Apples Need Frost: An interview with Kimberly Kae, inspired by Jenny Offill's WEATHER
Kimberly Kae, founder and co-owner of Metal House Cider, makes some of the best hard cider in the country. We've spent time together on Hudson Valley orchard trips, NYC tastings, and I was even lucky enough to serve her cider at my wedding in place of some distantly-delivered bubbles. I asked if she'd answer a few questions about the present and future of cider-making in New York and beyond. -EH
How are you (personally, and you Metal House) doing right now?
Well, I am certainly thankful for good health and the opportunity to slow down and listen, while very aware that this is a privilege. Like everyone else, I’m also super frustrated and challenged by months without school/camp and any attempt to stay focused on my work is...a challenge.
Metal House is trucking along, albeit a little behind schedule. We have the best crop in the big orchard that we’ve seen since starting there in 2017. We’re very excited about the 2019 vintage and 3 upcoming releases - just waiting on labels.
In terms of sales things are picking up again although $25+ bottles of celebratory cider may not be in high demand at the moment and we are trying to encourage the sales by making it more approachable, through discounts and by trying new production methods that help reduce our costs.
As a cidermaker in the Hudson Valley, what is the presence of climate change in your work? How have you seen things change since you began producing cider? What do you anticipate to come?
So, a little backstory: In 2010 we moved up to Esopus and started tending trees and making cider for our own consumption. In 2015 we started Metal House in full and were then of course becoming aware of and paying closer attention to the weather. 2015 was a bumper year followed by a bust year, which is when we realized we had to find a more dependable source of fruit that was up to our standards. So in 2017 we were very fortunate to begin managing the big orchard for our production.
During this short time, we have witnessed major weather events (such as a lack of true winter, extreme drought in summer, and/or very wet springs) occurring on a regular basis. Local farmers had told us one of those things might happen every few years...not all three!
Complicating matters further is the fact that the weather events are not the same from year to year i.e. each season we are faced with a totally new dire weather event. Let’s start with that frost you referenced. It’s important to first note how long trees take to manifest the effects of living in their environment. A light winter where the trees don’t get to shut down and recuperate fully with the cold means they go into the new season at a disadvantage, in terms of their immunity and energy stores.
In previous times, we might have a winter that is light here and there, but now we are seeing it every other year more or less
Without true winter and a sufficient number of chilling days, the tree may have poor or uneven budbreak, reduced or delayed foliage development, weak bloom, abnormal flower development, poor fruit set, and/or early growth cessation. And while you won’t see one warm winter kill a tree, the accumulated effects of one season to another will deplete the tree to the point that it will finally succumb to disease, because it’s no longer resilient enough.
There are more immediately visible experiences of the harm of changing climate, such as an early spring with super warm days like we had this March that trick the trees into believing it’s spring. This can lead to an early bloom, which can then be damaged by a subsequent hard frost later in the spring - as we’ve seen with polar vortex winds in recent years.
The length of the bloom can also be affected by those early warm to cold spells. This leads to pollinator problems, as some pollinators don’t fly unless it’s at least 50 degrees Fahrenheit or more. There are also a lot of commonly used crop management practices that pose serious threats to pollinators, and just as without frost there are no apples, without bees there won’t be apples either.
I'm curious how cider making in this region has existed and shifted over the decades (centuries?) and what traditional knowledge or techniques might inform resilient orchard management and cider production?
The only way forward to me seems to be the return to small, diversified farms. I just don’t think you can do things well, with intention and integrity and good farming practices, on a massive scale or with a monocrop.
Extensive, committed composting is one remedy. Anyone taking over an orchard or farm right now faces soil issues due to the chemical residues and depleted soils of conventional practices. Other than leaving the land to find its own equilibrium for a few decades, composting is our future.
If we were to think and work in a preindustrial way, ie, conserve water, employ animals on the farm, work with our bodies in a way that most Americans are no longer comfortable doing, while employing the best clean technologies to do so….that would look like progress. If at least 15% of the farmers were Black that would also look like progress. There is white supremacist ideology built into our agricultural systems and power structures that are tied to our environmental problems. We need to address all of it.
How, if at all, is the industry changing to improve or prepare for the forecast?
One way to prepare is to grow fruit that can withstand the wild new extremes we’re seeing. So on a micro level I have a lot of respect for folks who are following wild apples, seeing what thrives outside of a cultivated environment, and grafting them into their orchards. Many people have been doing this for some time, and I do think more people will have access to plant those varieties in the future, but this is still a very small pocket of us.
Another way to prepare is to stop using conventional chemicals that foster an industry destined to exacerbate the degradation of our water and soil...basically start making the difficult switch to sustainability, which has become all the more difficult a decision to make due to the strain of the COVID crisis. There are pockets of dedicated cidermakers who are doing this -- can they inform the greater cider industry, much of which could care less where their alcopop apples come from or how they were grown. Or the big apple farmers?
Honestly, I think it’s going to take something more drastic to change the large conventional apple farms.Perhaps in a few more years the farms will be taken over by the farmers' daughters... Maybe all the spotlight on natural wine will contribute to people taking a personal stake in how these crops are managed. Hopefully it will result in something other than a marketing ploy for pretty colored juice, and that people will look harder at labor practices, growing practices, ownership...because it all goes hand in hand right? Cutting corners profits somebody, let's look closer and see who.
But especially now when everyone is compromised in some way, how many of the big apple farmers are going to choose an option that’s more expensive and potentially less effective and costs more? It’s easier, faster and cheaper to rely on conventional methods. Immediate gratification for the least amount of input. And that’s where white supremacy wins again. Whenever you have a massive monocrop, things are going to fall out of balance with the people and with the land.
This is where it comes back to small diversified farms where we can support good practices on a realistic, meaningful level including helping those in our community who are interested in farming and winemaking but who have not had access or who are already in it but don’t get a shot at ownership.
You wrote incisively in Metal House's newsletter about the specific failures of the cider industry on racial justice issues, from land access legacies to the power/ownership equity gap. Can you share more about that, and how the industry needs to address its shortcomings?
Our work in the orchard is no different from the personal work we must undertake at this moment. We must be asking ourselves hard questions and then apply those questions outwardly. We have all come up in a racist culture and it will take reprogramming and a lot of education to reframe our thinking. All of us, not just white people...There is so much fantastic reading out there and for those of us that can’t sit down to read it’s all available on audio so no excuse.
First step. Education. Wherever you are, you can start by researching the soil you stand on. What happened there, what is it’s history? What injustices were perpetrated there and for how long have we been abiding by the ‘winners’ version of that history. Once you know that history you can share it. You can look at how that’s formed generations of similar or conforming behaviour and practices. And you can begin to dismantle it.
Wherever you stand in this country you can look down and say, “What happened here?” and begin to respond to the answers.
On the cidery side, we can decide to do a better job offering access in an industry that is predominantly white. Maybe that’s cidery by cidery in how we hire or through internships, or maybe it’s by a social justice committee like the one forming at the NYCider Association (I will be on the committee). Hopefully a replicable model can be initiated.
In the orchard, it’s more daunting, and just as urgent. The majority of workers in apple orchards are Jamaican, many here on workers’ visas. But what about ownership? How many Jamacain orchard-owners are there in the Hudson Valley? How many Black cidermakers? That needs to be examined and repaired, not just in the Hudson Valley but nation-wide.
That means ownership; land, home and business ownership for people of color. So if I can give up some portion of my profit so that a person of color can gain some footing a little more quickly, that is a kind of reparations without having to wait for it. Spreading wealth on a small, person- to-person scale. Not waiting for a program or a form to fill out. Do whatever you can to help people gain ownership. Everyone can have an ongoing active role in this process, and white people need to put down the “what do I get out of it” mentality; we as white people have gotten a lot out of this country’s “it” for a long damn time.
*Kim recommended Zafa Wines as one excellent Black-owned winery and cidery in our region*
Which apples/ciders will you be able to produce the longest as the climate here changes? Which will you lose first?
This question might be better asked of someone who has been growing specifically cider apples for a long time. I can see some varieties struggling more than others, but for a variety of reasons that I wouldn’t want to assume were climate-related. We are trying to focus on some of the historic varieties that were here 150 years ago by planting them back into the orchard...which may be a mistake given the climate issues?
Also, what we make is always specific to what is available to us (wild or sustainably grown) in any given year. So I think we would continue to make whatever cider we are able to, given the apples that survive.
If you could no longer make cider, what would you do?
I guess that also rules out making wine… I would find a way to work as an apple tree pruner. For real, I love it so much.
I would also:
Build a museum to Sojourner Truth in Esopus.
Keep painting, but more likely on walls and paper rather than canvas with oil.
Learn to play drums.
Can you tell us about a cider you're especially proud of?
Well, our ciders are such a labor of love - the two of us have picked, pressed and disgorged them all by hand, which is not the best business model by the way, but at least you can be proud of what you make.
I would have to say the 2017 Arista. I love its flavor profile and high acidity, but also because it is a tribute to the attempt to farm holistically as referenced by a prayer on the back of the bottle. I hope people read it aloud by the light of a candle like an incantation going up with the smoke.
Also, the 2017 Ammir. It is entirely made of fruit from the first year at the big Esopus orchards, and I am completely dedicated to that landscape and those trees, so that’s special as well. Plus it’s perfect right now with a little kashkaval and watermelon. Goes right down.
There are also two wild fermented ciders on the way and the biggest news is that we’ll be releasing a true blanc de blancs very soon!
Kim’s Recommended Reading
Me and White Supremacy by Layla Saad
Malus zine started by Ellie Cavalli of Tilted Shed Ciderworks
How to be an Anti-Racist Ibram X. Kendi (highly recommend the audio version as the Kendi’s spoken voice is an effective tool for reprogramming all of us)
Whetstone Magazine and Point of Origin podcast
Uncultivated by Andy Brennan
All About Love -by Bell Hooks
Cider: The Forgotten Miracle by James Crowden
Mycorrhizal Planet by Michael Phillips
I like to buy my books online at Sisters Uptown Bookstore or in-person at Rough Draft and Half Moon Books in Kingston
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