Cidre Bouché is made entirely of old-world french bittersweet cider apples, including Muscat de Lense, Domaines, Medialle d’Or, and Michelin apples. Though these apples are all of French heritage, we use all apples grown right here in the Willamette Valley. A number of these apples come from our own traditional cider apple orchard in our hometown of Corvallis, Oregon.
Cidre Bouché is perhaps one of our most labor intensive and complex ciders. Made using a traditional French method of pressing and fermenting called ‘keeving,’ Cidre Bouche has complex notes of earth, over-ripe apples, apple blossom and barnyard, making it a wonderful example of the old world french style. Keeving allows for and encourages a lengthy fermentation using only wild yeast, which adds to the complexity of the bouquet. After fermentation is complete, we age the cider in french oak foeders, allowing the intense tannins to mellow and create a full, structured mouthfeel. The low acidity and high tannin content of these apples creates a rich, lush, and full bodied cider that is balanced out to dryness with the immense amount of tannins in the cider.