Business People Vermont August 2012 : Page 9
ick Cowles, 61, the impresario/owner/ g r owe r/d i s t i l le r/ singer/songwriter of Shelburne Orchards, is an enthusiastic, wild man. His lanky, 6-foot, 5-inch frame is topped by a mop of long, unruly salt-and-pepper hair. He plunges into his enthusiasms, the latest of which is making apple brandy in two imported, handmade, Portuguese cop-per stills. Last year he sold 100 bottles of his brandy for $100 apiece, but that $10,000 infl ux hasn’t persuaded him to sell more any time soon. He intends to let the other 19 oak barrels of the stuff age for a full eight years before bottling it as Dead Bird Brandy. (There’s a good story behind the name, about his grandfather’s moonshin-ing days.) Cowles has a way of roping people into his life. When radiation oncologist Peter Swift moved next door 25 years ago, they got together to sing a little. “I didn’t play an instrument,” Swift recalls, “so Nick handed me an electric bass and told me to pluck it.” Now the retired Swift plays stand-up bass for The Meatpackers, an irreverent country-bluegrass band for which Cowles sings lead and writes songs about New Age rednecks, pie-makers, and truck-lovers (“Why can’t my women be a little more like my truck?”). Other band members are Kevin Clayton, owner of Village Wine and Coffee, and Todd Sagar of G.E. Health Care. Cowles has bestowed appropriate nicknames on all of the band members. N “Nick has a presence that allows him to get away with things normal people couldn’t, just because of who he is,” Swift says. “He can walk into a room, and it lights up with his smile and stories.” Swift is also impressed with Cowles’ business savvy. “He’s constantly experi-menting with ways to stretch his product line.” Shelburne Orchards grows an aston-ishing variety of apples — over 30 — ranging from the familiar McIntoshes, Cortlands, and Empires to bitter antiques such as Kingston Black, Fox Whelp, and Tremlets. Cowles also grows peaches, sour cherries, grapes, barley, and pump-kins. From the apples he makes sweet and ginger cider, the aforementioned brandy, cider doughnuts, apple pies, and cider vinegar. His various products gross about $300,000 a year. Not bad for a kid who dropped out of high school in the middle of 10th grade. His parents, William and Virginia Cowles, moved to Shelburne in the 1940s and later purchased the Silver Fox Orchard, renaming it Shelburne Orchards. The elder Cowles was an architect who also served as secretary of human services when Deane Davis was gover-nor. But son Nick (the fi fth of six chil-dren) struggled in school with learning disabilities. At the private Stowe School, he thrived on the Outward Bound part of the curriculum, but when he told head-master Jack Handy that he was quitting, Handy understood. Amazingly, so did his supportive parents. “I fumbled around,” Cowles admits. He worked on the Rutland Railroad, then did woodworking. He earned his Nick’s Mom’s Apple Betty Because Business People‑Vermont is so careful with its ethics, this writer must reveal that he, too, has been roped in by Nick Cowles. Inspired by his Portuguese stills, I sang “Copper Kettle” to him, and he’s promised to let me sing it some day with the Meatpackers. I arrived at the orchard for the interview just as the sour cherry season was end-ing. He helped me pick two bags and sent me off with recipes for a sour cherry pie and cherry cordial. It took a long time to pit those cher-ries, but the pie was worth it. The cordial is brewing. — M.P. 8 Vermont McIntosh apples ¼ cup maple syrup Cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice to taste 9 graham crackers (1 package) 1 stick melted butter 1 cup brown sugar Preheat oven to 350º F. In a casse-role dish, add peeled, cored, and chunked apples. Add maple syrup and spices. Mix and set aside. Mix graham crackers, melted butter, and brown sugar. Make sure that your hands are clean, then crumble it all together. Pat the crumb mixture over the apples. Bake for 35–40 minutes or until apples bubble up through and crust is golden brown. Serve hot with vanilla ice cream. • Terry Hotaling, Cowles’ right-hand man, has worked at Shelburne Orchards since arriving in 1977 as part of a pruning crew traveling New England and tired of life on the road. The tractor pulls a tankful of water for the trees. GED and a two-year associate of arts from Franconia College. He played the guitar and sang. He went back to the Stowe School and ran its winter program, teaching kids from Harlem to make and inhabit snow caves on Mount Mansfi eld. During one summer, he and a writ-ing instructor from Champlain Valley Union High School teamed up to put kids through outdoor experiences about which they wrote. He got married and divorced in his early 20s. “I think marriage is like mak-ing pancakes — sometimes you have to throw out the fi rst one because the griddle wasn’t hot enough.” Then his parents decamped for the BUSINESS PEOPLE–VERMONT • AUGUST 2012 JEFF CLARKE 9
Publication List
Using a screen reader? Click Here