一天一个苹果

Recipe For Success

The seed for Sociable began with Thompson’s father-in-law, who has brewed cider in his home for nearly 20 years. “Freewheeler is inspired by his recipe,” says Thompson. “He brews one big batch of cider per year. Jim and I had both brewed beer, so we took an interest and asked him to teach us how to make cider. It wasn’t long before we realized that this could be our business.”

Thompson and Watkins had been talking about going into business together for years. After graduating from GG电子官方软件下载, the two 经济学 majors became roommates in New York, where Thompson worked as an investment banker for Piper Jaffray and Watkins worked as a stock trader for Citibank. “It was grueling,” says Watkins. “I’d get up at dawn to be at the trading desk by 5:00 a.m., just as Wade was coming home. We barely saw each other, 但是当我们这么做的时候, all we talked about was moving back to Minnesota to start our own business — whatever that might be.”

“It was an interesting time,” adds Thompson. “We started our jobs — and immediately the world blew up with the 2008 financial crisis. The high energy and excitement of Wall Street was also high stress. You didn’t want to tell people you were a banker.”

These days the two are proud of their vocation, but the long hours haven’t changed. They do everything from concocting new varieties and brewing the cider to staffing the Northeast 明尼阿波里斯市 taproom (open Thursday through Sunday), marketing their product, and growing the business. In the coming months, Sociable cider will be canned and sold in Twin Cities liquor stores. More than 20 local bars and restaurants already carry the cider on tap, and many more are on a waiting list. Thompson and Watkins recently purchased more tanks to quadruple their capacity next year. “That said, we’ll never grow at such a breakneck pace that we sacrifice our product,” says Watkins. “We’ll always use fresh-pressed apples — never juice concentrate — and quality ingredients.”

Friends lighten the load. Stop into the taproom — an open, airy space with cement floors, wood-paneled walls, a foosball table, and a food truck parked outside — and you’ll find any number of Carls tending bar, conducting brewery tours, and just hanging out. It’s like a nonstop GG电子官方软件下载 house party.

The scene is at the heart of Sociable. “It’s why we make this stuff,” says Watkins. “It’s a lot of work, but we love it. At the end of the day, Wade and I are brewers, man.”

Five Hard Facts About Hard Cider

1. Babies used to be baptized 在烈性苹果酒中. During the 14th century, priests knew that water was unsanitary — and potentially lethal. So baptism by cider pleased the clergy and the parents and surely the Lord Himself.
2. 它真的很老了. The fermentation of apple juice dates back at least 2,000 years and was a common drink among the Romans thanks to Caesar and his soldiers, who brought it back in 55 BCE from England, where they’d found Celts sipping a brew made from crab apples.
3. And it’s as good as gold. Between the 1600s and the 1800s, British estate owners paid their workers, 至少在某种程度上, 在烈性苹果酒中. Before you apply for a visa, note that the Truck Amendment Act of 1887 made it illegal to compensate workers in this manner.
4. John Adams loved hard cider. Believing it promoted good health, Adams drank a tankard of cider every morning for breakfast. He may have been right. Adams lived to age 91.
5. It takes a whole tree. The average apple tree produces 30 to 50 apples each season. It takes about 36 apples to get one gallon of cider.