ACA Advocates for Ice Cider Standards

The board of the American Cider Association recently send a letter to the L’Association des Industries des Cidres et Vins de fruits de l’UE (AICV), or the European Cider and Fruit Wine Association urging them to recognize the precedent for the definition of Ice Cider (Cidre de Glace) set by the government of Quebec, Canada.

The AICV is currently in the process of developing marketing standards for Ice Cider/Apple Ice Wine in Europe and the ACA board felt it was timely to urge that the organization adopt the definition set by the government of Quebec, where the style of cider originated in the 1990s as the standard definition.

The definition is as follows: “Ice Cider” – cider obtained by the fermentation of juice of apples that has a pre-fermentation sugar content of not less than 30° Brix achieved solely by natural cold, producing a finished product with a residual sugar content of not less than 130 g per  litre and an actual alcoholic strength of more than 7% by volume but not more than 13% by volume.”

This definition has been accepted by the ACA and by GLINTCAP and the required use of natural cold weather for cryo-extraction or cryo-concentration is enforced by our U.S. Federal Alcohol & Tobacco Tax & Trade Bureau (TTB)  with respect to labeling. 

You can read the full letter from the ACA board here.