As craft cider and mead gain popularity with consumers (the American Mead Makers Association called mead, or honey wine, "the smallest but fastest growing segment of the entire U.S. alcohol business" last year), Cajun Cafe on the Bayou's inaugural Cider & Mead Festival held Saturday afternoon was timely.
The four-hour fest in Pinellas Park, benefiting the Dunedin Doggie Rescue, drew crowds of drinkers itching to taste nearly 100 offerings such as dry ciders, cysers (mead made with apples) and melomels (mead made with fruit). Meaderies, homebrewing clans, cider houses and more showcased their beverages crafted locally and in spots like California, Sweden and Spain.
Pork cracklings in hand, this editor and her sampler in crime visited the booths lining the outdoor venue's perimeter. Some vendors served their nectar from bottles and jugs, others on tap, and with our limited mead experiences and sugary expectations of cider, we learned a ton, including braggots aren't my thing and dry ciders can be delicious.
First thing was first, though. Does it matter if mead's offered warm or chilled? The serving method at the fest seemed evenly split. Although the folks behind the booths said that different flavor profiles surface depending on how mead is served, they mostly told us no, not really. It just depends on personal preference.
The Suncoast Barley Mashers, based in Pinellas County, was one of the featured home-brew guilds. My compatriot and I sampled nearly all of its, mainly mead, offerings, including Laurie Bridges' tasty two-year-aged Frederic's Leap Year Nectar. But considering SBM's bounty (10 bottles were displayed on the table and more in a large bucket to the side), one would think the group specializes in these rather than beer.
In between eating chunks of pineapple and white cheddar from toothpicks, as well as a hearty plate of Cajun fare, we found our most interesting sips of the day early on: the French-style Cidre Nouveau by Virtue Cider and Maeloc's Hard Cider Dry, made in Spain. Unlike anything we'd ever tasted, they weren't sweet but were still refreshing and drinkable. Sonoma Cider's organic, bourbon-inflected Anvil was neat, too.
Sahtipaja's Violmjod (a stellar Swedish sparkling mead); the Berzerker, made with wild yeast, by Superstition Meadery; the Blue Honey Melomel from Crafted Artisan Meadery; Julie and Trevor Bernier of the Pinellas Urban Brewers Guild's There's Something About Cranberries Cider; B. Nektar Meadery's The Dude's Rug (a chai cider); and the Late Start Brewery collaboration mead from Cigar City Cider and Mead were among my favorites.
The DeLand-based Odd Elixir Meads, and the charming nerd thing it has got going on (sometimes you just gotta drink mead from a mini lab beaker), also got our attention. Its mead and ciders, such as the A Peach for Peaches mead, have around 6 percent alcohol, and are really good. Odd Elixir isn't open yet, but plans to launch around April.
And for those unconvinced the two beverages are winning over locals, St. Petersburg's Green Bench Brewing Co. debuted its soon-to-be-tasting-room-served mead and cider creations, with tastes like the Cherry Cyser and Farmhouse 4-Pear Cider.
Life beyond Strongbow never tasted so good.
This article appears in Jan 29 – Feb 4, 2015.
