Our Story

“When my wife Tracy and I decided to grow our family, we discovered that the journey would be much more complicated than we had anticipated. After countless months of trying we learned that we had fertility issues.

For years we tried and nothing seemed to work. None of the doctors and specialists seemed to provide the answer, nor did taking medications and fertility drugs help. It seemed western medicine would not lead us to salvation.

Eventually we began to take a more holistic approach with acupuncture, massage, herbal remedies and altering our diet, which included becoming gluten free. No gluten, no beer. The once avid home beer brewer had to find a new passion.

As luck would have it, growing up on the Russian River, I spent my youth playing in and around apple trees and had fond memories of celebrating the apple harvest in such events as the Apple Blossom Parade and the Gravenstein Fair. I literally had some of the world’s best heirloom varietal apples growing in the backyard of my childhood home. The realization that I could use my experience and skill as a brewer to make cider gave me and Tracy an exciting new outlet for spending quality time not only with each other, but with the friends and family whose trees we’d be harvesting from.

I immediately built a press and grinder from spare parts around the house and repurposed some of my brewing equipment. This transformed our garage into a cidery.

Something about harvesting and pressing apples from the land of my youth with the people I love most to make cider whose quality surpassed any fermented beverage I’d ever tasted before resonated with me on a spiritual level. It was at this time the cider maker in me had awakened.

In the years that followed, I was able to better hone my skills at crafting high quality cider working out of my garage as well as working part-time at a few local professional cideries, more importantly during this time, Tracy became pregnant and gave birth to our son. A couple years later our daughter followed.

It is from the love of cider and family that the ciders of Mount Diablo Cider Company were born and it is my extreme pleasure to share them with you and yours.”