It might sound like a Morgan & Morgan radio ad. But “by people, for people” is the inspiration behind a cider and mead company recently established by a Carrollwood resident — in Sweden.
Slim Pickens Cider & Mead is the brainchild of Todd Strauss, whom locals likely know from Tampa’s Cigar City Cider & Mead and Yeoman’s Road Pub. He became involved in the industry via Yeoman’s back when longtime pal and Cigar City Brewing CEO Joey Redner owned the place; the pub carried around 115 brews (a rarity at the time) and kickstarted Strauss’s beer-ducation.
About 25 years ago, right around high school, he got the name for his latest venture, not from the actor best remembered for his role in Dr. Strangelove, but through a poem penned by Redner.
“Slim are the pickins,” the prose read.
In this context, the poem was talking about blades of grass, but Strauss thought of humans — how we’re the same, but also different in a sense.
While “slim pickings” is generally defined as not a whole lot to choose from, Slim Pickens cider and mead reflects Strauss’s interpretation of people. Each creation — ciders for now, meads down the road — could be modeled after anyone, strangers you meet in the grocery store line included.
There’s the Ananas pineapple cider inspired by Anne Lunell, co-owner of a Swedish coffee shop that Strauss fell in love with, for instance, and Make Momma Proud, a sour apple-passion fruit cider, is dedicated to Strauss’s mother Sharon. Mom’s cider is his way of telling her, “Thanks for putting up with all my shit.”
Why start a mead and cider biz overseas, though?
It happened on a whim.
Last year, Strauss visited B. Nektar to learn more about mead while helping out the crew with cider.
“That’s why I love the industry. At the end of the day, we teach each other,” he said.
He later embarked on a month-and-a-half-long collaboration tour with the Michigan meadery, making stops in destinations like London and Sweden, where they started working with brewery and importer Brekeriet. Here, Strauss met Marcus Hjalmarsson of Helsingborg’s Brewski; the pair ended up hitting it off and stayed in touch once Strauss was back in the states.
Fast forward to St. Petersburg’s inaugural Shelton Brothers Festival, which Brewski and Brekeriet attended last October. After the event, Hjalmarsson overheard Strauss on a phone call with the bank, then proposed the idea of launching Slim Pickens on Swedish turf. Hjalmarsson now acts as the company’s head cider maker.
“Marcus said, ‘Come on over and do it with me and my place,’” Strauss said. “We just sent over a pallet of kegs to Tampa for a soft launch in April.”
Europe’s fruit is on another level, according to Strauss. The region omits the use of pesticides, and there’s a bounty of ingredients he’s never heard of, including raspberry-like orbs known as cloudberries. Not to put down destinations like Vermont or D.C., but trying to do that quality of juice in the U.S. isn’t cost effective for him. The allure of these other farms and orchards was, “Whoa, wait a minute.”
The brand’s official launch has been pushed back to the end of May. However, the first Slim Pickens release, Make Momma Proud, is available in taprooms from Tampa to Miami, including Angry Chair Brewing, The Stein & Vine, Mermaid Tavern, Hops & Props and CCC&M, to name a few. Every month, a fresh batch of Slim Pickens will make its way to Florida and New York through Progressive Distribution; the release of Ananas will likely happen in July.
The founder whose audio engineering background leads him to liken mixing a record to finding the right balance of ingredients when blending a cider or mead plans to keep one saying in mind throughout the new project: “relationships first, make great juice, money shows up.”
This article appears in May 5-11, 2016.