Noble Fir is a new bar/small-plate serving place in Ballard, of course. Opened by a couple recently wanting a change of career, or pace, the Noble Fir has a classic northwest feel. Travel books, maps and atlases line one of the walls in a little reading area. It’s a great accompaniment to a tasty IPA and a flannel, or in our case, a cider (not that we don’t like beer, obviously). They have a ton of ciders; a few are on draft, a lot are in the bottle. We don’t know a ton about ciders but we want to learn (as in does one say the term ‘sweet’ if it’s actually sweet)? We have tried a few different ones, one tasting purely like a bite out of a Honeycrisp and the other almost exactly like a horse stall or sheep pasture smells. It’s refreshing to find a place that serves so many different types, as that seems hard to find, which is interesting as cider was once the most popular alcohol in America.
