kentucky

Featuring a seemingly endless spectrum of heirloom apple varietals from Kentucky and beyond, Wise Bird Cider Co. is quickly becoming one of the most intricate and beloved small batch traditional-style cider spots in Southern Appalachia. 

“We’re really focused on using heirloom and cider-specific apples for the different profiles that we’re trying to create,” said Tim Wright, co-owner and cidermaker at Wise Bird. “We work throughout the year on our ciders, but it’s right now when the apples are ripe on the tree, which is always exciting—apples are our lifeblood.” 

Once the apples are harvested, it’s the beginning of the production cycle for cideries. Once picked from the tree, the fermentation process will take place from October through early spring, depending on what flavor profiles or styles the cidermakers are looking to put forward. 

“We do a range of dry to semi-sweet ciders, and also have several dessert ciders,” Wright said. “And in the fall, we release two or three new single varietal ciders that are from the prior harvest year.” 

Wright looks at the fall cider releases as a way to remind people that there’s a whole other world of apples out there besides the go-to varietals like “red delicious.” 

“There’s this great diversity of apples that exists in our region, and we want to showcase that,” Wright said. “And, besides that, we also want to introduce people to the beauty of cider, this other side of the craft beverage industry [that includes beer, wine and distilled spirits].”

Gypsy Circus Cider

Kingsport, Tennessee

“We kind of live and die by the fall season,” said Stephanie Carson. “We’re getting ready to intake the freshest juice that we’ll get all year.”

Co-owner of Gypsy Circus with her husband, Aaron, the couple are at helm of a growing section of the beverage industry in East Tennessee. With locations in Kingsport and Knoxville, the brand has several signature flavors, with its “Jack Tales” fire-roasted pumpkin cider a highly sought after style come fall.

“Jack Tales has a cult following—it’s like pumpkin pie in a glass,” Stephanie noted. “It’s made with real pumpkins from this area, which also means we have to wait for the pumpkins to be harvested on top of waiting for the apples to be ready.”

The cidery also has a fall chai tea blend, which is a collaboration with AppalaChai in Asheville, North Carolina. Aside from its ciders, Gypsy Circus has a well-regarded mead program within its company, something many folks look forward to when the leaves begin to change. 

For those perhaps unfamiliar with mead, it’s an alcoholic beverage resulting from the fermentation of honey with water (or with a variety of fruits, spices, hops and grains). 

“Mead showcases the intricacies of honey, [where] you’re able to showcase each honey profile and how it renders itself,” Aaron said. “[For us], we see mead as being the next frontier for craft beverage manufacturers.” 

With its flagship “Flower Child” mead, Gypsy Circus brings orange blossom honey and hibiscus through the fermentation process. 

“You get more florals from orange blossom. You get more of an amber tone with buckwheat honey, and you get more lighter notes with wildflower,” Aaron said. “The hope is that you're really letting the honey shine through in the fermentation process.”

Wyile Cider

Sevierville, Tennessee

When fall slides into the mountains of East Tennessee, Wyile Cider gears up into full-production mode, harvesting a wide-array of apples (from Tennessee, Virginia and North Carolina) to ferment, bottle and incorporate into the numerous styles offered at cidery. 

“Around this time of year, we have ‘Scrumpy’s Spice of Life,’ which is our spiced cider,” said Mike Reeves, owner and cidermaker at Wyile. “And although we’re right in the middle of production, we’re also the busiest in the fall with all of the visitors, whether locals or tourists, who come by to see what we’re up to.” 

At Wyile, Reeves looks to present the purest of ciders. Straight-forward hard apple cider with no filler, no sweeteners added like sugar, honey or molasses. What you see and taste is what you get—apples directly from the tree and into the bottle for you to consume with gusto. 

“What’s so great about cider is seeing how many people taste it for the first time and find that they really enjoy it,” Reeves said. “We have craft beer and wine people come in all the time. And even if cider might not be on their radar, they’ll become big fans of cider once they leave our taproom—it’s pretty great.” 

But, besides the production and presentation side of cider in the fall months, Reeves truly looks forward to all the faces, whether new or familiar, that stroll into his taproom. 

“It’s all about the people,” Reeves said. “In this business, you get to meet all kinds of people from all sorts of places in this country and abroad. It’s about interacting with each other, and hearing their stories—all because of sharing a cider together.”

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