The Cider Press – Part 1: Pressing

"The press is a stubborn animal," said Solène.

"I can see that," said Maeve.

They stood in a stone barn in the Normandy rain, looking at the great oak press, a hundred years old, iron-banded, groaning under a stack of crushed apple pulp. Juice ran from it in a thick golden stream into a copper trough. The air was sweet and cloudy with fermentation. Rain drummed on the slate roof. Outside, the orchard was a field of soaked grey trunks, strewn with fallen fruit.

Solène was thirty-six, the cider maker, tall and wiry, with a long brown braid, a waxed jacket and a weathered face, muddy to the knees. Maeve, thirty-two, was small and freckled, with a mop of red curls under a woolly hat, in borrowed overalls. She had come over from Cork for the harvest. She had never seen a press.

"What do I do?"

"You feed it. And you do not fall in."

They worked in a steady rhythm: Solène heaving the pulp, Maeve spreading it in cloth-lined layers, the press turning with a deep, slow creak. The juice poured out amber. The smell was heady and sweet. By dusk they were drenched, sticky and splattered to the ears.

"You are good at this," said Solène.

"I'm Irish. We're born with an apple in our hand."

"You say that about potatoes."

"We're versatile."

Solène laughed, a short, startled sound, and handed her a tin cup. The fresh juice was cold and sharp, cloudy and bright, tasting of rain and sun. Maeve closed her eyes.

"That's incredible."

"It is not yet cider."

"What is it?"

"A promise."

They sat on upturned crates by the open barn door, listening to the rain, drinking from the same cup. The orchard glowed in the dusk. A lantern swung from a beam.

"Can I ask you something?" said Maeve.

"Yes."

"How long until it's cider?"

"Six months," said Solène. "It cannot be rushed."

"Green?" said Maeve, an apple, a leaf.

"Green," said Solène, with a slow smile. "Very green. I will wait."

Continue the story: Part 2 – First Taste.