About us
It all started with a brief love affair with cider while on a trip to Ireland in 2010. “I’ll never forget the stag party lads. I turned towards the commotion and they had propped my wife up on a bar table and began chanting in chorus for her to teach them Whitney Houston and Michael Jackson songs. We sang and drank cider all night. What was fun at the time became a life-changing moment. I wouldn’t realize its significance for six more years.”
Tristan returned to the states and quickly reverted back to his whiskey and beer interests.
Fast forward to 2015, Tristan was diagnosed with serious soy and gluten allergies. “I was sitting on the hospital bed, the doctor staring at me intently. I had one question. was I really really sick?”
“In a flash everything I thought I knew about food and drink needed to change.”
The Quest Began
For anyone trying to understand what they put into their body the path to a gluten and soy-free existence is not straightforward. Breaking old habits is tough and many ingredients in commercial foods are less than desirable. Perhaps the worst part of this was saying goodbye to beer and whiskey.
So the journey to change began. it started with food and alcohol. Tristan gave up alcohol altogether for nearly 7 months. “Purely out of fear. I literally thought I might be dying. What I didn’t realize was that I had been slowly poisoning myself.”
After months of focusing on his diet, Tristan got the green light from physicians to jump back into enjoying the occasional libation. It had been difficult because nearly every social event involved drink. Tristan had a take a step away from the social scene which was equally hard. Upon getting the all-clear the go-to choices of mass-produced wine and hard liquor simply weren’t good options. That’s when Tristan recalled the trip to Ireland and the lightbulb began to glow brightly. The quest to become a cider maker began in earnest.
The Goal
Tristan wanted to do something simple; create an American-made, modern style, handcrafted cider here at home. anyone who knows anything about winemaking knows that this is not as easy as it sounds. Especially coming from a completely different career.
Two years of research and now armed with certificates from Cornell viticulture center and Oregon State University’s cider production school, here we are.
With schoolbooks studied, recipes developed, a supportive wife and family, and an unstoppable passion we are beyond excited to bring you some of the finest American craft cider you have ever tasted.
Why Northern Virginia?
The DC region is our home, not to mention Virginia is the country’s 9th largest apple-growing state. How do you argue with Washington and Jefferson who planted large swaths of fruit trees here for their, uh hmm, personal enjoyment? Virginia’s apple history runs deeper than any other state in the country and we’re honored to continue this long tradition.
With personal connections to local orchards, where better to begin this journey? Virginia Ciderworks provides the area’s first homegrown craft cidery supported by a new population of taste enthusiasts. The region on whole offers one of the country’s most progressive stances on new food and drink and we’re ready to introduce you to something very old, but new again. Lost Boy Cider is here.
