Frequently
Asked Questions

No. Unlike table fruit, cider fruit (apples or pears) are small in size and par­tic­u­larly rich in tannins.

Apples are clas­si­fied into four fam­il­ies (sharp, bit­ter­sharp, sweet and bit­ter­sweet). It is the subtle blend of these dif­fer­ent vari­et­ies that gives the cider to be dis­tilled the bal­ance and char­ac­ter that will later be found in the Calvados. All the vari­et­ies of cider apples and perry pears are listed in the appen­dices to each appellation’s specifications.

The min­im­um ageing time before market release is 2 years in oak bar­rels (and 3 years for Calvados Domfrontais).

A still can be heated by gas or, more tra­di­tion­ally, by wood. 

Ageing allows the Calvados to devel­op firstly in colour, and then its aromas and length on the palate. A young­er Calvados will tend to have a straw yellow hue and will devel­op very dis­tinct fruit or floral aromas. An old Calvados will, on the other hand, have a more amber colour, remin­is­cent of mahogany, and will devel­op a more com­plex range of aromas with a mix­ture of can­died fruit, dried nuts, car­a­mel or chocol­ate notes.

In the 19^th cen­tury, the “Trou Nor­mand” had an offi­cial place at meal­times, it was a small glass of Calvados served to aid diges­tion during ban­quets and formal meals. Gust­ave Flaubert alludes to this wide­spread custom in his “Bouv­ard et Pécuchet” writ­ten in 1881. Tra­di­tion has it that, midway through the meal, the master of the house invited his guests to raise their half-filled glass of Calvados, smell it and then swal­low it down in one gulp. Today, the tra­di­tion is to serve an apple sorbet soaked in Calvados in the middle of the meal.

No. Calvados is a cider or perry eau-de-vie and not an apple or pear eau-de-vie — i.e. it is obtained from fruit that has already been fer­men­ted. It is depend­ent on the terroir, the vari­et­ies har­ves­ted, their qual­ity and quant­ity, and the nature of the cider or perry made from these fruits.

It is estim­ated that about 18kg of apples are needed to obtain 13 litres of cider at 5% vol. ready for dis­til­la­tion into Calvados. These 13 litres will pro­duce 1 litre of Calvados at 70%, i.e. before its ageing and reduction.

The “angels’ share” is the pro­por­tion of the volume of a spirit that evap­or­ates during its ageing in bar­rels. Over the ageing pro­cess, the alco­hol con­tent will gradu­ally decrease. 

An Appel­la­tion d’Ori­gine Con­trôlée (AOC) is a French label identi­fy­ing a product whose vari­ous stages of man­u­fac­tur­ing (pro­duc­tion and pro­cessing) are car­ried out in the same geo­graph­ic­al area and accord­ing to recog­nised know-how. The concept was born in 1905, but it was not until 1935 that a legis­lat­ive decree cre­ated the Appel­la­tion d’Ori­gine Con­trôlée. The first AOC status was awar­ded on 15 May 1936. The Calvados Pays d’Auge became an AOC in 1942. Today there are 3 AOCs for Calvados: Calvados (1984), Calvados Pays d’Auge and Calvados Dom­fron­tais (1997).

At the end of the 19^th cen­tury, it was cus­tom­ary for work­ers and farm­ers to add a drop of Calvados to their morn­ing coffee, to warm them­selves up and summon the energy needed to work in often dif­fi­cult conditions.

This tra­di­tion gradu­ally took hold in French pop­u­lar culture.

To be leg­ally sold, Calvados must be at least 40% abv. This alco­hol con­tent is obtained by the gradu­al addi­tion of dis­tilled or demin­er­al­ised water to the eau-de-vie. This is known as reduction.

How­ever, some “cask strength” Calvados are unre­duced. They have a “nat­ur­al” alco­hol con­tent cre­ated by the evap­or­a­tion of the eau-de-vie over time. Taken dir­ectly from the top of the barrel, they are usu­ally bottled on demand and show a won­der­ful con­cen­tra­tion of aromas. Some “cask strength” Calvados can con­tain up to 55% vol.