Business

How Wickham’s Fruit Farm makes its apple cider

Wickham's Fruit Farm apple press

Fresh-pressed apple cider isn’t a luxury on the North Fork. In fact, those who shop at Wickham’s Fruit Farm in Cutchogue — which has been pressing its own juice for more than 50 years — might consider it a necessity. 

At 112 years old, Wickham’s cider press is a few years older than the nearly century-old barn in which it resides. 

“It was built in 1904 and has never missed a season of operation,” said farm manager Tom Wickham.

The press was originally owned and operated by the former Billard Farm in Cutchogue, where a King Kullen supermarket is now located. The Wickhams brought their apples to be pressed at the farm on an annual basis until the early 1960s, when owner Irving Billard sold them his press.

Read more at northforker.com

Photo: Geraldo Rais supervises as apple pulp drops onto a waiting canvas tarp, where it is prepared for the cider press. (Credit: Monique Singh-Roy)