Mount Diablo Cider Release Party

Join Mount Diablo Cider Company, a small family owned and operated Lamorinda cidery specializing in premium small-batch heirloom ciders made in the traditional method, for their 2026 release party at Local Vines in downtown Lafayette.

Starting with a glass of Newtown Pippin to wet the whistle, cider master Thomas Henry will give a quick introduction to traditionally made, low-intervention, naturally fermented cider.

Moving on to a deep dive, and taste, into their Gravenstein Solera program, a dynamic, fractional aging and blending method originally developed in Spain for Sherry. It involves stacking barrels in tiers, where the youngest liquid sits at the top and the oldest (the solera) is at the bottom. As older liquid is removed from the bottom for bottling, the headspace is continuously refilled with progressively younger liquid from the tiers above, creating a consistently uniform and complex final product.

We’ll do this by tasting a bottled first vintage Gravenstein from our 2019 Solera barrel prior to blending. We'll then move on to our most recent bottled Gravenstein release, 2025 Girl Named Sue (the most recent Gravenstein vintage to be blended with the Solera), followed by the most recent Solera release which contains an aged blend of all Gravenstein vintages from 2019 through 2025, (currently only available to our cider club members).

We will finish the night with a pre-release taste of Narwhal, a take on a traditional English cider comprised of a blend of four different low intervention cider apples naturally co-fermented in French neutral oak barrels and bottled before primary fermentation finishes using the pet-nat method. A Narwhal is a highly sought after, limited, or hard to find cider. In the beer world, such beers are called "whales". In the wine world, such wines are called "unicorns".

Join us for this very special presentation on these unique ciders! Tickets are limited, Narwhals are rare.