Scotland isn’t over-blessed with cideries so it’s always good to see new ones make an appearance. The latest is Lost Orchards from East Adamston Farm near Dundee who have unveiled a new Scottish Cider in time for National Apple month.

Created by a 4th generation family farmer Andrew Husband and his business partner Angus Morrison, the business was born from a collective vision to use the apples from the orchards on the farm to create a premium Scottish cider. Encouragingly, the pair have also been busy replanting orchards with 5,000 Katy apple trees already planted. The ultimate aim is to plant another 15,000 by 2025.

The Husbands have operated East Adamston Farm since the 1940’s and already grows and supplies blackcurrants for Ribena and produces Katy apples from their apple orchard.

The newly launched Lost Orchards Cidery was funded by an investment of £160,000 which included some assistance from the Food Processing Marketing Grant. This helped to transform an old barn into a state of the art fruit pressing centre in 2018. Co-Founder, Angus Morrison said: “Cider is continuing to enjoy a resurgence of popularity. We have created first and foremost a Scottish premium brand original apple cider.”

At 4.5% abv however, some alarm bells may be ringing about exactly how the cider is produced. The news that the company has also developed two fruity variants sets them ringing even louder, depending upon your views about fruit ciders and made wines. The Scottish Red Berries and Lime and Scottish Dark Berries variants seem to indicate a direction of travel that many proper cider drinkers might find unpalatable.

Further information on production processes has been requested and I’ll update this article if and when I hear back from the company’s PR agency. (The fact that the company has a PR company in the first place is not usually a good sign.)

“We engaged early in the process to ensure we worked with the best in the business and enlisted the expertise of cider guru Bob Chaplin. He was at the forefront of helping us develop the product and shared with us, his 30 years of industry knowledge. We are ethically conscious and are constantly looking to improve on our sustainability and traceability. ’

Andrew Husband added: “I have a passion for fruit growing and it was whilst watching my 80 year old father pressing apples for apple juice on an old wooden press, that the penny dropped. I planted the first orchard in 2012 and as a keen cider drinker, I felt there was a lack of quality premium ciders on the market and I wanted to develop our own. I also wanted Lost Orchards to reflect the taste and freshness of Scottish produce. I harvest our apples at their optimum ripeness and they are pressed in our onsite Cidery within 24 hours, to capture the full flavour and aroma. We have invested heavily in purchasing state of the art pressing equipment for the cidery and are continuing to look at new product development.”

The company has formed a grower group who have already helped plant thousands of trees over the past year and whose aim is to provide the cidery with home grown apples for years to come. The brand’s ethos? ‘For every sip we plant a pip’.

As one commentator (Rod Graham @rodbodtoo) has already quipped, it sounds nice and it rhymes, but it’s actively misleading. Another indicator of style over substance?

It would be a real shame if Scotland’s newest cidery wasn’t producing ciders we could get really excited about.

For the record, here’s the product info provided:

Lost Orchards Pure Scottish Apple
500ml
4.5% ABV
A light refreshing cider, created with a blend of sweet Katy and Red Windsor apples to provide a crisp balanced clean finish.

Lost Orchards Scottish Dark Berries
500ml
4% ABV
Scottish Dark Berries cider is a light refreshing cider created with a blend of sweet Katy and Red Windsor apples complemented with blackcurrants (also from the farm) and blackberries to provide a crisp balanced berry finish.

Lost Orchards Scottish Red Berries & Lime
500ml
4% ABV

Scottish Red Berries and Lime cider created with a blend of sweet Katy and Red Windsor apples complimented with strawberries, raspberries and lime to provide a crisp balanced berry finish.