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Here's to a drink that literally grows on trees

"You know that rule in skiing or biking where you don't look at the tree you're trying to avoid?" says Kathleen van der Ree, one half of Squamish's Northyards Cider Co. (and a partner with law firm Race and Co. "on the side").
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THE APPLE OF THEIR EYE The Sea to Sky's craft revival gets its cider on with foraged Pemberton crapabbles in a guest role. PHOTOS COURTESY OF Northyards Cider Co.

"You know that rule in skiing or biking where you don't look at the tree you're trying to avoid?" says Kathleen van der Ree, one half of Squamish's Northyards Cider Co. (and a partner with law firm Race and Co. "on the side").

"Now I've smashed into the tree head-on!" she says explaining that she spent her young life shunning the restaurant industry having grown up in a family of restaurateurs.

Her other half, in love and cider, Alison Round, spent five years planting trees, and another 11 hauling mailbags for Canada Post, before plunging head-first into her career second act as Northyards' cider maker.

"The funniest part of this dream," says Round, of the business they opened in late August 2018, after nurturing it from paper to apple press for four years, "is that I didn't really drink before Kathleen and I met. A bottle of wine could easily sit for three weeks in my fridge." But that was before she discovered craft cider.

How does a kombucha-drinking vegan who hates beer, and a lawyer who grew up avoiding the family restaurant business, come to open a craft cidery and tasting room in Squamish?

Well, early in their relationship, Round and van der Ree ended up at a beer festival in Bellingham. "I am not a beer drinker at all," explains Round. "I 100-per-cent hate it. I realized if I was going to have any fun at all (at the festival), my only hope was in the two craft cideries that were there."

Blown away by the taste of a traditionally brewed craft cider, compared to the flavoured sugar water that is more typically sold as hard cider, Round became a convert."I've always been interested in craft."

A certified nutritionist, Round has been brewing her own kombucha for two decades. Cider is traditionally made by adding yeast to fresh, pressed apple juice to incite fermentation—a craft that pre-dates the Roman invasion of England in 55 BC.

In the ensuing years, Round's new-found interest in cider combined with van der Ree's great palate fuelled foodie roadtrips to California, Washington and Oregon. "We tried millions of different types of cider," says Round.

Apples have twice as many genes as humans do—their flavour profiles are incredibly diverse. No two batches of cider will ever taste the same. Round started brewing cider herself, filling their apartment with her experiments, taking cider-making courses, connecting with cider masters, perfecting her craft.

Improbable or cosmically destined—either way Northyards Cider Co. is an awesome addition to the region's craft-beverage landscape. Tucked in an industrial pocket of Squamish, the cidery offers five dry and semi-dry ciders on tap, made from apples sourced from a family-owned orchard in the Okanagan, as well as a menu chock full of local produce, humane meats, gluten-free offerings, and Pemberton organic potatoes. Its first product bottling commences this spring.

"My family's restaurants were casual," remembers van der Ree, "but the food was always made up with thoughtful ingredients. My dad would drive from farm to farm in the Fraser Valley picking up eggs here and veggies there—he was doing the 100-mile diet before it became a thing. He never once promoted that aspect of the food. We're applying the same principles to our business."

And she gives a shout-out to Pemberton's Helmer's Organic Farms and orchardist John Jobst for keeping them well supplied.

Not long after they first opened, Round and van der Ree drove up to Pemberton to pick up 230 kilograms of crabapples gleaned as part of the Pemberton Fruit Tree project. Round pulled her visiting sister and family into the effort to crush and press those crabapples, generating 240 litres of juice that she then fermented, and will use to blend in with their base apple cider.

They also partnered with Solscapes Landscaping in Squamish on a fruit-tree gleaning project, to harvest apples from heritage fruit trees located around the district. These bear attractants were turned into the Squamish Heirloom Cider, a special blend that was released earlier this month to guests at Northyards' first Cidermaker's Dinner, and will be available in the tap room after its re-release at the Squamish Food Policy Council's April 10 Social.

"Our cider is made from 100 per cent B.C. apples, pressed then fermented," says van der Ree with pride. "No sugar, water, flavouring, or grain alcohol. Using traditional methods to make this old-time beverage is important to us."  

Echoes Round, "Being vegan, and a holistic nutritionist, I have zero interest in adding things, like chemical flavourings, that I wouldn't want to consume myself."

Make something you'd want to drink; It's so obvious, it shouldn't be radical. It should be simple to do something as old-school as offer a small-batch traditional craft product, made with direct-sourced ingredients. But the paperwork-maze that surrounds operating a craft cidery warrants a law degree, (lucky for the Northyards' braintrust) to navigate district planning restrictions, BC Liquor Distribution categories that mark the price of craft cider up 73 per cent as an "alco-pop" instead of the 12 per cent on craft beer, and the restrictive tax categories that van der Ree believes are holding back an amazing growth industry for B.C.

So while Round keeps the batches brewing, van der Ree keeps busy with the administrative side of the operation, dreaming up menu items and events, and writing position papers to advocate for a more-enlightened regime.

The B.C. craft cider industry is currently estimated to be worth $2 million. Ontario's is $35 million. The potential to close that gap in B.C. is stymied right now, in van der Ree's opinion, by forcing small-batch craft ciders to compete directly with mass-produced, sugar-filled, heavily carbonated alternatives that are made, not from juice, but from apple juice concentrate or using artificial flavours.

The products just aren't the same. It doesn't make sense that they're taxed that way, she argues.

A more accurate "craft" designation for craft cideries would serve orchardists, apple growers, packers and juicers, by providing a strong market outlet. And it would inspire more craft brewers—those without law degrees—to enter the game.

Keep the cider old-timey but update the legislation already. The world is thirsty for something good to drink.

The Velocity Project: how to slow the f*&k down and still achieve optimum productivity and life happiness.