Meet the maker behind SILO Cider: Nicole Leibon

Q: How was your interest in cider born?

A: I spent a semester in Paris, France during college. Cider was served at some meals, but we also travelled to Normandy where I was introduced to cider with crepes. I was smitten. When I returned to the states it haunted me, and I couldn’t find anything remotely like it.

Q: What was the first job you had that put you on the path to becoming a cider maker?

A: When a friend gave me a homebrew, I was amazed that such a thing could be created by regular people, not giant industrial plants. I took a couple homebrew classes in college. After discovering I couldn’t stand to work in an office, I landed a job at the brewery in my hometown of Modesto, CA (home of Gallo Wines and lots of agriculture.) That’s where I learned about clamps, hoses, and cleanliness.  It wasn’t until we moved out to the East Coast and I tried Farmun Hill Ciders that I found the flavors I had tasted in France. A mutual friend introduced me to Steve Wood, and I serendipitously ended up being his first cider hire, back in 2000.

Q: Can you talk a bit about your approach to SILO cider? What was the initial concept?

A: I wanted to be able to match the style that SILO made initially, but there was not a clear mandate to do that, so I took a leap of faith. I had never worked solely with dessert fruit before (Farnum Hill is known for its Bittersweet apples), so I was pretty challenged. I put my faith in the grower, Emily Gruber at Moore’s Orchard, and just decided to rely on her juice. I wanted to show off the fruit, keep it clean, and not bury it under sugar or other flavors.

Q: Your palette is extremely discerning. Can you talk about where you learned to taste and give tasting notes with such attention to detail? What advice would you give a beginner who wants to learn about tasting and developing their palate in regards to wine, cider, beer etc?

A: The short answer is that I love to taste things! I love food and flavors, so I have always paid attention to what I am tasting. There is so much complexity in cider! I think that by concentrating on the aromas and flavors, you can find so much. Smell is one of the best memory triggers for your brain, so use that to help:  does a smell take you somewhere in your mind? Where? What were you doing or eating? Were you rolling in the grass, eating a ripe peach, smelling a strawberry in a scratch n’ sniff book? Learning to smell and taste well is really just a matter of working at it and paying attention. Try to separate in your mind which fruit you smell - orange? Ok, is it an orange or a tangerine? The peel or the inside? And when you eat and drink, pay attention, and try to remember what things taste like. I take detailed notes because they are really helpful, both in terms of looking back and remembering what was going on with a cider batch, and because doing the work to really pay attention makes you better at it. Being able to give good notes as a cider judge is critical feedback to help other cidermakers.

Q: What is your favorite adult beverage? (Besides SILO Cider of course!)

A: It depends on the weather and my mood. I love whiskey and bourbon in cooler weather, and a gin and tonic in the heat. An IPA is my go-to beer, and I’ll drink wine anytime. Truth, though? I drink more water than anything.

Order SILO Cider online here! (Ships throughout the United States)