The 2025 Northwest Cider Cup celebrated one other excellent 12 months for craft cider within the Pacific Northwest, showcasing the area’s distinctive expertise, innovation, and dedication to high quality. Organized by the Northwest Cider Affiliation (NWCA), this prestigious competitors—now in its twelfth 12 months—stays probably the most rigorous cider judging occasions in North America, drawing entries from Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, and British Columbia.
What’s the Northwest Cider Cup?
The Northwest Cider Cup highlights the very best industrial ciders and perries produced within the Pacific Northwest. Open to cidermakers throughout these states and provinces, it units a excessive benchmark for excellence in one of many world’s most acknowledged cider areas. In 2025, the competitors noticed 231 entries submitted, reflecting sturdy participation and creativity amongst producers.
Entries are evaluated by skilled business professionals based mostly on key standards: look, aroma, taste, and mouthfeel. Medals—gold, silver, and bronze—are awarded in numerous classes, with solely the highest performers acknowledged. This 12 months, 57 medals have been handed out throughout 18 classes, which means simply 25% of taking part cideries took dwelling {hardware}—a testomony to the competitors’s excessive requirements.
The awards ceremony occurred on June 26, 2025, at Holocene in Portland, Oregon, the place the cider neighborhood gathered to toast the winners and have a good time the business’s progress.
Key Highlights and Tendencies from 2025
The 2025 version confirmed continued evolution in Northwest cider types:
- Fruit Submit-Fermentation Addition Candy remained the biggest and best class, rising 10% to 43 entries. This displays the area’s love for artistic, fruit-forward ciders that enchantment to a broad viewers.
- Specialty classes like Specialty Fortified expanded considerably (up 71% in entries following a 133% leap in 2024), highlighting experimentation with higher-ABV choices and distinctive strategies.
- Curiosity in perry (pear-based cider) surged, pushed by cidermakers’ dedication to uncommon, high-tannin pear varieties and farmers’ efforts to domesticate them.
- Tendencies in alcohol ranges have been notable: higher-ABV fortified types grew, whereas low-alcohol or alcohol-removed ciders additionally elevated barely, exhibiting customers paying nearer consideration to ABV.
The competitors additionally coincided with the NWCA’s fifteenth anniversary (based in 2010), underscoring the group’s position in uniting cidermakers, orchardists, and fans to advertise and develop the regional cider scene.
Prime Honors and Standout Winners
- Greatest in Present: Empyrical Cider’s Precept Perry — a standout perry that claimed the best total honor.
- Greatest in Present Runner-Up: Bauman’s Cider’s McIntosh Single-Varietal.
- Small Cidery of the 12 months: Empyrical Cider (which additionally took Greatest in Present).
- Giant Cidery of the 12 months: 2 Cities Ciderhouse.
- New Cidery of the 12 months: Olympic Bluffs Cidery and Lavender, acknowledged for his or her spectacular debut with Lavender Salal Cider.
Different notable achievements:
- Bauman’s Cider led with 8 medals.
- 2 Cities Ciderhouse and Empyrical Cider every earned 5 medals.
- Portland Cider secured 4 medals.
- Winners got here from throughout the area: 18 from Washington, 16 from Oregon, 2 from Idaho, and 4 from British Columbia.
Full Listing of Medal Winners
Botanical Herbed
Gold: Lavender Honey – Shuswap Cider Firm – British Columbia
Silver: Lavender Salal – Olympic Bluffs Cidery – Washington
Bronze: Salal Berry Cider – Bauman’s Cider – Oregon
Botanical Hopped
Gold: Hopped – Victoria Cider Co. – British Columbia
Silver: Recent Hopped – 19 Acres Cider Co. – Oregon
Bronze: Imperial Citra Kissed – Cedar Draw Cider – Idaho
Botanical Spiced
Gold: Winter Spice – Bauman’s Cider – Oregon
Silver: Golden Ghost – Rootwood Cider Firm – Washington
Bronze: Soulless Pear – Ten Towers Cider Firm – Oregon
Fruit Co-Fermented
Gold: Made Marion – 2 Cities Ciderhouse – Oregon
Silver: Noir – Kristof Farms – Oregon
Bronze: Juicy Pear – Bauman’s Cider – Oregon
Fruit Submit-Fermentation Addition Dry
Gold: Inquiry – Empyrical – Washington
Silver: Blueberry Agave – 19 Acres Cider Co. – Oregon
Bronze: Strawberry – Swift Cider – Oregon
Fruit Submit-Fermentation Addition Candy
Gold: Moon Berries – Schilling Cider – Washington
Silver: Huckleberry Lemonade – Portland Cider Co. – Oregon
Bronze: Pacific Berry – Portland Cider Co. – Oregon
Bronze: Excelsior Imperial Passionfruit Pineapple – Schilling Cider – Washington
Bronze: Imperial Magic Berry – Tieton Cider Works – Washington
Excessive-Tannin Ciders Dry
Gold: Brut – Kristof Farms – Oregon
Silver: Kingston Mix – Puget Sound Cider Firm – Washington
Bronze: Kearns Property – RAW Cider Co. – Oregon
Excessive-Tannin Ciders Candy
Gold: Bittersweet – Sea Cider Farm & Ciderhouse – British Columbia
Silver: Virginia Crabapple – Puget Sound Cider Firm – Washington
Bronze: White Barn Property Cuvee 2023 – Bull Run Cider – Oregon
Excessive-Tannin Perries
Gold: Precept – Empyrical – Washington
Silver: Perry – Finnriver Farm and Cidery – Washington
Bronze: Property Perry – Blossom Barn Cidery – Oregon
Low-Tannin Ciders Dry
Gold: Ashmead’s Kernel – Bauman’s Cider – Oregon
Silver: 14th Anniversary – 2 Cities Ciderhouse – Oregon
Bronze: Kinda Dry – Portland Cider Co. – Oregon
Low-Tannin Ciders Candy
Gold: Midnight Blue Dragon – Seven Seeds Seidr – Oregon
Silver: Authentic Gold – Portland Cider Co. – Oregon
Bronze: Odyssey – Seattle Cider Firm – Washington
Low-Tannin Perries
Gold: Rogue Valley Perry – Blossom Barn Cidery – Oregon
Silver: Barland – Empyrical – Washington
Bronze: Parametric – Empyrical – Washington
Pink-Fleshed Ciders
Gold: Mountain Rose SV – Bauman’s Cider – Oregon
Silver: Airlie Pink – RAW Cider Co. – Oregon
Bronze: Glow – Alpenfire Cider – Washington
Single Varietal
Gold: McIntosh Single Varietal – Bauman’s Cider – Oregon
Silver: Golden Russet – Rootwood Cider Firm – Washington
Bronze: Early Fowl – Bauman’s Cider – Oregon
Specialty Fortified
Gold: Pommeau – 19 Acres Cider Co. – Oregon
Silver: Estelle – Pommeau – Ten Towers Cider Firm – Oregon
Bronze: Pommeau – Union Hill Cider Co. – Washington
Specialty Low Alcohol/Alcohol Eliminated
Gold: Lite Cider – Bauman’s Cider – Oregon
Silver: Sidekick Pacific Pineapple – 2 Cities Ciderhouse – Oregon
Bronze: Pub Cider – Cockrell Cider Farm – Washington
Specialty Different
Gold: Sidra Pure – 2 Cities Ciderhouse – Oregon
Silver: Rosé – Meriwether Cider – Idaho
Bronze: August – Empyrical – Washington
Wooden/Oaked
Gold: Oak Barrel Kingston Black – Greenwood Cider Co. – Washington
Silver: Fireplace Barrel – Finnriver Farm and Cidery – Washington
Bronze: The Dangerous Apple – 2 Cities Ciderhouse – Oregon
BEST OF SHOW
Better of Present (overarching award): Precept – Empyrical – Washington (Excessive-Tannin Perries)
Better of Present Runner-Up: McIntosh Single Varietal – Bauman’s Cider – Oregon (Single Varietal)
The Northwest Cider Cup does greater than hand out awards—it elevates the craft, encourages innovation, and connects customers with top-tier producers. Whether or not you’re a cider fanatic exploring new bottles or a fan of the area’s apple- and pear-driven traditions, the 2025 outcomes spotlight why the Pacific Northwest stays a powerhouse in fashionable cider making.
Elevate a glass to the winners, the hardworking cidermakers, and the intense way forward for Northwest cider! For extra on the NWCA and upcoming occasions, take a look at nwcider.com or comply with @nwcider on social media. Cheers! 🍎🍐
