Sins perpetrated by berries
A brief review of Original Sin’s Elderberry Cider
I’ve been saving this cider for a couple weeks now. It’d be too warm out or too cool or the food wouldn’t be right or my mood would be off. Tonight, however, I finally gave in and opened the Original Sin Elderberry Cider that’s been staring at me from the refrigerator for so long.
I figured that this was going to be something I liked because I liked the Angry Orchard Elderflower seasonal so well.
It’s worth noting again that I try really hard to NOT drink from a can or bottle. The experience of pouring into a nice(r) glass and taking a moment to get a real sense of the scent of the cider. As usual, I led by pouring the OS Elderberry into a glass and taking a big whiff. It was NOT the most pleasant experience I’ve ever had. It made me start wondering if elderberries are so named after the musky scent that people tend to exude as they age. Then I started wondering if there wasn’t such a thing as a “musk berry” and if it was in fact an elderberry.
It reminded me a lot of those fairly sketchy “mixed fruit” fruit chews. I’ve had those fruit chews. They smell like butt, but they taste pretty good. Such is the experience of this elderberry cider.
Despite the scent, I liked the flavor. In fact, my husband, smelling the cider from the next sofa cushion over, told me to just throw it away. I didn’t do it though. I persevered and was better for it. This is a pretty nice cider once you get past the musk of it all. There’s not much after the taste except for quite a bit of effervescence (I suspect that they use the same yeast in this as their original cider — which is a champagne yeast).
I doubt I’ll buy this again, but it was a pretty entertaining experiment.
